May 22, 2008 (LPAC)--Career prosecutors from the U.S. Department of Justice are escalating their investigation into the British arms cartel BAE Systems, centered on billions of dollars in bribes, paid to top Saudi officials, including former Saudi Ambassador to Washington, Prince Bandar bin-Sultan. According to sources close to the investigation, in addition to charges of violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, DOJ investigators are now considering adding RICO (racketeering conspiracy) charges, based on BAE evasion of U.S. tax payments. In further signs of escalation of the targeting of BAE, the Justice Department has issued subpoenas against five executives of the company, in recent days. On May 12, two top executives, CEO Mike Turner, and outside director Sir Nigel Rudd, were detained as they arrived in the United States. Both men had their laptop computers, cell phones, and personal papers confiscated, and they were served with subpoenas to appear before a U.S. grand jury. Sir Nigel Rudd is the chairman of BAA, an airport management firm, and is deputy chairman of the leading City of London bank, Barclays.
While the BAE probe is ostensibly centered upon the alleged bribes to Prince Bandar and other top Saudi officials, U.S. intelligence sources confirm that there are two other, far more significant issues, that are driving the probe.
The first issue is the role of Prince Bandar in the 9/11 attacks, and the possibility that some of the BAE bribe money was actually used to fund the hijackers. The 9/11 Commission obtained evidence that between $50-75,000 was provided by Prince Bandar and his wife, Princess Haifa, to two men in California, both believed to be Saudi intelligence officers, who, in turn, shared some of the funds with two of the Sept. 11, 2001 hijackers. Sources report that a 28-page section of the official 9/11 Commission Report, dealing with the Bandar funds, was redacted from the declassified final version. U.S. Senate intelligence committee investigators were reportedly stymied from interviewing FBI agents, who had probed the Bandar fund flows, causing further anger and suspicion, that the full 9/11 story has yet to be told. ``The 9/11 issue is still radioactive among many U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials,'' one senior U.S. intelligence source acknowledged.
The second issue is the Anglo-Saudi covert fund, accumulated under the ``Al Yamamah'' deal, brokered by Prince Bandar with then-British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in 1985. Under the oil-for-arms deal, which continues to this day, MI6 has accumulated an offshore, off-the-books fund estimated at more than $100 billion, according to current and former U.S. government officials, interviewed by Executive Intelligence Review. Those funds have been reportedly used to promote wars and destabilizations around the globe, dating back to the Afghanistan War of the 1980s, when BAE funds were covertly funneled to the Afghan mujahideen. In a recent authorized biography of Prince Bandar, details of the ``Al Yamamah'' slush fund were provided, indicating that some of the funds also went to the purchase of U.S. weapons, bypassing U.S. Congressional oversight.
The Bandar issue is particularly sensitive to the White House, given the Prince's longstanding close ties to the Bush family. Despite these connections, career prosecutors are moving aggressively forward with the BAE probe.
And there are signs that the U.S. Senate may be getting into the act as well.
On May 21, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held hearings on a pending U.S.-British treaty, that would grant British defense firms full access to Pentagon contracts, on an equal standing with American defense firms. While the Chairman of the Committee, Sen. Joseph Biden (D-Del.) and the ranking Republican, Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.), both indicated that they supported the treaty in principle, they both agreed that the State Department had not provided the Committee with sufficient details on the treaty's implementation, and they have postponed, for at least another three months, any action on the matter. Given that BAE Systems is already the largest foreign contractor with the U.S. Department of Defense, the ongoing DOJ probe could have dramatic implications for the future of the bilateral treaty--and U.S.-British relations in general.
Lyndon LaRouche has emphasized that the conflict between the United States and the British ``BAE'' imperial faction, is the key to understanding the current global strategic situation. Were the United States to break, decisively with London, and align with the three great Asian powers, Russia, China and India, in the tradition of Franklin Roosevelt, all of the major crises facing the planet today could, over time, be peacefully resolved. It is in this context that the BAE case takes on a profound significance.
