BNL - IRAQGATE SCANDAL

 

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                             BNL - IRAQGATE SCANDAL

                  The Chicago Connection - Bush & Saddam Inc.

                  Key documents - sought by Gonzalez - withheld

With George Bush ready to take America into another war with Iraq to

destroy the nuclear, chemical, biological and missiles weapons that Bush

himself helped Saddam Hussein to build, Congressmen Henry Gonzalez, the

courageous Texas Democrat who heads the House Banking Committee, continues,

single-handedly, to peel back layer after layer of cover-up to reveal the

monumental proportions of the Iraqgate-BNL (Banca Nazionale Del Lavoro)

scandal that now threatens to bring down the Bush regime. But the most

explosive documents have been withheld.

         Over the past several months Gonzalez  has shown  the  Iraqgate-

BNL scandal to be bigger than anyone had imagined.  He has uncovered and

reported incontestable evidence that Bush and his associates secretly sold

nuclear, biological, chemical and missile-related weapons materials to

Saddam Hussein; blocked investigations into the use of such materials by

Hussein; suppressed memos warning of the dangers of such sales;

deliberately  falsified documents on such sales submitted to Congress and

interfered illegally to halt investigations into the criminal activities of

the BNL bank in secretly diverting American agricultural loans to buy the

weapons for Hussein.

BNL-BCCI  Chicago Branches

       Gonzalez has revealed a Bush policy disaster that lead to the first

Gulf War and a blunder that is now costing the Americans  $2 billion to pay

off the loans Bush guaranteed with U.S. taxpayersU money . Bush repeatedly

ignored warnings that Iraq would default on the loans.  Now,  certain key

documents - perhaps the most revealing yet -  are  being withheld from the

Gonzalez investigation.  They are said to be the records of the Chicago

branches of BNL and BCCI (Bank of Credit and Commerce International),

through which, some investigators say , George Bush and Saddam Hussein may

have been  involved in a joint, private enterprise to skim oil profits

arising from Reagan-Bush policies toward Iraq. The  documents have been

impounded by a Chicago court and Congressman  Gonzalez Banking Committee

has been denied access.

Bush's Pennzoil Profits

       Between 1980 and 1990 the Gulf region exported a trillion dollars

worth of oil to the West. Hundreds of billions of dollars in kickbacks were

involved. Some of the kickbacks were said to be  handled by the BNL/BCCI

banks for Pennzoil, an oil company founded by George Bush  The Pennzoil

case  was (is?) the target of Ross PerotUs much-denied investigation of the

Bush family and friends. Investigators believe the Chicago bank records

could help explain BushUs massive, covert military support for Iraq in the

years between 1981-1990.

         The Chicago BNL /BCCI records could also provide clues to why the

Bush Administration secretly - and possibly illegally - exempted eleven

members of the Bush cabinet from conflict of interest restrictions in their

handling of the Gulf war policy. Bush simply declared that the law

regarding conflict of interest would cease to apply to his advisors on the

Gulf war policy. He then ordered that his declaration would be not be made

public. Congressman Gonzalez is now asking Bush to  explain the deal. Bush

has not responded.

          According to some investigators,  the BNL-BCCI bank documents

now impounded by a Chicago  judge could  shed light not only on the

Iraqgate case, but on other illegal transactions including Iran-Contra,

October Surprise and the Inslaw case. In all instances monies passed

through the BNL/BCCI  banking network.

          BNL is an Italian bank now under  investigation by Congress for

fraud in using loans from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to finance

IraqUs pre-war military buildup. Over the past thirty years, BNL is

suspected of involvement in a wide range of international criminal

activities. (French Intelligence investigators have even linked the bank to

large payments to certain individuals in Europe in late 1963, thought to be

associated with the John Kennedy assassination.)

         On December 28th 1990, when Gonzalez  sought the records of the

Chicago branch of BNL (Case number 90 C 6863 of the U.S. District Court in

Chicago: People of the State of Illinois ex re; William C. Harris v. the

Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System),   Gonzalez was told by

Federal Judge, Brian Duff that he could not have them. Duff, a friend of

both Bush and Reagan, works closely with the Federal Reserve Bank. Duff

impounded the documents and abused GonzalezU attorney for Rbehaving like an

800 -pound gorilla.S That is when Duff impounded the records.

          Questions abound. Suspicions arise from the fact that among

officials involved in the BNL bank is Brent Scowcroft, BushUs National

Security advisor who, Gonzalez has now revealed, maintained a million-

dollar financial interest in 40 of the biggest U.S. weapons companies that

profited from U.S. policies toward Iraq, including General Electric,

General Motors, ITT, and Lockheed. Gonzalez has also revealed that

Assistant Secretary of State Laurence Eagleberger worked closely with BNL

when he and Scowcroft were part of Henry KissingerUs consulting firm.

Kissinger was a member of the board of BNL and his firm represents BNL in

the USA.

BNL, P2 and the Vatican Bank

        The BNL bank was also used for secret arms trade by the outlawed P2

Masonic Lodge of Rome, whose Grandmaster, Licio Gelli is thought to have

been the mastermind behind BNLUs illegal, world-wide banking strategies,

until his arrest in 1981, for embezzling $1.5 billion from the Vatican

Bank. The Vatican Bank had close ties with BNL. Gelli was recently

sentenced to 18 years in jail for his role in the case.

          Gelli was involved with the PopeUs banker and bodyguard, Bishop

Marcinkus (formerly of Chicago) in the Vatican Bank embezzlement. When  the

Italian government issued a warrant for the BishopUs arrest they were

blocked by the Vatican, which claims  separate city-state authority. (The

Pope is still closely involved with Marcinkus and the Vatican Bank is still

closely associated with BNL.)

        Bush and Gelli are friends.  Gelli was guest of honor at the 1981

Reagan-Bush inaugural ball. (N.Y. Times, June 4, 1981, page 7.)  Kissinger

also knew Gelli. When Gelli was arrested in March, 1981, Kissinger

immediately sent an agent to Rome with $18,000 to try to buy some of the

documents in the P2 case to keep them from becoming public ( In These

Times, Sept. 1982).  It may be of interest that P2 had a lodge in Chicago.

          Chicago, it is now emerging, has been the central point for vast,

international, illegal transactions involving the BNL and BCCI banks and

secret deals with American oil companies, military manufacturers, the CIA,

and possibly U.S. politicians. (According to a London source, unreleased

BCCI documents in the possession of the Bank of London  list the names of

at least 105 members of U.S. Congress - of both Houses and both parties -

who have received money through the Chicago branch of BCCI. The U.S.

Federal Reserve is said to have a copy of the same secret BCCI list).

The Octopus

       Just as the P2 scandal in Italy brought down the government and

destroyed hundred of careers in politics, industry and banking,  so too the

BNL/BCCI - Penzzoil case could bring down the Bush administration and send

dozens of top administration officials to jail. Indeed the P2 and BNL cases

overlap in the October Surprise case,  and U.S. investigators would do well

to examine the Italian government documents in the P2 case as part of their

inquiry into the October Surprise/BNL/BCCI/Penzzoil/Bush/Hussein links. It

is beginning to look as though the late journalist, Danny Casselaro was on

the right track at the time of his highly suspicious RsuicideS last year,

when he was investigating what he called RThe OctopusS, a vast,

interlocking, international criminal conspiracy.

Bush's Watergate

       Congress is now calling for the appointment of a Special Prosecutor

to investigate the ballooning BNL-Iraqgate case.  In his insightful and

relentless reporting on the case in The New York Times, William Safire says

flatly that BNL will be BushUs Watergate.  Saffire is now investigating the

Chicago link to the case. (Updates on the case now appear regularly on the

recorded telephone hotlines of controversial Chicago investigator, Sherman

Scholnick of the RCommittee to Clean Up the CourtsS,  who has spearheaded

his own investigation. Call: 312 - 731 1100 &  312- 731 1505 for five-

minute recorded updates.)

         When appointed, the Special Prosecutor in the BNL/Iraqgate case

should have immediate access to all the records, including the crucial

documents now confiscated and impounded by the Chicago court.

          When the truth of the BNL case is finally revealed, the War &

Peace foundation believes we will see the extent to which politics around

the world

have been corrupted by the arms trade. Iraqgate will serve as further

evidence of the need for international monitoring by the United Nations of

all weapons traffic as a first, essential step toward complete world

disarmament.

          Ironically, as we go to press,  joint efforts by both houses of

Congress in the wake of the Iraqgate revelations to tighten restrictions on

the sale of nuclear weapons-related materials to nations like Iraq, Iran

and Syria, have provoked a threat of veto by George Bush, who argues that

such non- proliferation legislation would mean a loss of business for

American nuclear exporters!

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