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A MadCowMorningNews investigation has revealed
that San Diego defense contractor Titan Corp
is at the center of a private intelligence
network engaged in a broad range of criminal
activities with seeming impunity, everything
from drug trafficking to white collar crime
that includes massive stock fraud cumulatively
totaling billions.
The network involves
elements from the military, as well as
intelligence agencies like the CIA and Mossad,
in combination with Gulf and Saudi financiers
like the notorious Adnan Khashoggi, and
individuals who give off more than a whiff of
international organized crime.
However, with the recent
conviction and sentencing of California
Republican Congressman Randy “Duke”
Cunningham, the influence-peddling scandal
involving a nest of San Diego defense and
intelligence contractors that includes Brent
Wilkes, Titan Corp. and SAIC may be losing
momentum before getting anywhere close to the
dark heart of corruption beating just below
the surface.
A cabal of Republican
Congressmen from Southern California that
remain unscathed have culpability: Duncan
Hunter, Dana Rohrabacher and a man who may be
doing more long-term damage to American
national security than any of the others,
current Chairman of the SEC and former
Republican U.S. Rep. from Newport Beach,
Christopher Cox.
Another in-the-closet
Republican 'Patriot'
One of the biggest
potential benefits of a major Democratic
victory in the mid-term elections may be an
increased enthusiasm for confronting the epic
fraud which has been taking place since the
9/11 attack under the umbrella of “Homeland
Security.”
Because if the FBI’s
investigation peters out, as seems possible,
before reaching them, it will go down in
history as the biggest cover-up in America
since the prematurely-halted Iran-Contra and S
& L Scandals of the late 1980’s and early
1990’s.
Even though San Diego
defense contractor Titan Corp is currently
being investigated by more federal agencies at
once than any company since the heyday of
Lockheed in the 1970’s, despite the company's
history of running afoul of the law it is
still scoring big federal contracts.
One current
highly-sensitive $3 billion Titan contract,
for example, is to supply radios, signal
repeaters and related communications equipment
to federal law enforcement agencies, including
the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms,
the Customs Service, the Secret Service, the
Immigration and Naturalization Service, the
U.S. Marshals Service, the Drug Enforcement
Administration, and the FBI.
Double-dip me, heavy on
the secret sauce
Company executives may
eventually be able to listen-in to
intra-agency law enforcement communications
discussing Titan's own illegal activities.
And if they do, few will be
surprised...because "being connected means
never having to say you're sorry."
The companies involved
market products to businesses and consumers
that were originally developed for grandiose
defense schemes like the U.S. Stars Wars
program, or dreamed up in the labs of the CIA,
Mossad and other intelligence agencies.
No one plays this
“double-dipping” game better than the Titan
Corporation. Their subsidiary Surebeam’s
“anthrax-killing” machines cost the U.S. Post
Office $40 million, from technology originally
developed and paid for by the U.S. Defense
Department as part of the U.S. Star Wars
program under President Reagan.
Surebeam’s ‘solution’ was
so ineffective that the Post Office quietly
gave them away.
But the $40 million
contract paid for some really nice corporate
bonuses.
Rose colored glasses for
us, please
Need a pair of sunglasses
fitted with a fiber-optic video camera? How
about a bullet-proof umbrella? A baseball cap
strong enough to repel a hatchet blow?
Everyone can use shirt
button that is actually a surveillance
microphone, right?
All were originally
created for professional spies by a company
which Titan helped (with seed money to company
principal Michael Farkas) called CSS
International, that makes them available to
weekend spooks, like you or me, in their
famous Counter Spy shop in London.
The money involved in
this “global network” we are attempting to
describe is big enough to warp the galaxy's
space-time continuum and distort reality in
some truly amazing ways. We'll take a peek at
two examples...
All you need is love...
and a good divorce lawyer
You wouldn’t expect to
find one of the principals in this global
network, Saudi arms dealer and long-time CIA
fixer Adnan Khashoggi, up to his, er, eyeballs
in Sir Paul McCartney’s divorce.
But the sordid past of
McCartney’s wife, Heather Mills, and her
secret sex games with Khashoggi (and an
apparent slew of Saudi princes) surfaced with
a vengeance in London in their divorce
proceeding, splashed across the front pages of
every London tabloid.
Khashoggi paid her more
than $11,000 to have sex, said the tabs. And a
Saudi prince shelled out $9,000 to have her
join in a three-way with another woman.
"I mean it... the greasy
one costs extra."
It can’t be pleasant to
read that your wife was a hooker for Adnan
Khashoggi.
When lawyers for Heather
said she “strongly denies the allegations,” a
man identified as Khashoggi's former private
secretary contended in the News of the World
that "she has repeatedly lied. She was a
hooker. I know. I paid her."
Ouch! The recollections
of Heather’s former workmates were even more
vivid...
“The prince was tall and
greasy and I wanted to leave but I knew that
to get my money I'd have to have sex with
anyone in the room who picked me,” said one.
“Heather, on the other hand, was bubbling over
with enthusiasm."
Boeing 707 vs. Hard Rock
Neon Guitar
Another example of the
global network for which Southern California
Republican Congressmen run interference:
If you happened to be in
Miami on a hazy day in late July of 1997, you
might have seen a 707 Boeing jet threading its
way between skyscrapers downtown, and barely
missing the Hard Rock Cafe's giant neon
guitar.
“The case of the
weaving, wobbling Boeing 707 just grows more
curious,” reported the Miami Herald on July
26, 1997.
“A Boeing 707 cargo jet
that flew out of Miami in such spectacular,
scary fashion Thursday afternoon -- wobbling
and weaving between downtown buildings, nearly
buzz-sawing the and skimming Biscayne Bay at
an altitude usually occupied by pelicans --
sat safely on the tarmac last night in Gander,
Newfoundland.”
The plane, it turned
out, was owned by the partner of Titan Corp’s
most curious partner, Miami attorney Michael D
Farkas. Allen Beni had quite a colorful
curriculum vitae, even before his Boeing jet
started bobbing and weaving its way through
downtown Miami.
"We forgot about the
Ecuador thing, honest."
Today Farkas and Beni
own a company attempting to market Israeli
anti-missile technology to U.S. airlines and
owners of commercial aircraft.
The 707 belonged to
Beni’s cargo airline, Florida West Airlines,
said the story. Beni claimed to be in the dark
about why his aircraft had dodged disaster
with daredevil maneuvers over downtown Miami.
But that’s what spies do, isn’t it.
The story's next line
pretty much tells you everything you need to
know about how the “global network” operates:
“The 707 was registered
in Liberia and was being leased and operated
by a company called Shuttle Transporteur
Aerier, with offices in Belgium and the Congo,
formerly known as Zaire.”
The Herald reported
dryly, “The incident followed a slew of
mishaps, starting in April 1994, when the
airline failed to tell shareholders that one
its jets was seized after cocaine was
discovered on board during a drug raid in
Ecuador.”
Ouch!
"Let's steal one for the
Dukester"
Titan has a ringside seat
in the unfolding military procurement scandal,
and in the coming weeks we’ll go as deep as we
can into the company’s lead role in what we’re
calling Dukegate.
Titan was the single
biggest campaign contributor to both convicted
former Congressman Randy “Duke” Cunningham, as
well as the recently-announced Presidential
candidate (and as-yet un-indicted) Chairman of
the House Armed Services Committee, Duncan
Hunter.
The company faces
numerous federal investigations for work done
in Iraq and around the world. The Army
recently suspended 10% of Titan's payment for
work in Iraq pending an audit of employment
practices.
The company was hit last
year with a record-breaking $28 million fine
after its conviction for fixing a Presidential
election in an unlikely location: the African
state of Benin.
The Wall Street Journal
reported recently that the company is being
investigated in Bangladesh and the
Philippines.
But wait! There's more...
Titan contractors have
been accused of complicity in the torture and
prison abuse scandal in Abu Ghraib, Iraq.
Rounding out the rap
sheet, according to corporate watchdog
CorpWatch the Securities and Exchange
Commission (SEC) is currently investigating
bribery charges against Titan in at least five
separate countries: Indonesia, Ivory Coast,
Nigeria, Saudi Arabia and Zimbabwe.
And we’ve already
extensively reported on (so we won’t beat it
to death here)
Of course, it is Titan’s
still-unexplained involvement with both
Michael Farkas and the company he founded,
SkyWay Aircraft of St Petersburg, FL., which
is ultimately the firm's most intriguing
criminal connection...
Skyway is the company
recently in a spotlight of unwanted media
attention (okay, a flashlight of attention,
from only the MadCowMorningNews) as the
owner/operator of “Cocaine One,” the DC9
caught carrying 5.5 tons of cocaine in Mexico
in April for which no one, apparently, is
responsible.
Titan’s cumulative
history of running afoul of the law should
land it a slot in the U.S. Bureau of Prison's
Florence Supermax.
What's holding it up? And
who?
.
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