by Mark Lombardi
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There are many reasons why someone would want to avail themselves of such services. Perhaps the oldest is the fear of seizure or confiscation in times of war, civil unrest, or political instability; what’s known as “fright capital.” Quite often when a country is invaded, under threat of invasion, or in the grip of a civil war or reign of terror, there is an attendant rush to ship assets out of the country. A classic case is the struggle of thousands of European Jews to transfer their property (most of which was never recovered) out of Nazi-controlled areas and into Switzerland and beyond.
But far and away the most common reason is tax evasion. The first truly modern multinational tax evaders arose in the United States in the 1920s. They were men like Joseph P. Kennedy, father of the late president, a stock manipulator and liquor importer who ordered his foreign suppliers and attorneys to submit fraudulent and inflated bills which he then promptly paid in order to move otherwise taxable profits overseas. Another was Meyer Lansky, the infamous longtime chief financial officer of the American mob. Lansky and his associates, whose revenues came primarily from bootlegging, illegal gambling, loansharking and prostitution, employed couriers and bagmen to carry their ill-gotten loot to banks overseas, primarily in Canada, Switzerland, and the Bahamas. By the mid-l930s many large US-based corporations had also begun to get in on the act by setting up foreign subsidiaries and affiliates, particularly in the United Kingdom and Bermuda, as vehicles for various kinds of financial gimmickry.
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The attitude of most Western governments to this activity is simple; they deplore it in countries considered unfriendly while condoning or even encouraging it among clients and allies. The purpose is to concentrate money and power in the hands of loyal local elites. Thus, unlike hot investment capital flowing in from other tainted offshore sources, “politically-packaged” black money often receives special red carpet treatment because it is controlled by a corrupt ally.
Though fully aware of the source of the plunder, officials of even the most “law-abiding” Western countries rarely interfere in the process, citing “mutual cooperation,” "national security interests," or “healthy export markets” as a pretext. Thus former Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie was able to amass a fortune worth around $15 billion over the course of his reign, most of which was banked and invested in Europe; ex-Zairean president Mobutu Sese Seko was believed at the time of his ouster to control bank accounts and assets in Belgium, the former colonial power, worth several billion dollars at a minimum; and Saddam Hussein’s personal and family fortune was at one time estimated at between $10 and $15 billion, some of which was invested in major French companies. Much the same applies to the Marcoses of the Philippines, the Shah of Iran, the Duvaliers of Haiti, Noh Tae Wu of South Korea, Suharto of Indonesia, Somoza of Nicaragua, the Salinas brothers of Mexico, ad infinitum. In some cases the level of cooperation offered by a patron state can go beyond “noninterference” to the actual provision of advisors and access to financial entities capable of performing whatever services the lucky ally or client might require. It is thought that Castle Bank and Trust (founded in the Bahamas in 1964), Nugan Hand Limited (chartered in Australia in l973), and World Finance Corporation (which operated out of Miami in the middle to late 1970s) provided such services at the behest of several successive American administrations.
Container vom 5. Juli 2009 von Bert Rebhandl
Der beste Film über die Deutschland AG stammt von einem Österreicher:
Hat Wolff von Amerongen Konkursdelikte begangen? von Gerhard Friedl aus dem Jahr 2004. Hier ist ein Blogeintrag dazu, und beim Wiener Innovativfilmvertrieb Sixpackfilm gibt es das offizielle Filmdatenblatt dazu. Gerhard Friedl, Jahrgang 1967, hat an der Münchner Filmhochschule bei Helmut Färber studiert.
Bei einer Begegnung vor wenigen Wochen sprach er von einem neuen Projekt, zu dem die Recherchen schon weit gediehen waren und das ihn in die Karibik hätte führen sollen. Wie wir heute erfahren haben, hat Gerhard Friedl sich das Leben genommen.
