Despite the special relationship between the US and the UK, the UK has spent the past several decades undermining the US government and making the world poorer and less safe. While the UK is an ally of the US, it really is mostly an opportunist looking to exploit any conflicts for its own gain.
This is the thesis of this book by Oliver Bullough (a Brit), with the subtitle, How Britain Helps the World’s Worst People Launder Money, Commit Crimes, and Get Away with Anything.
Unlike the US where we investigate the crooks, the UK serves them and considers them clients. This started in the 1950s after the US took over as the world’s superpower and the financial center of the world. Britain needed a new business model. Britain became the world’s butler. The author defines this as “An amoral enabler for hire, an enforcer for cash, which hides the reality of what it’s doing behind quaint traditions, literary allusions, immaculate tailoring, references to World War Two, and a supercilious manner.”
Hundreds of billions of pounds are laundered through the British banking system each year. That is money that has been stolen from people that desperately need it.
There are several chapters about Britain’s now diminished Empire, including the Suez Canal, the British Virgin Islands, Gibraltar, the Cayman Islands, and others. Most of these chapters describe the way that the territory has changed their laws to attract multinational companies and criminals of every stripe. A place like the Cayman Islands now depends on being a tax haven for scoundrels for over half their federal receipts.
In 1962, US Secretary of State Dean Acheson said that England had lost an empire and not yet found a new role. In fact, Britain had found a new role: as an amoral servant of wealth wherever it could be found, using the skills it had built up over centuries of empire building to help the owners of wealth avoid having to account to anyone but themselves.
The whole book isn’t about the far-flung remnants of empire. Much of the butlering, maybe most of it, goes on right in the City of London. It is there that the Russian oligarchs have chosen to live and spend. And the new rich of China are right behind them.
The most prominent of the Russians featured in the book is Dmitri Firtash, Putin’s man in Ukraine. Firtash came to London with enough money to buy up real estate, create foundations and make donations that got him access to the highest levels of British government. He was able to buy political power. But Britain is being corrupted by accommodating these criminals.
The contrast with the US is striking. The US has continued to investigate Firtash as the criminal he is. Eventually, Firtash was arrested in Vienna at the request of the FBI. He was accused of bribing officials in India. He has been held in custody in Vienna for the last nine years.
This book is about the damage that Britain’s business model has done, both in Britain and around the world. Greed has led to corruption in many places around the world, problem gambling in Britain and the increased influence of criminal elements in Britain.
Britain has come to realize that they are dependent on the butlering business they have created. The author hopes that Britain will change its ways and do the right thing. However, history doesn’t lead one to be optimistic this will happen.
This is an eye-opening book and beautifully written. I recommend it.
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