Lockheed scandal ( eng. Lockheed bribery scandals , ロ ッ キ ー ド -) is a political scandal in Germany , Italy , the Netherlands and Japan related to corruption of political circles of these countries and the American aircraft manufacturing company Lockheed .
The airline gave big bribes to officials of the mentioned countries for the sale of its military and passenger aircraft. In 1976, a bribe was discovered and made public by the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee . This caused a great political scandal in these countries.
For example, Lockheed manager and lobbyist Ernest Hauser admitted at a US Senate hearing that in 1961 his corporation bribed $ 10 million to German Defense Minister Franz Josef Strauss and his CSU party to buy from Lockheed for the Bundeswehr 916 Lockheed F-104 Starfighter fighters .
In Japan, ex-Prime Minister Tanaka Kakuea , a number of significant politicians and businessmen, as well as the airline’s leadership, were arrested for bribes from Lockheed. The trial dragged on for almost two decades. In February 1995, the Supreme Court of Japan finally found all suspects guilty.
Literature
- Solomon, L. & Linville, L. (1976) Transnational Conduct of American Multinational Corporations: Questionable Payments Abroad , 17 BCL Rev. 303, [1]
- Sampson, A. (1977) The Arms Bazaar: From Lebanon to Lockheed , Viking, ISBN 978-0-670-13263-8
- Sampson, A. (1976) Lockheed's Foreign Policy: Who, in the End, Corrupted Whom? New York Magazine, 03-15-1976, pp. 53–59 [2]
- Boulton, D. (1978) The Grease Machine: The inside Story of Lockheed's Dollar Diplomacy , New York: Harper and Row. ISBN 978-0-06-010431-3
- Hunziker, S. & Kamimura, I. (1996) Kakuei Tanaka, A political biography of modern Japan , Singapore: Times Edition ISBN 978-9812046895 [3]
- Mitchell, R. (1996) Political Bribery in Japan . Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. ISBN 978-0-8248-1819-7
- Hartung, W. (2010) Prophets of War: Lockheed Martin and the Making of the Military-Industrial Complex , Nation Books, ISBN 978-1-56858-420-1