Matt Kennard and Phil Miller's new film about a BAE factory town features an ex-government adviser on Saudi arms sales speaking on camera with a journalist for the first time.
October 15, 2021 | By Matt Kennard and Phil Miller
Harry Kane has just scored a late goal, confirming England's win over Germany in this summer's Euros. We are seated under a marquee outside a pub near a main road in the nondescript village of Warton, Lancashire.
One of the punters stands up, lifting his Jägerbomb high into the air. "There were 10 German bombers in the sky," he sings as he dances awkwardly. "And the RAF from England shot one down."
Warton has a population of 2,000 people and on the surface there is nothing that sets it apart from any other English village. It has the primary school, nursery, Tesco Express, playground, corner shop, that make up the standard vista in small-town Britain.
It's definitely not the kind of place to which you would drive 250 miles to watch an England game. But we're here because Warton is, in fact, not just another sleepy corner of England. On the other side of the pub sits BAE Warton, a factory and aerodrome belonging to Britain's largest arms company.
This factory, surrounded by lush fields and residential cul-de-sacs, is a key cog in the Saudi Arabian war machine which has been bombing Yemen since 2015, creating the world's worst humanitarian disaster in the process.
But it appears this is a dirty secret most Wartonians are unaware of. "Nobody knows anything like that," Gary Isaacs, one of the spectators at the pub, tells us after the game. "We only know what goes on here in Warton. We don't know if the flights come in and then disappear out somewhere else."
On the factory's exports to Saudi Arabia, he adds: "No, I'd be quite concerned about that, to be quite honest."
Isaacs actually lives next to the aerodrome itself. "Where we live we're literally at the bottom of the runway," he says. "You can see the whites of their eyes sometimes of the pilots when they're coming in and some of them actually quite enjoy putting a bit of afterburner on and get all the alarms going everywhere we live."
Before kick off we had checked out the runway. Around its perimeter stands high fencing and barbed wire with signs forbidding entry. As we approached, a Hawk fighter jet taxied down the runway and then took off. The noise was incredible, but the horses in the field next door barely noticed.
The Saudis have bought dozens of Hawks from Warton to train their pilots before they can fly the company's more powerful Tornado and Typhoon aircraft. Thirty Saudi pilots have learnt to fly the Hawk in the U.K. since 2018.
We are in Warton specifically to see a flight that leaves every Wednesday and which ends up at the King Fahad military airbase in Saudi Arabia. Although its cargo is murky, it is believed to carry supplies for the Saudis' Typhoon fighter jet fleet.
Please go to Consortium News to read more.
________
It's definitely not the kind of place to which you would drive 250 miles to watch an England game. But we're here because Warton is, in fact, not just another sleepy corner of England. On the other side of the pub sits BAE Warton, a factory and aerodrome belonging to Britain's largest arms company.
This factory, surrounded by lush fields and residential cul-de-sacs, is a key cog in the Saudi Arabian war machine which has been bombing Yemen since 2015, creating the world's worst humanitarian disaster in the process.
But it appears this is a dirty secret most Wartonians are unaware of. "Nobody knows anything like that," Gary Isaacs, one of the spectators at the pub, tells us after the game. "We only know what goes on here in Warton. We don't know if the flights come in and then disappear out somewhere else."
On the factory's exports to Saudi Arabia, he adds: "No, I'd be quite concerned about that, to be quite honest."
Isaacs actually lives next to the aerodrome itself. "Where we live we're literally at the bottom of the runway," he says. "You can see the whites of their eyes sometimes of the pilots when they're coming in and some of them actually quite enjoy putting a bit of afterburner on and get all the alarms going everywhere we live."
Village airport: A cargo plane taxis down Warton's runway, bound for Saudi Arabia. (Phil Miller, Declassified UK)
The Saudis have bought dozens of Hawks from Warton to train their pilots before they can fly the company's more powerful Tornado and Typhoon aircraft. Thirty Saudi pilots have learnt to fly the Hawk in the U.K. since 2018.
We are in Warton specifically to see a flight that leaves every Wednesday and which ends up at the King Fahad military airbase in Saudi Arabia. Although its cargo is murky, it is believed to carry supplies for the Saudis' Typhoon fighter jet fleet.
Please go to Consortium News to read more.
________
Doing royal deals while the people in Yemen get royally bombed:
Check this tosser out talking about "building businesses":
Impressive history is it not?
Impressive history is it not?
Britain has talent:
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.