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BAE/Saudi scandal latest
BillieTheBot
Posts: 8,721 Bot
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7339231.stmThe High Court has ruled that the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) acted unlawfully by dropping a corruption inquiry into a £43bn Saudi arms deal.
Defence firm BAE was accused of making illegal payments to Saudi officials to secure contracts, but the firm maintains that it acted lawfully.
'National security reasons' my hairy arse :rolleyes:
So can we expect a criminal investigation, and given that Tony fucking Blair was almost certainly behind it all, can expect him to be charged and face trial? Don't hold your breath...
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The biggest issue in all of this isnt the fraud case at all, its the reasoning behind giving a fairly unpleasant government loads and loads of weapons.
As for the practices involved, while it might be common practice in the Middle East it is not in this country, to the best of my knowledge at least, and the government's intervention as well as the justification for doing so were pathetic.
As far as selling to the Saudis goes - Saudi Arabia doesn't pose any security threat. It's for defensive purposes, I don't see the problem. Granted, it's an unpleasant government but what would we achieve by blocking the sale? (Other than creating redundancies here and creating jobs in France/US). Besides, if we're supplying we know capabilities, we've got greater intelligence, etc. And they're also reliant on us for spare parts... Perhaps Aladdin should speak to one of the thousands of people who's livelihood would be destroyed if he got his way.
Word :thumb:
Of course, you should also bear in mind that the much-repeated vague threat about thousands of jobs being lost is a monumental load of bollocks as well- certainly as far as BAE is concerned.
However it seems that no matter how dodgy, no matter how unethical the deed, all somebody needs to say to have their little dirty dealings go through is to claim "thousands of British jobs will be lost" for everyone to look the other way.
Pretty easy from where you're sitting. You're not a BAE factory worker with a family to support.
Principles and ethics are subjective - pacifists might oppose producing or selling absolutely any type of military equipment. Should their principles be forced on everybody? Should yours?
I don't think we are putting profit before human rights by selling the Saudis this equipment - which is for defensive purposes. (There's no evidence to suggest otherwise...)
Are you opposed to this deal simply because of the shady way the Saudis to business - or are you opposed to doing business on any terms with Saudi Arabia?
No it's not. If BAE don't win contracts jobs will go.
This is the government that made a solid promise to adopt a new "ethical foreign policy" (LOL) and to stop trading weapons with oppresive regimes.
Regimes don't come much more oppresive than Saudi Arabia.
Jets have been used by regimes to oppress and attack their own civilians in the past. There is no telling what those jets might be used for in the future. At any event, the selling of advanced weapons to brutal dictatorships with large elements of terrorists, insurgents and fundementalists all struggling for power is not only unethical but plain stupid.
I'm opposed to selling weapons to brutal, backward-as-fuck dictatorships, regardless of what they may use them for (nor that we can tell what they will use them for anyway). Something that our own government claimed to believe in when it first gained office.
Luckily for BAE it is one of the most profitable, successful and busiest companies in the world. If the the contract had been cancelled life would go on at BAE.
Pretty easy from where you're sitting. You're not a Saudi subject about to have his hands amputated, a Yemeni nomad being shot for drifting across an artificial border, a blogger held without charge in solitary confinement for criticizing the government and business, or a young unemployed man being flogged for daring to protest against his rulers.
As for Saudi Arabia not being a threat to the UK: 15 of 19 of the 9/11 hikackers were Saudi, as is Osama bin Laden. The Saudi government also fund extreme Islamist literature in British mosques which include homophobia, misogyny, and anti-semitism.
All this high morals bollox is easy when your sitting comfy at home ...it's not so easy when your actualy confronted by it ...ask bong. He went on a protest march about human rights abuses ...when he saw someones human rights being abused in front of his very eyes ...he turned away.
Other than being driven by money, why would anybody want to work for the likes of BAE?
Of course the business world isn't driven by ethical concerns - it is driven by profit and usually pretty open about this. But a line has to be drawn somewhere, unless you think its is acceptable to be selling torture apparatus to Pinochet, or Zyclon gas to Hitlern because its "in the name of business," "British jobs will be lost," and if you don't do it "somebody else will." :yeees:
Not nice. But, what has any of that got to do with selling them fighter jets? Will these fighter jets be used to target bloggers and young unemployed men?
Ideologically I suppose their very extreme interpretation of Islam could be viewed as a threat. Militarily Saudi Arabia is no threat to Britain.
The Saudi elite care about making sure the oil money flows through smoothly (and educating the kids at elite schools here, shopping at Harrods, flash Mayfair apartments, palaces etc). They won't even go out of their way to help the Palestinians - if they got awkward about oil, Israel could be forced to withdraw from the West Bank by the end of the week.
I'm not sure of any documented cases of British fighter jets being used against such people, although I wouldn't be suprised if they were used against nomads etc when no one is paying attention. The point is it all goes towards strengthening the Saudi military and the Saudi Monarchy, and would be used against popular rebellions/revolutions attempting to overthrow the regime. Hence, it is supporting an odious feudal-medieval dictatorship, quite apart from bribing individual Saudi officials who are most probably total fuckers.
By the way, I bet this Briton wished he'd lost his Saudi Arabian job...
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1156275.ece
I don't actually see this as an issue - after all, isn't this the Global freemarket? FREE for companies to do as they like?
Also, hey, they are buying our stuff. Thereby supporting our businesses. If you don't like it, go for a different system.
I know that nothing is black and white and that absolute morality does not work. However, even though it might not necessarily make sense I believe lines can and should be drawn. Even though Saudi might not be a threat to us (for now) I find it quite revolting that we should sell weapons to such regimes. Specially after the Labour government who won office in 97 made it one of its core policies to implement an ethical foreign policy and to stop arms trading with just such regimes.
What I find most pathetic of all is not the bungs and the dodgy dealings between BAE and the Saudis (which to an extent you could expect), but the government's efforts to cover up such dealings and to actually block any attempts to investigate those deals.
Not really - even the most extreme market fundamentalists would argue for some kind of democracy (rather than a feudal monarchy), human rights, and certainly transparency in government financial/trade deals. This would supposedly ensure efficiency and prevent corruption/cartels/monopolies, etc.
But since when was this story even about market liberalism? This is about a foreign government taking bribes from a British firm, then threatening our government when attempts were made to investigate. Quite apart from the nature of this regime, the idea of a bribe is to undermine market comptetition through personal "incentives".
It was absurd to investigate in the first place. The investigation was dropped because continuing it would serve absolutely no purpose.
The Al Yamamah contracts with Saudi Arabia have made BAE over £43 billion. Doing business with the Saudis has been lucrative, very important to the British economy and vital to safeguarding British jobs. Future and existing business with Saudi Arabia would have been obliterated by continuing the investigation. The very fact that there was any investigation - and this High Court ruling is very damaging. The Saudis understandably, are going to be wary about giving contracts worth billions of pounds - if it means their embarrassing secrets get exposed for all to see. And what purpose is served by this charade of investigating corruption?
Will the Saudi regime suddenly become transparent and open in its dealings? Will bribes and kickbacks suddenly become historical? Will the Saudis have nobody to fulfill their multi-billion contracts? Since the answer to each of those questions is a definitive 'NO' please forgive me for valuing British jobs, British industry and the British economy over misguided, vain and toothless 'principles'. Take your 'principles' to the BAE workers with families to support - and enjoy a pat on the back from the French or US govt for creating jobs there...
It's a bit like the seventies all over again ...the winter of discontent and all that stuff. This time though it isn't power crazed leftwing unions but overpaid and iresponsible city boys and bankers who are bringing the country down. The world of finance is in on the verge of freefall ...manufacturing nations will get by a lot easier than those in the service sectors. Those jobs are vital and this stupid witch hunt may already have ensured that next time round ...the French or the yanks may well get the business.
should we only sell weapons to nice people then?
Yea. You think we should sell them to bad people then?
Nice people tend to use fewer guns.
Except the Yanks took up the investigation when we dropped it however, despite the strong relationship between Bush and Prince Bandar.
Investigators in Switzerland and the US Department of Justice, who took up the Saudi case when Britain abandoned it, will also be awaiting the government's next move. Ministers have so far refused to assist the US which has made requests for documents under a mutual legal assistance treaty.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/apr/11/bae.armstrade
There's no promise that the contracts will be honoured, there's no promise that the jobs will be secure, there's no promise that payment will actually be made for what is bought. You can't have any of that if you reinforce and support a corrupt method of working.
If no rules apply then they could simply take the planes without payment, or they could change their minds and award the contract to someone else who pays an even bigger bribe.
Basing an economy on corrupt practices isn't the solution to an economic problem, it's the proof and at times the causes of economic difficulties.
You gain no stability, you are weakened in the eyes of any other further contractor and you reinforce a situation that will mean you will lose business. Pretty soon business in the UK are likely to have no money to pay bribes - at that point all contracts based on bribery just go to whoever can still pay a bribe.
All you're doing until then is artifically creating work you wouldn't of otherwise had. At what point do you stop paying bribes - at 10% of the total profit of a contract? at 50%? at 95%?
The most important part of the ruling though is something I completely agree with - a government should be bound by the law.
If you believe a government shouldn't be bound by the law then you encourage not only unsound business practices but anything else a government may choose to do outside of a law. It all reinforces the idea that those who rule should exist without any boundaries to their power. Let the government stop investigations into bribes today then what's tomorrow - stopping investiagtions into workplace violence and intimidation? Stopping investigations into forced labour and slavery?
If you want to draw the line somewhere then at least start from where the law begins. And to throw away legal control on a government because of money and private profit - I can't imagine a reason that fills my heart with more sadness.
As to this though - good on the courts and now let's hope the bill is defeated in Parliament.
The US want to investigate BAE, they dont want to investigate the US companies who want the business. They are using the Justice Department as a protectionist policy.
Not sure that's true - the Justice Department has often investigated US companies
The US crackdown on online gambling firms reeked of protectionism. This is the same IMO, business with the Saudis is worth billions. They've got hard cash to spend and a lot of it, Saudi oil money is worth a lot to the US too and they've also got billions in contracts from them... Would make sense for them to want to keep a cosy and exclusive arrangement and keep BAE out.
I'm sure the Americans have investigated their own companies - but I'm also absolutely sure that they've turned a blind eye before.
In certain countries it is apparently standard practice to pay an inflated price for a big contract and then get something back in the form of bribes. It's not ideal - and it's not how we do business here but I cannot see any benefit to Britain or Saudi Arabia out of an investigation.
I am not, but this is the kind of system we are evolving more and more into. And whilst we are under that system, should we not accept how it works?
I am not supporting it, or saying it is right. But this is the Free Market. And these things make the Free Market work.
Anyway. Yeah, I wouldn't mind to much if the government was blatant about it. I only really dislike the cover up efforts, it all seems kindof lame. Governments do dodgey deals to get trade, we know this. So stop trying to hide it from us. I couldn't actually care less that we are dealing with the Saudi's. Stops them buying shit from Russia or China at least. And hey, we're selling our probably second rate products! So it's a bad regeime. It's never stopped us before, has it? If anything is a scandal, it's America arming Israel, who then sells that US technology to China, who America has expressley forbid to ever aquire it. It's hilarious, but still disgusting.