SECTION III

Business as Usual

 

 

BAE’s Al Yamamah deal, the largest and most corrupt weapons transaction in history, was not an isolated incident. It was part of a pattern of doing business that the company employed from Pretoria to Puento Alto via Prague. With the tacit support of the British government, BAE’s bribing of officials and politicians and their efforts to cover up the corruption undermined democracy and the rule of law and inhibited socio-economic development in the purchasing countries, which were much poorer than Saudi Arabia. Judging by their behaviour in the late 1990s, the only lesson BAE learned from the Al Yamamah experience was how to work the system: bribe and corrupt as necessary and then rely on your political friends for protection.