From: harelb@math.cornell.edu (Harel Barzilai)
Subject: Secret Loans: White House arms "Friendly Dictators" -- the status quo
Originator: daemon@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: misc.activism.progressive on UseNet ; ACTIV-L@UMCVMB
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 02:40:35 GMT

...when friendly dictators misbehave -- murder, torture, tyranny,
don't count as misbehaving, for the White House -- as in being
unreliable/unpredictable, then we invade and mass-slaughter the
civilians and conscripts we've been forcing to live under the Butcher
by supporting him for years and years. -- Harel

 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
From: Jackie Hulme <cadwallader@igc.org>
 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

    "The President recently denied point blank that the 
    White House of the State Department knew of the charges 
    that Iraq was diverting United States assistance to build 
    nuclear weapons. [...]

    "Given the contents of the CIA report the President's statement
    seems rather disingenuous. The White House and State Department
    were keenly aware that BNL loans were tied to Iraq's highest
    priority weapons programs.


******************************************************************

Subject: BNL? Scared Witless.

        Here are some exerpts from Rep. Henry Gonzales July 
7, 1992 speech in the Special Orders section of the Debate 
in the House of Representatives. It can be found in Volume 
99,  Page H6005, under the title of The Rostow Gang.
        A full transcript will gladly be made available upon 
request to the address below.

	[From: Jackie Hulme <cadwallader@igc.org> 
 	--Harel]

"....Two days prior to winning approval for one billion 
dollars [in AGRICULTURAL subsidies for FY 1990], the 
National Security Agency and the State Deppartment 
received a detailed secret CIA report on BNL. The CIA 
report is entitled "Iraq-Italy, Repercussions of the BNL-
Atlanta Scandal." The report was prepared by the CIA's 
special division, the Office of the Near East and 
Southeast Asia Analysis.

[...]

...The secret report indicates that BNL loans were used to 
fund Iraq's clandestine military procurement network which 
was operating in the United States and Europe. The report 
indicates that several of the BNL-financed front companies 
in the network were secretly procuring technology for 
Iraq's missile programs and nuclear, bioliogical and 
chemical weapons programs.
        The President recently denied point blank that the 
White House of the State Department knew of the charges 
that Iraq was diverting United States assistance to build 
nuclear weapons. The President was quoted as saying:

        We didn't know that. The State Department didn't
        know that. You can talk about what one State
        Department employee *** and if we had known it
        wouldn't have happened.


        Given the contents of the CIA report the President's 
statement seems rather disingenuous. The White House and 
State Department were keenly aware that BNL loans were 
tied to Iraq's highest priority weapons programs. The CIA 
also had plenty of information in its files showing that 
the Iraqis involved in the BNL scandal represented the 
highest levels of the Iraqi government.
        For example, one of the unindicted co-conspirators in 
the BNL scandal is Hussain Kamil. Mr Kamil is Saddam 
Hussein's son-in-law and at the time he was in charge of 
Iraq's massive military industrialization effort. At the 
time of the BNL scandal the CIA listed him as the second 
most powerful man in Iraq. At this point I would like to 
place a telex in the RECORD showing Kamil wishing the 
employees of BNL a happy Easter.
        The telex referred to is as follows:

                        March 26, 1989

        For the attention of Mr C. Drogoul:
        I would like to express my greetings and personal
        good wishes for you and your family and all your 
        staff at Del Lavoro Bank - Atlanta on the occasion
        of the Easter festuivities. Wishing you all 
        happiness, good health and prosperity.
                Hussein Kamil Hasan
                The Ministry of Industry and Military 
                Production.

[....]

        [There was] regular conact between the various 
agencies involved in the handling of the BNL scandal and 
the decision to approve the CCC Program for Iraq. This 
includes regular contact with the State Department, 
Agriculture Department, Federal Reserve and te Justice 
Department. The contacts also included the White House.

        On November y7, 1989, this individual had a 
conversation with a fellow Treasury Department exmployee 
and the assistant US attorney in Atlanta, Ms Gail 
McKenzie.  [Ms McKenzie had been the assistant of a 
Justice Department employee who had been hired by the law 
firm HIRED TO DEFEND BNL] The notes of the conversation 
read:

        McKenzie: She has been called by the White House
        -- got the impression (they are) concerned about
        embarassment level.

        It is clearly improper for the White HOuse to be 
calling an assistant US attorney to talk about an open 
criminal case -- especially a case as sensitive as the BNL 
case.

        Rep. Gonzalez has also entered into the public record 
an article by Michael T. Klare entitled, FUELING THE FIRE: 
HOW WE ARMED THE MIDDLE EAST.

        The article quotes an anonymous Reagan Administration 
official from the State Department as saying, in 1983:

        Arms sales are the hard currency of foreign affairs.
        They replace the security pacts of the 1950's.

        This seems to encapsulate quite fairly the curent 
Administration's philosophy on arms control.


Rgds,


J. Hulme 

Newsgroups: alt.activism,alt.society.revolution,talk.politics.misc