Regarding Ret :
He is definately based in Russia. I have no idea where his shit is shipped from or whatever as I never used him or knew anyone personally who did. But physically the man is in Russia I know for a fact because our paths crossed last July when I was in St. Petersburg (though he does not live there).
The threads being deleted on here are not a big conspiracy theory. That has been happening BEFORE all the busts occured.

HELLO. Pay Attention 101. Ret was placed on an extended time out (not banned) for conflicts on the board and it was per admin request that any threads by him or regarding him were to be deleted. (Are ee all on the same page now?) He was off the board before this shit went down.
As far as why his threads are being "mysteriously" deleted, (love the drama build up like that), it is no different than threads regarding certain other sources that have not been revealed to be busted being deleted too. Do you see any threads remaining about K*******9? What about *****Z? No. Because if there is not evidence of them being busted, they are taken down. Nothing mysterious about that. We - *I* - have made it clear about posting source related threads. Apparently MOST of us are on the same page around here.
Whether or not Ret is busted is not something anyone can answer, but it is a fact that he is not answering emails. At least no one has claimed to get one from him. Chances are he could be, chances are he is just using the time to make over his biz or some shit like he said he was going to do back in July when the two MD mods started rolling.
Right now it is just purely speculation, no one has proof of anything.
Why on earth people are even worrying sources at this point of time is beyond me.