Remember The Dodgy Dossier?

This was the suspect document created by the British government that made the case for the Iraq war. It's been discredited for a long time, but new information has been discovered which makes Tony Blair look even more like Bush's poodle. It seems like they hired an official spin doctor to make sure the document was performing properly under the war brand.

Fresh evidence that a senior government press officer was closely involved in drawing up the government's discredited Iraq weapons dossier, despite official denials, was revealed yesterday.

A document the Foreign Office tried to suppress shows that John Williams, its director of communications at the time, had access to secret intelligence as he prepared an early draft in 2002.

The document suggests that Williams, a former Sunday Mirror political editor, used the same sources as the Joint Intelligence Committee, chaired by Sir John Scarlett, which produced the government's final dossier. Though there are striking similarities, Williams's draft does not contain the claim that Iraq could launch a chemical warfare weapon in 45 minutes - a claim central to the prime minister's case for war.

The 45-minute claim was made later, and subsequently withdrawn.

They ran an intelligence document by their press guy. Wonder if Ari Fleischer got the same treatment?

The fact that the 45-minute claim wasn't in the early draft, but so many other charges were identical, shows further that the document was sexed up, with something shocking added that Blair could use as a talking point for the public.

We're so used to government being run as a press operation in the Bush era, that it's not necessarily shocking that Britain was imitating this style. The case for war was so flimsy that all the rhetorical stops had to be pulled out. While the bitter-enders may thank God we invaded Iraq, sane people are looking for ways to ensure that this doesn't happen again. How about political consultants and press advisors don't get intelligence clearance?

Australian Hearst

So we learn that Rupert Murdoch, the soon-to-be owner of the Wall Street Journal, which he can add to the rest of his media empire, called Tony Blair 3 times in the 10 days before the start of the war in Iraq.

The telephone conversations were among six calls between the two men detailed by the cabinet office in response to a freedom of information request by the Liberal Democrat peer Lord Avebury [...]

No details were given of what subjects Mr Blair and the News Corporation chairman discussed in the calls on March 11, 13 and 19 2003, ahead of the launch of US-led military action in Iraq on March 20.

Lord Avebury said: "Rupert Murdoch has exerted his influence behind the scenes on a range of policies on which he is known to have strong views, including the regulation of broadcasting and the Iraq war. The public can now scrutinise the timing of his contacts with the former prime minister, to see whether they can be linked to events in the outside world."

I have a feeling that I know the nature of those three conversations:

"You furnish the pictures and I'll furnish the war."

Media concentration is so completely dangerous, and this is a textbook example of why.

Fourthbranch, Bandar Bush, and the 80 Billion Dollar Slush Fund

The WaPo series on Fourthbranch Cheney has given us a template for how this de facto chief executive likes to operate. We know that he likes to operate in the shadows, valuing secrecy above almost anything else. We know that he likes to be the filter through which all decisions are ultimately made. And we know, from today's third installment, that he likes to control the purse strings, and use that as a way to keep his subordinates in line (at least that's what I got from it. If he's in charge of the most minute of budget details, then the heads of NSA or State are going to want to stay on his good side).

We can put these known knowns (to borrow a Rumsfeldian phrase) to work in understanding Fourthbranch's involvement in the burgeoning scandal in Brtiain involving the Saudi Prince Bandar (a.k.a. Bandar Bush), a British defense contractor (oh wait, they're British - defence), and hundreds of billions of dollars - far more than is being discussed in most press reports.

Today BAE Systems announced that the US Department of Justice was investigating them:

BAE faces allegations that it ran a fund to help it win plane and military equipment orders from Saudi Arabia.

The allegations of illegal payments by BAE date back to the 1980s and the £43bn ($85bn) al-Yamamah deal that supplied Saudi Arabia with Tornado jets and other military equipment.

Earlier this month, the BBC and the Guardian newspaper reported that BAE had made payments worth hundreds of millions of pounds over a number of years to Prince Bandar, a leading member of the Saudi royal family.

According to the Guardian, the Department of Justice became interested because BAE used the US banking system to transfer regular payments to accounts controlled by Prince Bandar at Riggs Bank in Washington.

As a result, prosecutors decided that BAE could be investigated under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA).

OK, let's back up. But put that "al-Yamamah deal" in your back pocket.

What happened initially was that Bandar Bush was getting $2 billion dollar tips from BAE for helping push through enormous military aircraft deals between London and Riyadh. It was part of a large corruption investigation which was actually shut down in Britain by Tony Blair because it would potentially harm national security by damaging the fine reputation of Saudi Arabia (the 15 9/11 hijackers, apparently, didn't). Blair, I guess, got his payback by being named Mideast envoy. DoJ got involved because the tips were going into Bandar's account at Riggs Bank in Washington. This is VERY interesting, because Riggs Bank is a known launderer for dictators like Augusto Pinochet and others.

Riggs Bank courted business from former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet and helped him hide millions of dollars in assets from international prosecutors while he was under house arrest in Britain, according to a report by Senate investigators.

The report also says the top federal bank examiner in charge of supervising the District's largest bank kept details about Riggs's relationship with Pinochet out of the Riggs case file. That happened a few months before the examiner retired from the government and joined Riggs as a senior executive. The examiner, R. Ashley Lee, denied the allegations to Senate investigators.

The Senate report also said Lee recommended, while still working for the government, that the bank not be punished for failing to take steps designed to prevent money laundering.

So we know that this tip money is going into a bank with a notorious history of money laundering and covering for dirty figures around the world (Teodoro Obiang Nguema, the dictator of Equatorial Guinea, also did business with Riggs Bank). We know that Riggs Bank was actually run by one of Bush's uncles along with another crony, Joe Albritton. Yet DoJ is focusing pretty much on the BAE's use of the US banking system to make these corrupt payments. By the way, BAE is effectively an American company these days, and they're trying to take over US arms companies and do lots of bsuiness with the Pentagon (now why would the former head of Halliburton have a problem with that?).

Could the Justice Department be deliberately focusing on one small part of the scandal in order to distract from the big picture:

Because we know that Fourthbranch and Bandar Bush have been in cahoots lately. Sy Hersh spelled it out.

To undermine Iran, which is predominantly Shiite, the Bush Administration has decided, in effect, to reconfigure its priorities in the Middle East. In Lebanon, the Administration has coöperated with Saudi Arabia’s government, which is Sunni, in clandestine operations that are intended to weaken Hezbollah, the Shiite organization that is backed by Iran. The U.S. has also taken part in clandestine operations aimed at Iran and its ally Syria. A by-product of these activities has been the bolstering of Sunni extremist groups that espouse a militant vision of Islam and are hostile to America and sympathetic to Al Qaeda [...]

The key players behind the redirection are Vice-President Dick Cheney, the deputy national-security adviser Elliott Abrams, the departing Ambassador to Iraq (and nominee for United Nations Ambassador), Zalmay Khalilzad, and Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the Saudi national-security adviser. While Rice has been deeply involved in shaping the public policy, former and current officials said that the clandestine side has been guided by Cheney. (Cheney’s office and the White House declined to comment for this story; the Pentagon did not respond to specific queries but said, “The United States is not planning to go to war with Iran.”)

One thing that struck me after reading that is, where is the money coming from for these clandestine operations in the Middle East? Is Congress appropriating it? Hersh says no. Is it part of the intelligence budget? Hersh says it's off-the-books money. So, is it coming out of Bandar Bush's tip jar? Marcy Wheeler:

Cheney and Bandar have been freelancing on foreign policy of late. Of course, Congress is not paying for that freelancing [...] So where do you think Cheney and Bandar are getting the money? [...] I can imagine how much easier it'd be to start a war with Iran if you had an independent source of funds for the propaganda to make your case for war.

Seriously though, this looks more and more like Dick Cheney, with his buddy Bandar Bush, has decided to relive both Watergate and Iran-Contra, all in one.

And apparently, there's more than just the $2 billion dollars in Bandar's tip jar. It could be up to $160 billion, and that brings us back to the Saudi-British "al-Yamamah deal". It was essentially oil-for-jet fighters, but a lot of that cash may have been skimmed into this Riggs Bank account to fund future wars:

While British news organizations, led by The Guardian and BBC have published revealing details of BAE bribery and slush funds, involving Prince Bandar, former Chilean dictator Gen. Augusto Pinochet, and the late Dutch Royal Consort, Prince Bernhard, none of the British media have touched upon the full magnitude of the scandal--the approximately $160 billion in secret oil revenues, generated by the BAE-Saudi Al-Yamamah deal, over the past 22 years (see accompanying chart for the year-by-year cash value of the Saudi oil shipments to BAE, through British Petroleum, Royal Dutch Shell and the British government's Defence Export Sales Organization) [...]

British author William Simpson, who wrote the 2006 authorized biography of Prince Bandar, The Prince--The Secret Story of the World's Most Intriguing Royal, on the other hand, provided authoritative details "right from the prince's mouth" that should be of great interest to American Justice Department and Congressional investigators. What Simpson hinted at is perhaps the biggest covert Anglo-American slush fund in history --one that the author openly acknowledged had been used to fund clandestine wars, including the Afghantsi Mujahideen war against the Soviet Army in Afghanistan, and other covert military actions in Africa.

Managing cash in oil deals is apparently far looser in Britain than in the United States. The Saudis would pay into a fund, and in return they would get the weapons systems. But the value of the oil was about four times the value of the systems the Saudis got. That leaves hundreds of billions of dollars... unaccounted for.

Between the more than $80 billion in untraced funds generated through Al-Yamamah, according to EIR's conservative estimate, corroborated by U.S. intelligence sources, and the use of the project as a cover for covert activities around the globe and unauthorized weapons purchases, both the Justice Department and the U.S. Congress have a much bigger series of crimes to probe than the $2 billion in fees allegedly conduited through the Saudi accounts at Riggs Bank. The issue is the British corruption and subversion of American law on a grand scale.

Prince Bandar's ghost writer, William Simpson, has revealed that Al-Yamamah provided off-balance-sheet covert funding for the decade-long Mujihadeen covert war to drive the Soviet Red Army out of Afghanistan. U.S. intelligence sources have independently confirmed that at least some of those funds went to the recruitment and training of foreign Muslim fighters, who were sent to Afghanistan. Some of those fighters, following the Afghan War (1979-1990) would later surface in such far-away places as Algeria, the Philippines, Indonesia, Yemen, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia as Islamist insurgents, including members of Al Qaeda.

Which leads us back to Fourthbranch. We know that he has no respect for US law. If he wants to fund covert operations around the globe, he'll find a way to do it and he'll do his best to keep it a secret. This little kitty held by Bandar Bush and the Saudis is the perfect way to get the money where he feels it needs to go; we know he loves contorlling the purse strings. It appeared out of the reach of US justice system because it's a British/Saudi deal. But when Bandar got popped in Britain it threatened the whole deal. So DoJ is sent out to do a show investigation to divert attention away from this giant slush fund. I don't know exactly what's going on here, but there's a lot of strings that need to be pulled together.

I Wish I Knew How To Quit You

George Bush and Tony Blair need to just own up to the world that they're gay for each other. This is a tolerant society, nobody's going to mind. And it'll be a load off of the mind of that beard Laura:

U.S. President George W. Bush bid a reluctant farewell to his close friend and ally Tony Blair on Thursday as the two met at the British prime minister's final G8 summit.

"This is the last meeting I will have had with him as prime minister. It's a nostalgic moment for me," Bush told reporters, standing beside Blair after bilateral talks at the gathering of the world's top powers in Germany.

"I'm sorry it's come to be, but that's what happens in life. We'll move on," he added.

"Maybe we'll go off to some mountain in Wyoming every year or so for a fishing vacation, you know, just us boys, a mini-summit. We'll wear our cowboy hats and boots and clear some brush. I'd sure like to clear his brush."

Here's the hilarious punchline, apparently the love in unrequited:

Blair, asked later if he was equally as sad as Bush, said he was too enmeshed in the details of tackling climate change at the G8 to think about his imminent departure.

"To be absolutely frank, I'm so into the difference between various linking systems of emissions trading that I haven't the time to feel nostalgic or anything else," Blair said.

"Stupid science, gettin' in the way of our love! Dad-gum global warmin'!"

For such a "steely-eyed hero," there's never been someone more unnecessary maudlin than George Bush. He sounds like a character from a Douglas Sirk 1950s melodrama. Yo, Blair, want some advice? Lock your door in Heiligendamm at night. This could go all Fatal Atraction very quickly.

"Look, I boiled a rabbit for ya, Blair! Don't leave me, Blair! I'm all alone here!"

Cheney With An Accent

I only heard a snippet of this as I was walking out the door, but did Tony Blair actually tell Brian Williams in an interview that the Shiites and Sunnis mainly get along except for a few agitators? Did he really explain away 1400 years of animosity and statements from Sunnis that Shiites are "worse than the Jews"?

If so, then Blair has truly taken neocon fantasyland beliefs to heart. He may have done good for Northern Ireland, but in the Middle East, he's simply living in a different world.

UPDATE: Confirmed, he really did say that.

While an interview this long will have to play out over several days and several of our broadcasts, the headlines from our discussion were these: his decision to step down was years in the making; he says he would do it all again the same way, even knowing what we now know about Iraq -- where he says the situation is not a civil war -- in fact, Blair contends most Sunnis and Shiites get along, but for an agitated minority.

UPDATE II: You may remember the last neocon moron to claim that the Sunnis and Shiites were BFF. But at least Bill Kristol said it in April 2003 and didn't have four more years worth of indisputable evidence.

"I think there's been a certain amount of, frankly, Terry, a kind of pop sociology in America, that, you know, somehow the Shia can't get along with the Sunni, or the Shia in Iraq just want to establish some kind of fundamentalist regime. There's almost no evidence of that at all. Iraq has always been very secular."

I knew England as a whole was a bit behind the times in fashion and such, but you would have thought this would have penetrated 10 Downing Street.

The End of the Poodle

Does this mean the end of the Clinton Era or the end of the Bush era?

Tony Blair said Thursday he would step down as prime minister on June 27, closing a decade of power in which he fostered peace in Northern Ireland and followed the United States to a war in Iraq that cost him much of his popularity.

In a somber farewell, Blair made way for Treasury chief Gordon Brown to take the top post. The British leader looked overcome with emotion, struggling to retain his trademark broad grin as loud cheers rang out.

Following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States, it was right, Blair said, to "stand shoulder to shoulder with our oldest ally, and I did so out of belief."

"Hand on heart, I did what I thought was right," Blair told party workers and supporters at Trimdon Labour Club in his Sedgefield constituency in northern England. "I may have been wrong, but that's your call. But believe one thing if nothing else. I did what I thought was right for our country."

You really need to watch The Queen to see Blair's sleazy cozying up to power in action. He's a firefly to power, and his lasting legacy is going along with whoever is the most powerful person in the room. He combined the most destructive elements of Third Way-neoliberalism with the imperialist ends of neoconservatism. He's a neo's neo. And he will not be remembered well.

At least he had the sense to walk away at some point. Unlike the Attorney General, you know.

Tony Blair, Lead Electric Triangle for Toad The Wet Sprocket

This is hilarious.

See Ya

Tony Blair says "We up out"

Prime Minister Tony Blair will announce Wednesday a timetable for the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq, with 1,500 to return home in several weeks, the BBC reported.

Blair will also tell the House of Commons during his regular weekly appearance before it that a total of about 3,000 British soldiers will have left southern Iraq by the end of 2007, if the security there is sufficient, the British Broadcasting Corp. said, quoting government officials who weren't further identified.

According to NBC News, White House officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Blair will announce he is withdrawing 1,700 troops from Basra, southern Iraq. Blair and President Bush spoke about the timetable Tuesday morning, NBC reported.

It's the coalition of the get me outta here. Why does Tony Blair embolden the enemy?