Word: bernhard
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...impetus for the new gossip and speculation was the 240-page report by a three-man Dutch commission headed by European Court Judge Andreas Donner, charging Prince Bernhard of The Netherlands with "unacceptable" behavior in his dealings with Lockheed. Although the commission found no proof that Bernhard actually received the $1.1 million that Lockheed allegedly paid him, the Dutch parliament last week somberly debated whether the 65-year-old royal consort should be prosecuted. A tiny left-wing faction favored prosecution. But Protestant Anti-Revolutionary Party Leader Willem Aantjes summed up the views of many: "History shows the faithfulness...
...effort to figure out Bernhard's financial activities, the commission had to thread its way through a labyrinth of deals that began in the late 1950s. Lockheed officials, who were distressed that Prince Bernhard favored Northrop F-5s over their Starfighter F-104s, thought the prince might appreciate a Jetstar plane for his private use. When the prince declined, Lockheed's European agent, Fred Meuser, suggested that $1 million in cash might be appropriate, and the money was channeled to the late Colonel "Chouli" Pantchoulidzew, a former officer of the Imperial Russian Guard who had been a permanent...
...later effort to reverse a Dutch decision to buy French Breguet Atlantic patrol planes rather than Lockheed's P-3 Orions, Lockheed offered Prince Bernhard $500,000 in July 1968. The prince, who knew that the Dutch government had already decided to buy the French planes, refused the money. According to the commission report, Lockheed insisted on showing "its appreciation of the prince's honesty by offering him $100,000 just the same." A Swiss bank check for that amount was cashed by a mysterious "Victor Van Baarn" before it too went inexplicably astray...
Perhaps the most damaging evidence unearthed by the commission was two letters that Prince Bernhard wrote to Lockheed in the fall of 1974, asking for commissions that might have netted him $1 million if The Netherlands decided to buy any of the corporation's P-3 Orions. Angered by Lockheed's apparent refusal of his request, the prince wrote: "Since 1968 I have in good faith spent a lot of time and effort to push things in the right way in critical areas and times and have tried to prevent wrong decisions influenced by political considerations...
...Lockheed, where a new management is now in charge, Board Chairman Robert Haack said only that he was "saddened" by the revelations in The Hague. That response seemed remarkably understated, for as the Dutch braced themselves for a televised parliamentary debate this week on the Bernhard report, they faced a bout of national soul searching as convulsive as that produced in the U.S. by the Watergate revelations...