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CounterPunch
February
15, 2003
Cold Fronts
War is Golden
for the Bush Administration
By CHRIS FLOYD
The opening of a long-delayed civil suit in a
London courtroom; a brief, buried article on a judicial nomination;
a fluctuation in the commodities market: three mundane, seemingly-unrelated
items in the news last week that combined to give a fleeting
glimpse of the ugly reality behind the frantic, diversionary
façade of the "civilized world."
The London case involves our old friends,
BCCI, the international bank that served as the front for a global
crime ring involving top officials and Establishment worthies
in dozens of "civilized" nations. BCCI ran guns to
Saddam and other heavies, funded Pakistan's illegal nuclear weapons
program, laundered drug profits, peddled prostitutes, doled out
bribes, served as a conduit for covert CIA operations--and, through
its connections to the bin Laden family, gave George W. Bush
a sweetheart loan of $25 million to bail out one of his many
business failures.
One of the respectable organizations
tainted by the ring was the Bank of England, which was the financial
regulator for BCCI when the front finally collapsed in 1991--leaving
its legitimate creditors some $11 billion in the hole. Not surprisingly,
some of these victims filed suit against ye olde B of E, claiming
that its oversight of BCCI left something to be desired. But
successive British governments--including the plagiaristic poodle-led
pack currently in power--have fought for years to quash the lawsuit,
the Observer reports.
That's because the trial could open a
can of particularly grubby worms concerning the UK government's
extensive canoodling with BCCI. A host of worthies are expected
to be grilled in the dock, including John Major, former UK prime
minister and current business partner of George Bush I in yet
another secretive international front that profits from war,
weapons, violence, repression and the greasing of highly-placed
palms: the Carlyle Group.
Even as the trial finally gets underway,
British PM Tony "Bow-Wow" Blair is withholding crucial
BCCI evidence, claiming it's top secret. In fact, says Blair,
the hidden juice is so red hot that even the law under which
it has been declared secret must remain secret. An overreaction?
Probably not--not when you consider the fact that BCCI was one
of the chief conduits by which Western governments secretly armed
Saddam Hussein with weapons of mass destruction throughout the
1980s. This is not the kind of dirty laundry you want aired at
the very moment you are waving the bloody shirt of war at, er,
Saddam Hussein for, er, possessing weapons of mass destruction
that, er, you and your allies sold to him in the first place.
The Italian bank BNL was one of BCCI's
main tentacles. BNL's Atlanta branch was the primary funnel used
by the first Bush Administration to send millions of secret dollars
to Saddam for arms purchases, including deadly chemicals and
other WMD materials supplied by the Chilean arms dealer Cardoen
and various politically-connected operators in the United States
like, weapons merchant Matrix Churchill. (As always with the
Busha Nostra, geopolitics--in this case, helping Saddam wage
aggressive war against Iran--and crony profits go hand in hand.
Once the war was over and Iran was left a shattered hulk, with
millions dead and displaced, the useful idiot Saddam was expendable,
swiftly morphing from good buddy into budding Hitler.)
As soon as the BNL case broke, President
Bush I moved to throttle the investigation. He appointed lawyers
from both Cardoen and Matrix to top Justice Department posts--where
they supervised the officials investigating their old companies.
Meanwhile, White House aides applied heavy pressure on other
prosecutors to restrict the range of the probe--especially the
fact that Bush cabinet officials Brent Scowcroft and Lawrence
Eagleburger had served as consultants for BNL during their pre-White
House days as spear-carriers for yet another secretive international
front that profits from war, weapons, etc., etc.: Kissinger Associates.
Which brings us to the judicial appointment.
One of the White House aides who unlawfully intervened in the
BNL prosecution was a certain factotum named Jay S. ByBee. Last
week, said factotum was nominated by the current warmer of the
Oval Office seat, George W. Bush, to a place on the federal appeals
court--a lifetime sinecure of perks and power. Well done, thou
good and faithful servant!
And the commodities connection? President
Pretzel's relentless hissy-fit for war on Iraq has of course
goosed the price of gold enormously--and that's set Bush Family
coffers a-clinking. How so? In the waning days of his failed
presidency, Bush I invoked an obscure 1872 statute to give a
Canadian firm, Barrick Corporation, the right to mine $10 billion
in gold from U.S. public lands. (U.S. taxpayers got a whopping
$10,000 fee in return.) Bush then joined Barrick as a highly-paid
"international consultant," brokering deals with various
dictators of his close acquaintance. Barrick reciprocated with
big bucks for Junior's presidential run. And in another quid
for the old pro quo, last year Junior dutifully approved Barrick's
controversial acquisition of a major rival. (Barrick is also
one of the biggest polluters in America, by the way.)
Thus every step toward war fills Bush
pockets quite literally with gold. That's the way they operate,
these liars and thieves in thousand-dollar suits, these secretive
fronts who profit from war, fear, blood and greasy palms. They
arm the "monsters," they disarm the monsters, making
money both ways. Then they drape themselves with Bible and flag,
like smug pimps promenading to church, singing "Glory Hallelujah"
while the whole world burns.
Chris Floyd
is a columnist for the Moscow Times and a regular contributor
to CounterPunch. He can be reached at: cfloyd72@hotmail.com
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February 8
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