Those wonderful Saudi allies against terror

Like the French in war, the Saudis there when they need you. They couldn't wait for us to send over our military after Saddam's 1990 invasion of Kuwait. When it comes to intelligence operations, well, there's the old saying: "With friends like these..."

From the FCPA Blog:

The case began six years ago with allegations that BAE secretly paid $2 billion to Prince Bandar bin Sultan -- Saudi Arabia's former ambassador to Washington -- in return for inside help selling Typhoon jet fighters to the Saudi government. The SFO opened an investigation but was forced to drop it in December 2006 -- just as investigators were closing in on evidence about money transfers through Switzerland. The SFO later said Saudi Arabia had threatened to end all anti-terrorism cooperation with the U.K. unless the Blair government pulled the plug on the investigation.