The quiet Bristol company that sells bombs to Israel

bristol | peace | news report Saturday August 05, 2006 12:47 by Banquo's Ghost

RAYTHEON Systems Inc is a multinational arms producer that has a quiet little office in the Bristol Business park at Frenchay. It is also heavily engaged in supplying the Israeli airforce with its munitions (including cluster bombs) to target civilians in Lebanon and Gaza.

Find out all about RAYTHEON Systems Inc as a corporate entity (including its addresses) at:

http://www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=139

Some of their armaments specialisations are covered at:

http://www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=138

From Corporate Watch's summary, radar electronics and air to air missiles seem to be RAYTHEON's forte. So far, it seems like the company's 'business' just deals with 'legitimate' combat. However, investigations from comments that followed a July 25th 2006 news article about Israeli air force use of air strikes against civilians soon lead off in another direction...

http://www.freenewmexican.com/news/46922.html

Here, Ann Thibodeaux talks about 'RAYTHEON made weapons blasting open homes' in Lebanon.

Searching elsewhere, one can discover RAYTHEON have been implicated in aerial bombardment massacres in Iraq too:

http://www.infoimagination.org/ps/iraq/support_troops.html:

'The Independent newspaper of London claims that it has conclusively proved that an American missile was responsible for the devastation at the Shu'ale market in Baghdad last Friday, with at least 62 civilians confirmed dead. The missile - either a high speed anti-radiation missile (Harm) or a Paveway laser-guided bomb - is manufactured by RAYTHEON in Texas. RAYTHEON is the world's largest manufacturer of so-called "smart" weapons - including Patriots and Tomahawks.'

Incriminating evidence for RAYTHEON's involvement in making cluster bombs is as follows, sourced from the CAAT report in 2003:

http://www.caat.org.uk/publications/armsfairs/dsei-2003-report/clusterbombs.php

'A number of companies with cluster bomb interests are exhibiting at DSEi 2003, including INSYS, Israeli Military Industries (IMI) and Raytheon. INSYS is contracted by the MoD to support the Royal Air Force's arsenal of RBL755s (INSYS's former incarnation, Hunting Engineering, manufactured the BL755). IMI is reported to be the manufacturer of the L20 Extended Range Cluster Shell used by the Royal Artillery. RAYTHEON is the prime contractor for the Tomahawk cruise missile and the JSOW AGM-154, both of which deliver BLU/97B submunitions (cluster bombs).'

The final incriminating piece of evidence tying up RAYTHEON, the Israeli air force's terror campaign in Lebanon and its use of cluster ammunition comes from an Indymedia source:

http://dc.indymedia.org/newswire/display/134864/index.php

Sourced from a Democracy Now interview on the 25th of July 2006:

'FRIDA BERRIGAN: ... Israel's relationship with the United States is unique in a number of ways. And one of those ways is that essentially the United States provides 20% of the Israeli military budget on an annual basis, and then about 70% of that money that is given from the United States, from U.S. taxpayers, to Israel is then spent on weapons from Lockheed Martin and Boeing and RAYTHEON. Most other countries don't have that sort of cash relationship, where they go straight to U.S. corporations with U.S. money to buy weapons that are then used in the Occupied Territories and against Lebanon...

'Another major corporation -- you mentioned the missiles -- is RAYTHEON... They manufacture the Tomahawk missile, the Sidewinder, a number of other high-tech missiles that Israel has in its arsenal. These missiles have very sophisticated targeting components -- heat-seeking, they’re interfaced with GPS for very targeted attacks...

'So you have maybe ten weapons corporations in this country that have a stake in -- essentially in Israel using its military arsenal so that it can be replenished again. And the great thing about this relationship with Israel is, Israel doesn’t have to pay for it itself. It comes directly from U.S. (or British?) taxpayers in the form of foreign military financing, which is transferred to Israel, and then turns right back around and goes to Lockheed Martin or RAYTHEON.'

Bristolians should be fully aware of the local companies that are complicit in supplying state terrorism and mass murder.