Word: bernhard
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Prince Bernhard, the globetrotting royal businessman accused of being on the take in the Lockheed scandal (TIME, Feb. 23), was charged last week with doing some palm greasing of his own. The Netherlands' leading newspaper, Amsterdam's Telegraaf, implicated Bernhard in a $12 million bribe paid 25 years ago to the late dictator Juan Peron and other Argentine officials to clinch a $100 million railroad-car contract for the Dutch firm Werkspoor. The bribe, which was authorized by the Dutch State Bank and approved by the government, also included the gift of a deluxe presidential train...
What made the report all the more intriguing was the role played by Marinus Holtrop, one of three men appointed by Prime Minister Joop den Uyl to investigate the allegations against Bernhard in the Lockheed case. Holtrop, it turns out, was president of the Dutch State Bank at the time the bribery money was placed in Swiss bank accounts held by Peron and other Argentines...
...Telegraaf report-confirmed by Dutch officials familiar with the deal-stated that Bernhard was acting under government orders when he persuaded Peron to make the deal. Curiously, some Dutch businessmen regarded the disclosure as a defense of the beleaguered prince. Said one executive: "There's a difference, after all, between giving bribes and taking bribes...
...Sergeant. A key anti-Bernhard propagandist is Willem Oltmans, a freelance journalist. Oltmans' chumminess with Soviet diplomats in The Hague has aroused the curiosity of The Netherlands' FBI, the BVD (Binnenlandse Veiligheidsdienst). Many believe that his anti-Bernhard allegations are part of a well-orchestrated program to swing public opinion in favor of abdication. Said one Dutch official: "If the KGB is not behind the campaign, then at least they must be delighted in Moscow...
...Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Romanov since their visit to the Soviet Union in 1972. Romanov is a regular guest at Drakestein (the couple's chateau). German-born Claus, who once served in Hitler's army, has been labeled the "Red Feldwebel" (sergeant) by Conservatives and supporters of Prince Bernhard. At a recent diplomatic banquet in The Hague, Beatrix was overheard scolding a foreign diplomat for his snide remarks about the Soviets' disastrous grain harvest. "Why," she said, "should one always emphasize the Soviet Union's shortcomings...