Stop Islamic Conquest

I begin with an article on a subject that an email tipster alerted me to, NATO agrees on Afghan drug role for military, from October 10, 2008:

BUDAPEST, Hungary - NATO defense ministers Friday authorized their troops in Afghanistan to attack drug barons blamed for pumping up to US$100 million (euro74 million) a year into the coffers of resurgent Taliban fighters.

Sound promising?

Ah, but longtime readers of my blog are aware of the importance of heroin in Afghanistan -- and thus, they know that this is not the beginning of the story, and neither will it be the end.

Before we continue with this, perhaps we should review some history. Though I have written extensively about this in the past, I will nevertheless paint the picture again in this series of posts.

I present material from an article that appeared on October 9, 2008, entitled U.S. Study Warns of Crisis in Afghanistan:

WASHINGTON -- A draft report by U.S. intelligence agencies concludes that Afghanistan is in a downward spiral and casts serious doubt on the ability of the Afghan government to stem the rise in the Taliban's influence there, the New York Times reported on Wednesday.

The classified report finds that the breakdown in central authority in Afghanistan has been accelerated by corruption within President Hamid Karzai's government and by an increase in attacks by militants operating from Pakistan, the Times said, citing U.S. officials familiar with the document.

There are two problems. One is that Pakistan is a sanctuary for the militants; the other is that of corruption in the Kabul government.

In reviewing my Genesis series, it is not surprising that Pakistan is a sanctuary for the militants; indeed, as I often pointed out during the Genesis posts, it sure looked like Pakistan was behind the rise of the Taliban. No wonder the Taliban would flee to the border area between Afghanistan and Pakistan, and no wonder Islamabad has been unable to root them out, and unwilling to give the US permission to enter Pakistani territory to do so.

Is it not interesting that one thing Benazir Bhutto was proposing was to get the militants out of the border area, without US help if possible, but with US help if necessary? And, of course, look what happened to her!

Then, there's the corruption in the Kabul government.

The report, a nearly completed version of a National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), is set to be finished after the November elections and will be the most comprehensive U.S. assessment in years on the situation in Afghanistan, the paper said.

Beyond the cross-border attacks launched by militants from neighboring Pakistan, the intelligence report asserts that many of Afghanistan's most vexing problems are of the country's own making, the officials said.

The report cites gains in the building of Afghanistan's national army. But officials said it also laid out in stark terms what it described as the destabilizing impact of the booming heroin trade, which by some estimates accounts for 50 percent of Afghanistan's economy.

Back now to NATO agrees on Afghan drug role for military from October 10, 2008:

"With regard to counter-narcotics ... ISAF can act in concert with the Afghans against facilities and facilitators supporting the insurgency," said NATO spokesman James Appathurai, referring to the NATO force.

The United States has pushed for NATO's 50,000 troops to take on a counter-narcotics role to hit back at the Taliban, whose increasing attacks have cast doubt on the prospects of a Western military victory in Afghanistan.

However, Germany, Spain and others were wary and their doubts led to NATO imposing conditions on the anti-drug mandate for the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force.

Troops will only be able to act against drug facilities if authorized by their own governments; only drug producers deemed to be supporting the insurgency will be targeted; and the operation must be designed to be temporary — lasting only until the Afghan security forces are deemed able to take on the task.

So, what is going on here?

We now begin with a translation by Ferghana.Ru of an article that originally appeared in Russian, entitled US AF serving Afghani drug dealers, from November, 2007; keep in mind that, as a translation by a non-native speaker of English, it reads just a little rough in places:

Afghani drugs are as much a pressing problem of the international community as the global warming is. Existence of the problem is recognized by everybody but a solution to it is not known. An international conference on the subject took place in Kabul in late October. According to the UN report presented there, Afghani opium reaching the international market accounts 93% of the global production. Fifty percent of Afghani drugs is produced in Gilmand on the border with Pakistan, a province where British troops are quartered.

Persuading the House of Commons to send British troops to Helmand last year [as this is a 2007 article, that would be 2006 -- YD], Premier Tony Blair capitalized on the danger to Great Britain posed by Afghani heroin. Paradoxically as it is, British servicemen and their American colleagues have found themselves now dragged into the international mafia that buys drugs made in Afghanistan and smuggles them abroad.

The information this publication is based on came from various Afghani sources that cannot be identified for quite understandable reasons. All the same, indirect evidence indicates that the Western military is involved in traffic. An operation against poppy plantations was to take place in several southern and southeastern provinces of Afghanistan this May (they were to be sprayed with defoliants). Sources in administration of Kandahar and Jalalabad say, however, that commanders of the US and British contingents in these provinces made a pact with the Afghanis and cancelled the operation.

Did you catch that? "[I]ndirect evidence indicates that the Western military is involved in traffic."

Of course, since then, there has been more of an outcry on the part of the Russian Federation regarding the involvement of the US military in the heroin trade.

Sources point out that interests of the Western military involved in trafficking out of Afghanistan (usually by US military aviation) coincide with interests of Afghani chieftains who control poppy fields. Afghani officials say that 85% of all drugs produced in southern and southeastern provinces are shipped abroad by US aviation.

Again, that was a report from a year ago: "Afghani officials say that 85% of all drugs produced in southern and southeastern provinces are shipped abroad by US aviation."

There are several ways of shipping drugs abroad. Some sources maintain that the chain begins with civilian salesmen - usually Americans acting under the cover of all sorts of non-governmental organizations and security firms. They buy "goods" from Afghani wholesale dealers and take them to military bases (usually the airfield in Kandahar). A well-informed source in Afghani security structures claims in the meantime that the American military never deals with Western civilian structures and works with local Afghani officials directly. It is these officials who deal with field commanders, from Taliban more often than not, who are in charge of drug production. The Talibs control bank accounts money is transacted to in all sorts of devious ways via the Afghanis living in the United States and West Europe.

As a matter of fact, money is not the only commodity drugs are paid with. Weapons will do too. Afghani sources claim that drugs-for-weapons barter deals with the Talibs are widely used. (One cannot help recalling the "deals" between our servicemen and the mujahedin during Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s.) It may be added that the mujahedin nowadays get weapons from the northern provinces to which the merchandise is smuggled in the first place from Asian states. Insiders say that a great deal of merchandise passes via Shurtepa, a settlement on the Afghani-Turkmen border. Insiders say that weapons and munitions are ferried to the Taliban-controlled provinces of Afghanistan by American or British armored vehicles.

Does this ring any bells?



From 'The Stakes Are Too High for Us to Stop Fighting Now' An interview with FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds by Christopher Deliso August 15, 2005:

CD: Can you elaborate here on what countries you mean?

SE: It's interesting, in one of my interviews, they say "Turkish countries," but I believe they meant Turkic countries – that is, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and all the 'Stans, including Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, and [non-Turkic countries like] Afghanistan and Pakistan. All of these countries play a big part in the sort of things I have been talking about.

CD: What, you mean drug-smuggling?

SE: Among other things. Yes, that is a major part of it. It's amazing that in this whole "war on terror" thing, no one ever talks about these issues. No one asks questions about these countries – questions like, "OK, how much of their GDP depends on drugs?"

CD: But of course, you're not implying...

SE: And then to compare that little survey with what countries we've been putting military bases in --

And, it's not just today's fight in Afghanistan against the Taliban; the same connections to corrupt US officials permitted 9/11 to occur (so it could be used as cover for a bigger crime).

From State Dept. Quashed 9/11 Links To Global Drug Trade -- FBI Whistleblower by Fintan Dunne, June 7, 2004:

Because of a provisional gag order issued by Judge Reggie B. Walton which prohibits revealing specific details, Edmonds can only paint a picture in the broadest of brush strokes.

But her measured words hint at politically explosive connections between criminal drug/intelligence networks, and the 9/11 attacks.

"You have [a] network of people who obtain certain information and they take it out and sell it to... whomever would be the highest bidder. Then you have people who would be bringing into the country narcotics from the East, and their connections. [It] is only then that you really see the big picture."

"And you see certain semi-legitimate organizations that may very well have a legit front, but with very criminal illegitimate activities -- who start coming at you from these investigations."

"And the picture becomes, actually, very clear. Crystal clear."

From 'I Saw Papers That Show US Knew al-Qa'ida Would Attack Cities With Airplanes' by Andrew Buncombe; published on Friday, April 2, 2004 by the Independent/UK:

Sibel Edmonds said she spent more than three hours in a closed session with the commission's investigators providing information that was circulating within the FBI in the spring and summer of 2001 suggesting that an attack using aircraft was just months away and the terrorists were in place. The Bush administration, meanwhile, has sought to silence her and has obtained a gagging order from a court by citing the rarely used "state secrets privilege".

She told The Independent yesterday: "I gave [the commission] details of specific investigation files, the specific dates, specific target information, specific managers in charge of the investigation. I gave them everything so that they could go back and follow up. This is not hearsay. These are things that are documented. These things can be established very easily."

She added: "There was general information about the time-frame, about methods to be used -- but not specifically about how they would be used ­ and about people being in place and who was ordering these sorts of terror attacks. There were other cities that were mentioned. Major cities -- with skyscrapers."

[snip]

She said said it was clear there was sufficient information during the spring and summer of 2001 to indicate terrorists were planning an attack. "Most of what I told the commission -- 90 per cent of it -- related to the investigations that I was involved in or just from working in the department. Two hundred translators side by side, you get to see and hear a lot of other things as well."

"President Bush said they had no specific information about 11 September and that is accurate but only because he said 11 September," she said. There was, however, general information about the use of airplanes and that an attack was just months away.

For a wild ride, stay tuned to Stop Islamic Conquest as this series continues!

Following on to Part 9, we actually continue from Part 6 by finishing our review of Is Afghanistan a Narco-State?:

That is where we are today. The solution remains a simple one: execute the policy developed in 2007. It requires the following steps:

1. Inform President Karzai that he must stop protecting drug lords and narco-farmers or he will lose U.S. support. Karzai should issue a new decree of zero tolerance for poppy cultivation during the coming growing season. He should order farmers to plant wheat, and guarantee today's high wheat prices. Karzai must simultaneously authorize aggressive force-protected manual and aerial eradication of poppies in Helmand and Kandahar Provinces for those farmers who do not plant legal crops.

2. Order the Pentagon to support this strategy. Position allied and Afghan troops in places that create security pockets so that Afghan counternarcotics police can arrest powerful drug lords. Enable force-protected eradication with the Afghan-set goal of eradicating 50,000 hectares as the benchmark.

3. Increase the number of D.E.A. agents in Kabul and assist the Afghan attorney general in prosecuting key traffickers and corrupt government officials from all ethnic groups, including southern Pashtuns.

4. Get new development projects quickly to the provinces that become poppy-free or stay poppy free. The north should see significant rewards for its successful anticultivation efforts. Do not, however, provide cash to farmers for eradication.

5. Ask the allies either to help in this effort or stand down and let us do the job.

There are other initiatives that could help as well: better engagement of Afghanistan's neighbors, more drug-treatment centers in Afghanistan, stopping the flow into Afghanistan of precursor chemicals needed to make heroin and increased demand-reduction programs. But if we — the Afghans and the U.S. — do just the five items listed above, we will bring the rule of law to a lawless country; and we will cut off a key source of financing to the Taliban.

But we know that will never happen, don't we.



From 'The Stakes Are Too High for Us to Stop Fighting Now' An interview with FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds by Christopher Deliso August 15, 2005:

CD: Can you elaborate here on what countries you mean?

SE: It's interesting, in one of my interviews, they say "Turkish countries," but I believe they meant Turkic countries – that is, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and all the 'Stans, including Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, and [non-Turkic countries like] Afghanistan and Pakistan. All of these countries play a big part in the sort of things I have been talking about.

CD: What, you mean drug-smuggling?

SE: Among other things. Yes, that is a major part of it. It's amazing that in this whole "war on terror" thing, no one ever talks about these issues. No one asks questions about these countries – questions like, "OK, how much of their GDP depends on drugs?"

CD: But of course, you're not implying...

SE: And then to compare that little survey with what countries we've been putting military bases in --

From Cracking the Case: An Interview With Sibel Edmonds by Scott Horton, August 22, 2005:

SH: And as you pointed [out], some of this information has been confirmed in the public. I know when you speak about the Iranian informant...

SE: Correct.

SH: ...who warned in April of 2001 -- that was even confirmed by Mueller, the director of the FBI.

SE: Absolutely there was actually an article in the Chicago Tribune in July 2004 saying that even Mueller expressed surprise that during the hearings, the commissioners didn't ask about this. And guess what, nobody reported all these omissions. What would happen if you hit them with 20 cases? And I'm talking about 20 affidavits from experts and veteran agents.

SH: This is all about the question of prior knowledge and who knew what, when before the attack.

SE: And also what happened afterward. I started working three days after Sept. 11 with a lot of documents and wiretaps that I was translating. Some of them dated back to 1997, 1998. Even after Sept. 11, covering up these investigations and not pursuing some of these investigations because the Department of State says, "You know what, you can't pursue this because that may deal with this particular country. If this country that the investigation deals with are not one of the Axis of Evil, we don't want to pursue them." The American people have the right to know this. They are giving this grand illusion that there are some investigations, but there are none. You know, they are coming down on these charities as the finance of al-Qaeda. Well, if you were to talk about the financing of al-Qaeda, a very small percentage comes from these charity foundations. The vast majority of their financing comes from narcotics. Look, we had 4 to 6 percent of the narcotics coming from the East, coming from Pakistan, coming from Afghanistan via the Balkans to the United States. Today, three or four years after Sept. 11, that has reached over 15 percent. How is it getting here? Who are getting the proceedings from those big narcotics?

From Former FBI Translator Sibel Edmonds Calls Current 9/11 Investigation Inadequate by Jim Hogue, May 07, 2004:

JH: Here's a question that you might be able to answer: What is al-Qaeda?

SE: This is a very interesting and complex question. When you think of al-Qaeda, you are not thinking of al-Qaeda in terms of one particular country, or one particular organization. You are looking at this massive movement that stretches to tens and tens of countries. And it involves a lot of sub-organizations and sub-sub-organizations and branches and it's extremely complicated. So to just narrow it down and say al-Qaeda and the Saudis, or to say it's what they had at the camp in Afghanistan, is extremely misleading. And we don't hear the extent of the penetration that this organization and the sub-organizations have throughout the world, throughout their networks and throughout their various activities. It's extremely sophisticated. And then you involve a significant amount of money into this equation. Then things start getting a lot of overlap -- money laundering, and drugs and terrorist activities and their support networks converging in several points. That's what I'm trying to convey without being too specific. And this money travels. And you start trying to go to the root of it and it's getting into somebody's political campaign, and somebody's lobbying. And people don't want to be traced back to this money.

From 'The Stakes Are Too High for Us to Stop Fighting Now' An interview with FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds by Christopher Deliso August 15, 2005:

SE: The fact that there are no investigations -- I will give you an analogy, okay? Say if we decided to have a "war on drugs," but said in the beginning, "right, we're only going to go after the young black guys on the street level." Hey, we already have tens of thousands of them in our jails anyway, why not a few more? But we decided never to go after the middle levels, let alone the top levels...

It's like this with the so-called war on terror. We go for the Attas and Hamdis -- but never touch the guys on the top.

CD: You think they [the government] know who they are, the top guys, and where?

SE: Oh yeah, they know.

CD: So why don't they get them?

SE: It's like I told you before -- this would upset "certain foreign relations." But it would also expose certain of our elected officials, who have significant connections with high-level drugs- and weapons-smuggling -- and thus with the criminal underground, even with the terrorists themselves.

Heroin -- the Sword of Allah!

May Allah be pleased with our officials in Washington this Ramadan!

:)

We continue from Part 4 looking at the UK's BAE scandal. Here we look at Saudi prince 'received arms cash', from June 7, 2007:

A Saudi prince who negotiated a £40bn arms deal between Britain and Saudi Arabia received secret payments for over a decade, a BBC probe has found.

The UK's biggest arms dealer, BAE Systems, paid hundreds of millions of pounds to the ex-Saudi ambassador to the US, Prince Bandar bin Sultan.

The payments were made with the full knowledge of the Ministry of Defence.

Prince Bandar "categorically" denied receiving any improper payments and BAE said it acted lawfully at all times.

The MoD said information about the Al Yamamah deal was confidential.

Sir Raymond Lygo, a former chief executive of BAE, told the BBC's World Business Report that there had been "nothing untoward" about the arms deal.

"I was the one who won the contract," he said. "I don't know anything about him (the prince) at all. I would have remembered that name."

When asked about the secret payments, Sir Lygo said that it was not going on when the deal was signed.

"I would have known if it was going on at the time. I was not aware of it, so as far as I am concerned it was not occuring.

"Yes, we paid agents. Nothing illegal about that. It was absolutely in accordance with the law at the time... there was nothing untoward about the deal whatsoever."

Private plane

The investigation found that up to £120m a year was sent by BAE Systems from the UK into two Saudi embassy accounts in Washington.

The BBC's Panorama programme has established that these accounts were actually a conduit to Prince Bandar for his role in the 1985 deal to sell more than 100 warplanes to Saudi Arabia.

The purpose of one of the accounts was to pay the expenses of the prince's private Airbus.

David Caruso, an investigator who worked for the American bank where the accounts were held, said Prince Bandar had been taking money for his own personal use out of accounts that seemed to belong to his government.

He said: "There wasn't a distinction between the accounts of the embassy, or official government accounts as we would call them, and the accounts of the royal family."

Mr Caruso said he understood this had been going on for "years and years".

"Hundreds of thousands and millions of dollars were involved," he added.

From An Interview with Sibel Edmonds, Page Two by Chris Deliso, July 1, 2004:

CD: [snip] At several points you state that such organized crime networks employ "semi-legitimate organizations" as their point of interface with governments and the "legit" world. Can you explain exactly what you mean?

SE: These are organizations that might have a legitimate front -- say as a business, or a cultural center or something. And we've also heard a lot about Islamic charities as fronts for terrorist organizations, but the range is much broader and even, simpler.

CD: For example?

SE: You might have an organization supposed to be promoting the cultural affairs of a certain country within another country. Hypothetically, say, an Uzbek folklore society based in Germany. The stated purpose would be to hold folklore-related activities -- and they might even do that -- but the real activities taking place behind the scenes are criminal.

CD: Such as?

SE: Everything -- from drugs to money laundering to arms sales. And yes, there are certain convergences with all these activities and international terrorism.

CD: So with these organizations we're talking about a lot of money --

SE: Huge, just massive. They don't deal with 1 million or 5 million dollars, but with hundreds of millions.

Continuing with Saudi prince 'received arms cash':

Investigation stopped

According to Panorama's sources, the payments were written into the arms deal contract in secret annexes, described as "support services".

They were authorised on a quarterly basis by the MoD.

It remains unclear whether the payments were actually illegal - a point which depends in part on whether they continued after 2001, when the UK made bribery of foreign officials an offence.

The payments were discovered during a Serious Fraud Office (SFO) investigation.

The SFO inquiry into the Al Yamamah deal was stopped in December 2006 by attorney general Lord Goldsmith.

Prime Minister Tony Blair declined to comment on the Panorama allegations.

But he said that if the SFO investigation into BAE had not been dropped, it would have led to "the complete wreckage of a vital strategic relationship and the loss of thousands of British jobs".

The SFO's inquiry is thought to have angered Saudi Arabia, to the point where there was a risk that BAE could lose a contract to sell the new Typhoon fighter to Riyadh.

Prince Bandar, who is the son of the Saudi defence minister, served for 20 years as US ambassador and is now head of the country's national security council.

Panorama reporter Jane Corbin explained that the payments were Saudi public money, channelled through BAE and the MoD, back to the Prince.

The SFO had been trying to establish whether they were illegal when the investigation was stopped, she added.

She believed the payments would thrust the issue back into the public domain and raise a number of questions.

'Bad for business'

Labour MP Roger Berry, head of the House of Commons committee which investigates strategic export controls, told the BBC that the allegations must be properly investigated.

If there was evidence of bribery or corruption in arms deals since 2001 - when the UK signed the OECD's Anti-Bribery Convention - then that would be a criminal offence, he said.

He added: "It's bad for British business, apart from anything else, if allegations of bribery popping around aren't investigated."

Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Vince Cable said that if ministers in either the present or previous governments were involved there should be a "major parliamentary inquiry".

"It seems to me very clear that this issue has got to be re-opened," Mr Cable told BBC Radio 4's The World Tonight.

"It is one thing for a company to have engaged in alleged corruption overseas. It is another thing if British government ministers have approved it."

From An Interview with Sibel Edmonds, Page Three by Chris Deliso, July 1, 2004:

CD: What are they so afraid of?

SE: They're afraid of information, of the truth coming out, and accountability -- the whole accountability issue that will arise. But it's not as complicated as it might seem. If they were to allow the whole picture to emerge, it would just boil down to a whole lot of money and illegal activities.

CD: Hmm, well I know you can't name names, but can you tell me if any specific officials will suffer if your testimony comes out?

SE: Yes. Certain elected officials will stand trial and go to prison.

It is amazing how America's Sibel Edmonds case gives us such insight into the UK's BAE case, isn't it?

More to follow as Taking Care of Business continues.

We continue from Part 3. Here we review commentary that provides some background to the BAE scandal, from Brothers in Arms: Bandar Bush Took a Billion in Bribes to Push UK Weapons Deal by by Chris Floyd:

So says the Guardian, which has had a sneak peek at the evidence compiled by Britain's Serious Fraud Office (SFO) in its lengthy investigation of vast corruption in a decades-long arms deal between Saudi Arabia and the Anglo-American arms merchant, BAE, Tony Blair's favorite war profiteer. The SFO's probe was preemptorily quashed by Blair's ever quiescent attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, last December. Now the Guardian has learned that BAE paid a quarterly bribe to Prince Bandar bin Sultan bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud -- long-time ambassador to the United States, and so intimate with America's ruling family that the president nicknamed him "Bandar Bush." BAE was plying Prince Bush with $30 million every quarter -- for ten years. Nice work if you can get it.

The background to this sordid business can be found in a piece I did last year: Last Bad Deal Gone Down: War Profits Trump the Rule of Law. A brief excerpt below sets the scene:

Slush funds, oil sheikhs, prostitutes, Swiss banks, kickbacks, blackmail, bagmen, arms deals, war plans, climbdowns, big lies and Dick Cheney – it's a scandal that has it all: corruption and cowardice at the highest levels, a festering canker at the very heart of world politics, where the War on Terror meets the slaughter in Iraq. Yet chances are you've never heard about it – even though it happened just a few days ago. The fog of war profiteering, it seems, is just as thick as the fog of war.

Sound familiar?

But here's how the deal went down. On Dec. 14, the UK Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith (Pete Goldsmith as was, before his longtime crony Tony Blair raised him to the peerage), peremptorily shut down a two-year investigation by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) into a massive corruption case involving Britain's biggest military contractor and members of the Saudi royal family. SFO bulldogs had just forced their way into the holy of holies of the great global backroom – Swiss bank accounts – when Pete pulled the plug. Continuing with the investigation, said His Lordship, "would not be in the national interest."

It certainly wasn't in the interest of BAE Systems, the British arms merchant which has become one of the top 10 U.S. military firms as well, through its voracious acquisitions during the profitable War on Terror – including some juicy hook-ups with the Carlyle Group, the former corporate crib of George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush and still current home of the family fixer, James Baker. BAE director Phillip Carroll is also quite at home in the White House inner circle: a former chairman of Shell Oil, he was tapped by George II to be the first "Senior Adviser to the Iraqi Ministry of Oil" in those heady "Mission Accomplished" days of 2003. BAE has allegedly managed to "disappear" approximately $2 billion in shavings from one of the largest and longest-running arms deals in history – the UK-Saudi warplane program known as "al-Yamanah" (Arabic for "the dove"). Al-Yamanah has been flying for 18 years now, with periodic augmentations, pumping almost $80 billion into BAE's coffers, with negotiations for $12 billion in additional planes now nearing completion. SFO investigators had followed the missing money from the deal into a network of Swiss bank accounts and the usual Enronian web of offshore front companies.

From The Highjacking of a Nation, Part 2: The Auctioning of Former Statesmen & Dime a Dozen Generals by Sibel Edmonds, November 29, 2006:

The foreign influence, the lobbyists, the current highly positioned civil servants who are determined future 'wanna be' lobbyists, and the fat cats of the Military Industrial Complex, operate successfully under the radar, with unlimited reach and power, with no scrutiny, while selling your interests, benefiting from your tax money, and serving the highest bidders regardless of what or who they may be. This deep state seems to operate at all levels of our government; from the President's office to Congress, from the military quarters to the civil servants' offices.

Of course, instead of "Congress" say "Parliament", instead of "President" say "Prime Minister" -- you get the idea.

Returning to Brothers in Arms: Bandar Bush Took a Billion in Bribes to Push UK Weapons Deal:

Bandar Bush was instrumental in setting up the deal in the first place, the Guardian notes, wheeling and dealing with Maggie Thatcher from his Washington redoubt. The prince -- one of the leading figures in perhaps the most repressive and extremist Islamic state on earth -- has continued to be influential with the White House even after stepping down as ambassador in 2005. (He's now head of the repressive state's security organs.) He's also played a key role in L'il Bush's political career -- making a deal to cut oil prices before the 2004 vote and publicly endorsing his "brother" in the election. One cannot but speculate on how much of the dirty BAE money was used to grease the overt and covert ops of the Bush political machine. According to the Guardian, Bandar's BAE bribes were drawn from BAE's slush fund and deposited in Bandar's account in Washington's Riggs Bank -- the notorious money-laundering outfit used for decades by American and foreign elites to wash their filthy lucre. L'il Bush's uncle, Jonathan Bush, was a top executive at Riggs Bank when it was hit with a record $25 million fine in 2004 for skirting money-laundering laws, as David Sirota -- and then the Washington Post -- reported.

From Cracking the Case: An Interview With Sibel Edmonds by Scott Horton, August 22, 2005:

SH: So let's get into some of that criminal activity then. The semi-legit organization that I think you are most often referring to is the American Turkish Council, which is headed by Brent Scowcroft, a former national security adviser of the United States, and is packed with the leaders of Raytheon, Motorola, Boeing, Lockheed, Martin Marietta, and some of the most powerful company names in the military-industrial complex.

SE: Correct.

SH: Is the ATC just one of many semi-legitimate organizations that you are referring to, or is most of this story focused on the ATC itself?

SE: There are many.

SH: And many organizations that you actually were overhearing?

SE: I cannot talk to you about what I was overhearing, but as I have pointed out there are several organizations.

Returning to Brothers in Arms: Bandar Bush Took a Billion in Bribes to Push UK Weapons Deal:

When questioned by the Guardian about the payments, BAE's defense was bold -- and probably accurate: "We have little doubt that among the reasons the attorney general considered the case was doomed was the fact that we acted in accordance with... the relevant contracts, with the approval of the government of Saudi Arabia, together with, where relevant, that of the UK [Ministry of Defence]." Goldsmith's office offered a similar assertion: "There were major legal difficulties [with the SFO investigation] given BAE's claim that the payments were made in accordance with the agreed contractual arrangements."

In other words, the bribes to Saudi royals were probably built into the contract from the beginning, in secret codicils that would have required the approval of UK government official for two decades, encompassing the years of Thatcher, John Major (who served as head of Carlyle's European operations from 2001 to 2004) and Tony Blair. Thus, even though such payments are illegal under UK law -- and have been outlawed in the United States since 1977, as the Guardian notes -- BAE can ultimately point to government sanction for its corruption... in the all-absolving name of "national security," of course.

From Cracking the Case: An Interview With Sibel Edmonds by Scott Horton, August 22, 2005:

SH: Okay, and you mention when you talk about criminal activity, drug-running, money-laundering, weapons-smuggling...

SE: And these activities overlap. It's not like okay, you have certain criminal entities that are involved in nuclear black market, and then you have certain entities bringing narcotics from the East. You have the same players when you look into these activities at high-levels you come across the same players, they are the same people.

SH: Well, when we're talking about those kind of levels of liquid cash money we probably also have to include major banks too, right?

SE: Financial institutions, yes.

Returning to Brothers in Arms: Bandar Bush Took a Billion in Bribes to Push UK Weapons Deal:

In a real sense, however, this story is not even news: "Bush Crony Takes Bribes in Oil and Weapons Deal." What's so unusual about that? It is, in fact, the way the world is run, and has been run since time immemorial. The elite insiders grease each other up like swingers at an orgy, wriggling and wallowing in the blood that lubricates their fortunes. Then they step out into the light of day -- in thousand-dollar suits, in princely robes -- and mouth pieties for the rubes and suckers they despise. The conclusion of the December piece on the BAE bagmen still applies:

Lord knows – and Lords know – that unseemly accommodations sometimes have to be made in this world, especially in geopolitics. A wink here, a little baksheesh there between unsavoury characters are often better than, say, launching a war of aggression and murdering more than half a million innocent people to achieve your political and commercial ends. But in the BAE case, as in so much else in politics, it is the hypocrisy that rankles most. Western governments obviously believe they must give guns and bribes to extremist tyrants in order to obtain the oil that keeps their own nations in such disproportionate clover – but they lack the guts to say so in plain language, dressing up this ugly business with meaningless trumpery about freedom, peace and security.

Are they trying to mask their own cynicism – or protect the tender sensibilities of their electorates, who might prefer sugared lies to acknowledgements of the dirty deals that undergird their way of life?

This idea that they are giving "guns and bribes to extremist tyrants in order to obtain the oil" would be the fall-back position, if they suddenly got indicted.



From 'The Stakes Are Too High for Us to Stop Fighting Now' An interview with FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds by Christopher Deliso August 15, 2005:

SE: Look, I think that that [the AIPAC investigation] ultimately involves more than just Israelis -- I am talking about countries, not a single country here. Because despite however it may appear, this is not just a simple matter of state espionage. If Fitzgerald and his team keep pulling, really pulling, they are going to reel in much more than just a few guys spying for Israel.

CD: A monster, 600-pound catfish, huh? So the Turkish and Israeli investigations had some overlap?

SE: Essentially, there is only one investigation -- a very big one, an all-inclusive one. Completely by chance, I, a lowly translator, stumbled over one piece of it.

But I can tell you there are a lot of people involved, a lot of ranking officials, and a lot of illegal activities that include multi-billion-dollar drug-smuggling operations, black-market nuclear sales to terrorists and unsavory regimes, you name it. And of course a lot of people from abroad are involved. It's massive. So to do this investigation, to really do it, they will have to look into everything.

CD: But you can start from anywhere --

SE: That's the beauty of it. You can start from the AIPAC angle. You can start from the Plame case. You can start from my case. They all end up going to the same place, and they revolve around the same nucleus of people. There may be a lot of them, but it is one group. And they are very dangerous for all of us.

Do you see the connection to what we addressed in Part 3? How Ari Fleischer, on behalf of Bandar Bush's brother in the White House, can say all that nonsense about how the Saudis are such good allies in the War on Terror, even though their sorry kingdom is in fact not just the source of the extremist ideology that motivates the jihadists, but is also a source of money and even the holy warriors themselves?

The Bush Administration puts out that story, because it's all "the same nucleus of people." London, Washington, Riyadh, Dubai, Rawalpindi.... "There may be a lot of them, but it is one group. And they are very dangerous for all of us."

We continue from Part 5 reviewing Is Afghanistan a Narco-State?:

But Karzai did not care. Back in January 2007, Karzai appointed a convicted heroin dealer, Izzatulla Wasifi, to head his anticorruption commission. Karzai also appointed several corrupt local police chiefs. There were numerous diplomatic reports that his brother Ahmed Wali, who was running half of Kandahar, was involved in the drug trade. (Said T. Jawad, Afghanistan's ambassador to the United States, said Karzai has "taken the step of issuing a decree asking the government to be vigilant of any business dealing involving his family, and requesting that any suspicions be fully investigated.") Some governors of Helmand and other provinces — Pashtuns who had advocated aerial eradication — changed their positions after the "palace" spoke to them. Karzai was lining up his Pashtun allies for re-election, and the drug war was going to have to wait. "Maybe we taught him too much about politics," Rice said to me after I briefed her on these developments.

That is an interesting comment coming from Condoleezza Rice, The Warrior Princess -- maybe they "taught him too much about politics".

Of course, what makes her think that the Bush Administration's neocons (and the neolib Clintonites before them) have the market cornered on corruption and influence peddling?

(I remember the 2000 election. I voted for President Bush, and was so happy as the court cases were finally decided in his favor -- I thought I was helping restore honorable government to the White House after eight ghastly years of Clinton. Little did I realize.... The neolib Clinton Administration was far and away the most corrupt, most treasonous Presidential Administration in American history, until Bush came along with his heroin-trafficking and war-profiteering neocons.)

Karzai then put General Khodaidad (who, like many Afghans, goes by only one name) in charge of the Afghan counternarcotics efforts. Khodaidad — a conscientious man, competent and apparently not corrupt — was a Hazara. The Hazaras had no influence over the southern Pashtuns who were dominating the drug trade. While Khodaidad did well in the north, he got nowhere in Helmand and Kandahar — and told me so. Karzai had to have known this would be the case.

I wonder what some of these people would think if they found out a new U.S. Administration was backing Khodaidad to take Karzai's place after the 2009 election? Unfortunately, both Obama and McCain are too beholden to heroin interests for that to happen, regardless of how the 2008 U.S. election turns out.

But the real test for the Afghan government and the Pentagon came with the "force protection" issue. At high-level international conferences, the Afghans — finally, under European pressure — agreed to eradicate 50,000 hectares (more than 25 percent of the crop) in the first months of this year; and they agreed that the Afghan National Army would provide force protection.

The plan was simple. The Afghan Poppy Eradication Force would go to Helmand Province with two battalions of the national army and eradicate the fields of the wealthier farmers — including fields owned by local officials. Protecting the eradication force would also enable the arrest of key traffickers. The U.S. military, which trained the Afghan army, would assist in moving the soldiers there and provide outer-perimeter security. The U.S. military would not participate directly in eradication or arrest operations; it would only enable them.

Of course, we know that wasn't going to happen -- the question, for those who don't already know the story, is how did this get derailed?

But once again, Karzai and his Pentagon friends thwarted the plan. First, Anthony Harriman was replaced at the National Security Council by a colonel who held the old-school Pentagon view that "we don’t do the drug thing." He would not let me see General Lute or Stephen J. Hadley, the national security adviser, when the force-protection plans failed to materialize. We asked numerous Pentagon officials to lobby the defense minister, Abdul Rahim Wardak, for immediate force protection, but they did little.

Consequently, in late March, the central eradication force set out for Helmand without the promised Afghan National Army. Almost immediately, they came under withering attack for several days — 107-millimeter rockets, rocket-propelled grenades, machine-gun fire and mortars. Three members of the Afghan force were killed and several were seriously wounded. They eradicated just over 1,000 hectares, about 1 percent of the Helmand crop, before withdrawing to Kabul.

They came under "withering attack" and lost some guys -- that'll learn 'em!

Meanwhile, Karzai can say he's serious about narcotics -- look at all the losses his people are taking in the eradication effort!



That's how politics work -- and don't think the very same thing isn't happening in London and Washington with the "War on Terror"!

This spring, more U.S. troops arrived in Afghanistan. They were effective, experienced warriors — many coming from Iraq — but they knew little about drugs. When they arrived in southern Afghanistan, they announced that they would not interfere with poppy harvesting in the area. "Not our job," they said. Despite the wheat shortage and the threat of starvation, they gave interviews saying that the farmers had no choice but to grow poppies.

At the same time, the 101st Airborne arrived in eastern Afghanistan. Its commanders promptly informed Ambassador Wood that they would only permit crop eradication if the State Department paid large cash stipends to the farmers for the value of their opium crop. Payment for eradication, however, is disastrous counternarcotics policy: If you pay cash for poppies, farmers keep the cash and grow poppies again next year for more cash. And farmers who grow less-lucrative crops start growing poppies so that they can get the money, too. Drug experts call this type of offer a "perverse incentive," and it has never worked anywhere in the world. It was not going to work in eastern Afghanistan, either. Farmers were lining up to have their crops eradicated and get the money.

On May 12, at a press conference in Kabul, General Khodaidad declared the 2008 anti-poppy effort in southern Afghanistan to be a failure. Eradication this year would total less than a third of the 20,000 hectares that Afghanistan eradicated in 2007. The north and east — particularly Balkh, Badakhshan and Nangarhar provinces — continued to improve because of strong political will and better civilian-military cooperation. But the base of the Karzai government — Kandahar and Helmand — would have record crops, less eradication and fewer arrests than in years past. And the Taliban would get stronger.

We need to consider carefully our choice to back a guy whose powerbase is right where the Taliban first came on the scene in Afghanistan.

Despite this development, the Afghans were busily putting together an optimistic assessment of their progress for the Paris Conference on Afghanistan — where, on June 12, world leaders, including Karzai, met in an event reminiscent of the London Conference of 2006. In Paris, the Afghan government raised more than $20 billion in additional development assistance. But the drug problem was a nuisance that could jeopardize the financing effort. So drugs were eliminated from the formal agenda and relegated to a 50-minute closed discussion at a lower-level meeting the week before the conference.

The last part of Is Afghanistan a Narco-State? is comprised of recommendations on how to battle opiate production in Afghanistan. Before we review that, we shall consider other aspects of this topic; next up, a glance at the impact of Afghanistan heroin on Australia, as The Sword of Allah continues.

We continue from Part 1 reviewing the Judgment Approved by the court for handing down in the UK's BAE Case; the judgment was dated April 10, 2008, with the hearing dates of two months earlier, February 14th and 15th.

Facts

8. Since this case has aroused public concern, we should stress that which is well-recognised in the field of public law. This court is not concerned to conduct an enquiry into the facts which led to the Director's decision, save to the extent necessary to reach a conclusion as to whether that decision was lawful. The defendant has disclosed facts which are sufficient for the purpose of reaching a conclusion but they are not comprehensive and it is no part of the court's function in these judicial review proceedings to achieve a more complete account of the events, unless omission inhibits a correct legal conclusion. We emphasise that, through the efforts of Treasury Counsel and those by whom he is assisted, there has been sufficient disclosure to enable us to reach a solution to the essential question whether the Director acted lawfully. We turn, then, to the facts on which the court needs to rely.

9. On 14 October 2005 the SFO issued a statutory notice to BAE requiring it to disclose details of payments to agents and consultants in respect of the Al-Yamamah contracts. On 7 November 2005, in response to that notice, BAE's solicitors wrote to the Attorney General in a memorandum described as "strictly private and confidential" seeking to persuade him to halt the investigation on the grounds that it would be:-

"seriously contrary to the public interest on the grounds that it would adversely and seriously affect relations between the UK and Saudi Arabian Governments and would almost inevitably prevent the UK securing its largest export contract in the last decade".

The adverse and serious effect on relations between the two kingdoms (the United Kingdom and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia) is described in an article that was published the day the above-quoted judgment was released (Graft inquiry linked to Saudis and BAE was terminated illegally, U.K. court rules):

LONDON: The quashing by the British government of an inquiry into a lucrative arms deal between Saudi Arabia and BAE Systems was illegal, two judges ruled Thursday.

The High Court did not immediately order the investigation into BAE Systems to be reopened, but the judges said they would hear further arguments.

The U.S. Justice Department opened an investigation last year into BAE Systems, one of the world's largest arms makers. BAE has been accused of funneling money to Prince Bandar bin Sultan of Saudi Arabia to help win a multibillion-dollar weapons deal.

Former Prime Minister Tony Blair shut down the investigation in 2006, claiming it threatened national security.

That decision was challenged by the Campaign Against Arms Trade and social lobby group Corner House.

The Serious Fraud Office was looking into allegations that BAE maintained a slush fund to pay off Saudi officials for lucrative contracts.

The director of that office and the government were wrong not to allow the investigation to go forward, the judges ruled.

"No one, whether within this country or outside, is entitled to interfere with the course of our justice," the judges said. "It is the failure of government and the defendants to bear that essential principal in mind that justified the intervention of this court."

Dinah Rose, an attorney representing the groups that wanted the investigation to continue, argued the government's decision was swayed by illegal considerations, notably threats from senior Saudi Arabian officials that BAE would lose a £10 billion, or $19.7 billion, contract for Typhoon Eurofighter jets if the investigation was allowed to go on.

Rose said government lawyers had not disputed an allegation that Prince Bandar, the former ambassador to the United States and now head of Saudi Arabia's National Security Council, told Blair during a meeting in July 2006 to stop the inquiry or lose the Typhoon contract.

Rose told the court that Bandar then met with officials from the British Foreign Office in December - shortly after he reportedly told the government the contract would be canceled within days and held talks with former President Jacques Chirac of France about an alternative purchase of Rafale fighter aircraft.

Days after that meeting, Blair sent a letter to the attorney general, Peter Goldsmith, telling Goldsmith to stop the investigation.

Blair said he was concerned about what he called the "critical difficulty" in negotiations with Saudi Arabia over a contract for Typhoon fighters, as well as "a real and immediate risk of a collapse in U.K./Saudi security, intelligence and diplomatic cooperation," the letter said.

These threats included the threat of stopping Saudi cooperation with the United Kingdom in the "War on Terror"!

I transition to yet a third source, before returning to finish the article we began above. From Blair: BAE investigation would have 'wrecked' UK, June 13, 2007:

Tony Blair has defended the government's decision to halt the Serious Fraud Office's (SFO) investigation into alleged bribery surrounding BAE Systems' contracts with Saudi Arabia.

The prime minister told the House of Commons continuing the investigation would have damaged the UK's relationship with Saudi Arabia.

However, he refuted allegations the attorney general Lord Goldsmith had attempted to block a subsequent Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) investigation as "completely and totally unfair and wrong".

It had been alleged Lord Goldsmith had warned officials not to disclose information to the OECD investigation.

Quizzed in prime minister's questions, Mr Blair defended the decision not to pursue an inquiry.

He said: "First of all these allegations are strenuously denied by the Saudi royal family, secondly if we were then going to conduct an investigation then that might last two, three years into these allegations that frankly I think would lead absolutely nowhere.

"What it would lead to is the complete wreckage of a relationship that is of fundamental importance of the security of this country, to the state of the Middle East, and to our relationship with countries in the Middle East."

Mr Blair continued: "I was asked for my advice as to what damage this investigation would do if it continued. I gave that advice because of the huge importance of working with Saudi Arabia on the Middle East peace process, on counter-terrorism, on the situation in the Middle East.

The fact that cooperation in the "War on Terror" was a bargaining chip says a great deal.

It screams to us that Saudi cooperation is a charade to begin with, something they do to pacify the public in the West; it allows us to understand the passage quoted in Part 1 from Congressional testimony last year, U.S. RELATIONS WITH SAUDI ARABIA: OIL, ANXIETY, AND AMBIVALENCE:

Then there is the issue of terrorism financing. It is no secret that large sums of money flow from Saudi Arabia to bad people and organizations all over the world. And as with all things Saudi, the picture of government's response has been mixed. They have signed the U.N. International Convention for the Suppression of Financing of Terrorism, but haven't ratified it. They have announced that a single-government entity, the Non-Government Commission on Relief and Charity Work Abroad, would be formed to control overseas charitable activities, but it hasn’t been established yet.

They have established new rules and regulations regarding money laundering and financial transfers, but they have yet to prosecute any prominent Saudis accused of violating these laws, as Under Secretary of the Treasury, Stuart Levey, reminded us last week.

It is an open secret that Saudi cooperation in the "War on Terror" is a charade; our government officials lyingly assure us Saudi Arabia is our ally, not our enemy, except for a few who go through the motions of questioning that lie.

This, in turn, places another passage from U.S. RELATIONS WITH SAUDI ARABIA: OIL, ANXIETY, AND AMBIVALENCE, not previously quoted in this series and from a little above the passage I just quoted, into context:

The Saudis, on the other hand, see the current government of Prime Minister al-Maliki as a tool of Tehran, and refer to our presence in Iraq as illegal occupation. Potent code words in the Arab world. And we believe the Saudis have been turning a blind eye to the movement of Saudi jihadis into Iraq.

Our "ally" in the "War on Terror" sends jihadis northward to battle us in Iraq, and we scream about their enemy, Iran!

(Maybe we should try reaching out to Iran? Turn the tables on Riyadh a little?)

Keep this in mind when you read Part 3 and beyond.

We continue now with Blair: BAE investigation would have 'wrecked' UK:

"I stick by that, and the idea frankly that such an investigation could be conducted without doing damage to our relationship is cloud cuckoo land, which after all is the natural habitat of the Liberal Democrats."

The Liberal Democrats have called on Mr Blair to confirm what he knew about the alleged bribery and when – noting that bribery of a foreign official became illegal in 2002.

Since 1985, BAE Systems has signed £43 billion worth of arms contract with Saudi Arabia. But it was alleged these were agreed in return for payments totalling £1 billion to Prince Bander.

The government halted a SFO investigation in December 2006 and the case has since been investigated by the OECD.

Tony Blair is a coward and a traitor. Bowing to the pressure of his Muslim overlords, the Saudi royal family, B-liar sold out the UK for a few (billion) pounds sterling worth of arms contracts.

The weakness he showed, and which the British government continues to show, dealing with the source of radical terrorism in the Middle East - Saudi Arabia - guarantees more 7/7-like incidents in the future.

British soldiers are fighting and dying in foreign lands in vain, because their efforts have been sabotaged by those who ordered them into the fray; British military personnel will sacrifice, and return to a UK that is across between a terrorist-targeted "House of War" and a dhimmi vassal state of Riyadh.

Returning to Graft inquiry linked to Saudis and BAE was terminated illegally, U.K. court rules:

Shortly afterward, despite Goldsmith's unease, according to documents tendered to the court, the director of the fraud office, Robert Wardle, confirmed the investigation had been dropped.

The judges said they relied on claims by Corner House and Campaign Against Arms Trade, based on media reports, that the threat to drop the Typhoon contract was made directly by Prince Bandar to Blair's chief of staff, Jonathan Powell.

Government lawyers did not dispute that, the judges said.

"Had such a threat been made by one who is subject to the criminal law of this country, he would risk being charged with an attempt to pervert the course of justice," the judges said.

British news media reported last year that more than $2 billion ended up in Washington bank accounts controlled by Prince Bandar, and that the payments coming from BAE were linked to an arms deal negotiated in 1985.

The prince has denied accepting "improper secret commissions."

Finally, the next short passage from Judgment Approved by the court for handing down:

The Group Legal Director told the Attorney General that he had discussed those issues with the Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Defence. The Legal Secretary to the Law Officers replied that it was not appropriate for law officers to receive a memorandum cloaked with confidentiality. The representations were then sent to the Director of the SFO. The foundation for BAE’s fears, described in its memorandum, was that compliance with the Statutory Notice would be regarded by the Saudi Arabian Government as a serious breach of confidentiality by BAE and by the UK Government.

10. On 15 November 2005 the SFO’s Case Controller, Matthew Cowie, questioned BAE's solicitors as to:-

"...why the pursuance by the SFO of its independent statutory powers of investigation could properly be regarded as a breach of duty of confidentiality by the United Kingdom Government." (our emphasis)

He reminded the solicitors for BAE that it was a participant in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) process, committed to the principles of the OECD’s Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions 1997 (The Convention), and set out the terms of Article 5 of the Convention:

"Investigation and prosecution of the bribery of a foreign public official shall be subject to the applicable rules and principles of each Party. They shall not be influenced by considerations of national economic interest, the potential effect upon relations with another State or the identity of the natural or legal persons involved."

British law was broken, outrageously so, as the country was sold out by big business and big politics - sold to those who are really behind the continued violence that takes British lives overseas and threatens them at home.

Why?

From Former FBI Translator Sibel Edmonds Calls Current 9/11 Investigation Inadequate by Jim Hogue, May 07, 2004:

JH: Here's a question that you might be able to answer: What is al-Qaeda?

SE: This is a very interesting and complex question. When you think of al-Qaeda, you are not thinking of al-Qaeda in terms of one particular country, or one particular organization. You are looking at this massive movement that stretches to tens and tens of countries. And it involves a lot of sub-organizations and sub-sub-organizations and branches and it's extremely complicated. So to just narrow it down and say al-Qaeda and the Saudis, or to say it's what they had at the camp in Afghanistan, is extremely misleading. And we don't hear the extent of the penetration that this organization and the sub-organizations have throughout the world, throughout their networks and throughout their various activities. It's extremely sophisticated. And then you involve a significant amount of money into this equation. Then things start getting a lot of overlap -- money laundering, and drugs and terrorist activities and their support networks converging in several points. That's what I'm trying to convey without being too specific. And this money travels. And you start trying to go to the root of it and it's getting into somebody's political campaign, and somebody's lobbying. And people don't want to be traced back to this money.

Tony Blair and other big wigs in UK politics and business are obviously among those who can "be traced back to this money".

In Part 3 we have a teaser, then in Part 4 we will begin to take a closer look at Prince Bandar, and his relationship with Blair's close ally in the "War on Terror", President George W. Bush.

We begin with a quote from The Highjacking of a Nation, Part 2: The Auctioning of Former Statesmen & Dime a Dozen Generals by Sibel Edmonds, November 29, 2006:

The foreign influence, the lobbyists, the current highly positioned civil servants who are determined future 'wanna be' lobbyists, and the fat cats of the Military Industrial Complex, operate successfully under the radar, with unlimited reach and power, with no scrutiny, while selling your interests, benefiting from your tax money, and serving the highest bidders regardless of what or who they may be. This deep state seems to operate at all levels of our government; from the President's office to Congress, from the military quarters to the civil servants' offices.

That quote pertains to the Sibel Edmonds case and thus, you are certain, to corruption in the United States.



But, the United States has allies -- close allies, with whom we coordinate our foreign policy and defense efforts, with whom we share intelligence and technology.

Don't for a moment think that these allies are immune to the kind of treasonous corruption and obstruction of justice that characterize the Sibel Edmonds case.

From An Interview with Sibel Edmonds, Page Two by Chris Deliso, July 1, 2004:

CD: [snip] At several points you state that such organized crime networks employ "semi-legitimate organizations" as their point of interface with governments and the "legit" world. Can you explain exactly what you mean?

SE: These are organizations that might have a legitimate front -- say as a business, or a cultural center or something. And we've also heard a lot about Islamic charities as fronts for terrorist organizations, but the range is much broader and even, simpler.

CD: For example?

SE: You might have an organization supposed to be promoting the cultural affairs of a certain country within another country. Hypothetically, say, an Uzbek folklore society based in Germany. The stated purpose would be to hold folklore-related activities -- and they might even do that -- but the real activities taking place behind the scenes are criminal.

CD: Such as?

SE: Everything -- from drugs to money laundering to arms sales. And yes, there are certain convergences with all these activities and international terrorism.

CD: So with these organizations we're talking about a lot of money --

SE: Huge, just massive. They don't deal with 1 million or 5 million dollars, but with hundreds of millions.

Hundreds of millions? Think bigger...

...a whole lot bigger....



Money is the fuel for corruption, and corruption -- not poverty, injustice or hopelessness -- is the enabler for terrorism.

From Former FBI Translator Sibel Edmonds Calls Current 9/11 Investigation Inadequate by Jim Hogue, May 07, 2004:

JH: Can you explain more about what money you are talking about?

SE: The most significant information that we were receiving did not come from counter-terrorism investigations, and I want to emphasize this. It came from counter-intelligence, and certain criminal investigations, and issues that have to do with money laundering operations.

You get to a point where it gets very complex, where you have money laundering activities, drug related activities, and terrorist support activities converging at certain points and becoming one. In certain points -- and they [the intelligence community] are separating those portions from just the terrorist activities. And, as I said, they are citing "foreign relations" which is not the case, because we are not talking about only governmental levels. And I keep underlining semi-legit organizations and following the money. When you do that the picture gets grim. It gets really ugly.

From Judgment Approved by the court for handing down in the UK's BAE Case:

Lord Justice Moses:

Introduction

1. This is the judgment of the Court.

2. Between 30 July 2004 and 14 December 2006 a team of Serious Fraud Office lawyers, accountants, financial investigators and police officers carried out an investigation into allegations of bribery by BAE Systems plc (BAE) in relation to the Al-Yamamah military aircraft contracts with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. On 14 December 2006 the Director of the Serious Fraud Office announced that he was ending the SFO's investigation.

3. In October 2005 BAE sought to persuade the Attorney General and the SFO to stop the investigation on the grounds that its continued investigation would be contrary to the public interest: it would adversely affect relations between the United Kingdom and Saudi Arabia and prevent the United Kingdom securing what it described as the largest export contract in the last decade. Despite representations from Ministers, the Attorney General and the Director stood firm. The investigation continued throughout the first half of 2006.

4. In July 2006 the SFO was about to obtain access to Swiss bank accounts. The reaction of those described discreetly as "Saudi representatives" was to make a specific threat to the Prime Minister's Chief of Staff, Jonathan Powell: if the investigation was not stopped, there would be no contract for the export of Typhoon aircraft and the previous close intelligence and diplomatic relationship would cease.

5. Ministers advised the Attorney General and the Director that if the investigation continued those threats would be carried out; the consequences would be grave, both for the arms trade and for the safety of British citizens and service personnel. In the light of what he regarded as the grave risk to life, if the threat was carried out, the Director decided to stop the investigation.

6. The defendant in name, although in reality the Government, contends that the Director was entitled to surrender to the threat. The law is powerless to resist the specific and, as it turns out, successful attempt by a foreign government to pervert the course of justice in the United Kingdom, by causing the investigation to be halted. The court must, so it is argued, accept that whilst the threats and their consequences are "a matter of regret", they are a "part of life".

7. So bleak a picture of the impotence of the law invites at least dismay, if not outrage. The danger of so heated a reaction is that it generates steam; this obscures the search for legal principle. The challenge, triggered by this application, is to identify a legal principle which may be deployed in defence of so blatant a threat. However abject the surrender to that threat, if there is no identifiable legal principle by which the threat may be resisted, then the court must itself acquiesce in the capitulation.

And, on the other side of "The Pond":

Then there is the issue of terrorism financing. It is no secret that large sums of money flow from Saudi Arabia to bad people and organizations all over the world. And as with all things Saudi, the picture of government's response has been mixed. They have signed the U.N. International Convention for the Suppression of Financing of Terrorism, but haven't ratified it. They have announced that a single-government entity, the Non-Government Commission on Relief and Charity Work Abroad, would be formed to control overseas charitable activities, but it hasn't been established yet.

They have established new rules and regulations regarding money laundering and financial transfers, but they have yet to prosecute any prominent Saudis accused of violating these laws, as Under Secretary of the Treasury, Stuart Levey, reminded us last week.

So on to this Jackson Pollock-like canvas of strategic convergence. The tactical disagreement, the Bush administration has splattered a $20 billion arms deal. Under the best-case scenario, this deal has significant merit. But what is the likelihood of the best-case scenario?

To be frank, I view arms deals with a great deal of skepticism. The recipient certainly welcomes the arms, but I don't think they love or respect us in the morning after the sale.

In this series, we shall examine the actions of those who sell out their country to the highest bidder, even though that "highest bidder" enables, encourages and supports terrorism against the country being sold out. Among other things, we will look at the UK's BAE scandal.

And we should bear in mind that this is intimately related to the subject matter addressed in my other ongoing series, The Sword of Allah.





Hat tip to my email tipster.