BREAKDOWN OF A FREELANCE GUN-RUNNING OPERATION

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00149R000100430022-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: November 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 4, 2000
• Sequence Number: 22
• Publication Date: August 1, 1965
• Content Type: NSPR

? Approved For Release 2000/135124nSIA-RDP75
(London, England)
AUGUST 1, 1965
STATI NTL
AR1VJS DEALING
#.6
wn of a free
r
gun-running operation
4
LAST TUESDAY in Parliament the Prime Minister
deplored the ? dangerous practIed under which arms are
transferred from Gov.ernments to private salesmen who
have been going all over the work! selling arms to trouble-
makers." Just 48 hours later, in Bedfordshire, fresh traces
a ppeared of the international arms racket: a Frenchman
na3ed Pant,. 4onte rank* the office of a transport firm at
Dimstable, and demanded delivery of 100 parachutes
stored there.
Paul,Thtnte is one of three mysterious Frenchmen who,
au ? an ex-operative of the U.S. Central Intelligence
A cy, tried earlier this year to parachute 198,000 worth
of muniskmade arms into Algeria. Ever since that
att ended with tile- arrest in Malta of their aircraft
an screw, it seemsthat Bonte and his fellow-promoters
?whp, totally escaped the rather cursory publicity over
the,bpdent?have been working to rebuild their aerial
surd*: mg system. Judging by certain converiOns in
Brusset$ duritig. the last few weeks, and Bontfs sudden
demand forI arachuttes (which were bought for a drop
t.
-planned son'. ? 1- ths ago) they may have been having
some sueeft,t_ ')4)
Investigatii% Ottheir first attempt, which failed merely
through the hilailouS incompetence of some of their
employees, revtaWntit only the surprising ease with which
arms can be bought and clandestinely shifted around
Europe: but also Mie fact that some Western and Com-
munist Governments seem curiously powerless in dealing
with the situation.
Continue
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Approved For Release 2000/05/24: CIA-RDP7
WHEN AT 7.15 a.m. on Feb-
ruary 4 a Lockheed Super-
Constellation?with the U.S. re-
gistration N 9642Z, but bearing
the false Ghanaian letter 9G28
?landed at Malta, and was
found to be carrying 1,000
rifles, two sub-machine guns
and 133,000 rounds of ammuni-
tion, it was assumed to be
bound for the Congo. After the
crew had been fined a total of
?240 for offences under the
Colonial Navigation Act, the
operator of the aircraft, Captain
Lucien Pickett, said he would
never divulge the destination,
because his life had been
t1ireaten14?
In fad, the arms were to
have ?i'lo ? 'parachuted into
the 1,1 of a peak called
Cascade de Kefrida, some
? 55 Viz . from the ;,mall
Algerian town of Bougie. An
elaborate plan had been laid to
deceive air-traffic controllers
orourf? ecliterraneak`
The ?egan on
11, 1964, en Train "--D .
an Aean, rear-ire? d 4,tinty
slings e at Arnster''darn 04',154
saying a marl called,,
wanted him.
The tact that pont
to talk about u
some time to in he fa
that it was to he nanced b
funds of the O.A.S. (the form
French-Algerian terrorist org
isation) took even longer.
the 44-year-old " Ben " Drew,, e,,,
cigar-burning, whisky-sinki
eg,end, in the world of fringe
1,,,,,
Viatica'', was a logical man to
la to about such a matter.
Drew, with 27 decorationA 'for
antry, used to be presient
even Seas airlines,
for the Unitad Natio
Congo, It was a
ion dJr outfit until
cau1it freighting quo
e -fighters into Tshombe, and
eig denounced byAdlai Steven-
son in the UN. _Seven Sem
went bust.
But between 1961, when he
_
left the Congo, and August.
1964, , when he arrived in
Amsterdam, Drew had been do-
en-
?
ing things even more interest-
ing to Bonte. He had been in
Vietnam; officially, he was work-
ing for a civil airline, but also
involved in aviation operations ,
for the American Central
gence Agency., Drew,:nowever, ;
has not been altogether,success-
ful with the C.I.A. Ile fratern-
ised with French agents, in the
bizarre belief that he could
bring them together with his
own bosses. I was fur-
loughed?that ,tneans fired."
Drew said lot week:
1,,,was in Vietnam Or
theU;Si Government, but the
conhegtion?between this and Vie
Algerian drop has no correfar
tion." The connection, however,
seems to be that Bonte's group
were given Drew's name
through his Vietnam contacts.
'Difficult cargo
Bonte met Drew at the Am-
sterdam Hilton and discussed a
"difficult ? cargo" in_ vague
terms. They made little pro-
gress for a week; but then
Bonte brought another French-
man, Georges Starkmann, to see
Drew. Suddenly, the talks
became "a 20-hour-a-day opera-
tion." Drew is still Feticent
about exactly what Starkmann
said to him which was so cim-
vincing?except for thes,t e- ,
merit: "Starkmann used to
in French Intelligence."
Drew recruitedn Amerrian
c
to called Bob Far ar " help
search for aircraft and crew..
After some false starts, they
happened on Captain H. Lucien
Pickett's Usair, operating out of
London. Usair had just un into
heavy financial trouble when
they " stranded " a party of
Jamaicans. On January ,26
Farquhar got on the phone to
Pickett's Argentinian assistant,
, Osvaldo Riba: had he any
DC 4s?
No, said Riba, but tlipil" fl
a Super-Constellation. Farqu ar
Ntited to know only one thing
hthe ,standard gun-runner's
question : did the doors open
inw.ar ds ? (Outward-o ening
doors prevent para-dropp ng.)
Captain Pickett: to go in at 500 feet
he doors were all right.
A day Bonte appeared at
Imulon Airport with Farquhar.
over drinks in the transit bar
Bonte ave Riba ?350 to secure
the deal. It was to drop arms
in Algeria, and as soon as the
tajk ended, Bonte left saying:
",NPw I have to go to Prague
and prepare the 'shipment"
:In principle, this was probably
the easiest part of the deal,
according to practitioners in
East-West trade. It wmild be
based on the Communist coun-
tries' lust for hard currency,
payment being made- simply by
setting-up a small import-export
company, and having it place
suitable deposits (for " machi-
nery ") to the account of one
of the Czech exporting firms in
Switzerland or Luxembourg.
However, the Czechs were not
told where the shipment was
going, in ease their political
sympathies with Ben Bella
overcame "'their commercial
instinct. :41/1eY were joicl the
arms we ThrRuand4ruadi.
On JamPit'ry 31 Pickett arrived
in Lona= to find his office
wildly eXeited over the prospect
of a -million deal. There
was,h ver, a difficulty: their
Const
on had a lien on it
for h dling-charges due to
their Agents at Gatwick Airport.
Next day, Drew and Farquhar
came over, to sort things out,
and a stormy but festive meet-
ing was ,,:held at Churchill's
night club ? ? Pickett, a 41-year-
old Floridan out of the same
war-hero and Congo-pilot back-
ground as !,P,,rew, attempted to
get the fee for the flight jacked
up from the ?3,500 offered: but
Drew told him that this was
merely the first of a series of
flights intended to, move 1,000
tons of arms from, Prague, and
if he could get the contract it
would be worth half-a!million
dollars. TheFrenchmen put
up, ?1,300 to release the lien.
' e Constegatipp was flown
to Apsterdamyhere Drew and
Farquhar had assembled five
rather motley crew-members
under Captain Vincent Burger.
Next day Pickett arrived to co
ordinate the take-off to the Um
airport of Beek, in South Hol
land, where parachutes were tE
be loaded and the registratior
changed: but he found the cre\A
in near-rebellion.
Bonte and Starkmann werE
there: and the crew, who up tc
then had thought it wa:
" straight " gun-running from
Prague to Leopoldville, did not
fancy the idea of a parachute.
drop at night in the Berbei
foothills. They wanted bonuses
and would only go if Pickett
accompanied the flight as navi-
gator., Drew had to give the
pilot another 1,000 dollars.
Special code
A Trinidadian student ii Lon-
don had been paid 1,000 dollars
to get a Ghanaian registration:
a telex message ostensibly
authorising the letters 9 G 28
was handed to Pickett, but bad
weather delayed take-off. Pickett
now radioed a ,rather unusual
message to Prague. Coded
LKPRYA, which:, meant ' direct
coniact with the Czech air
mi3Oistry headquarters: it asked
for, dfflay of 24 hours on " re-
quest. or penetration Red 11/
OMB:" It was signed with the
non-existent name Trans-African
at
Airw s.
Nor , ally, an aircraft would
ask its take-off airfield to obtait)
landing-clearance at Prague air-
port: clearly Pickett was opera-
ting under a Special relationship.
Next day, February 3, the air-
craft readied lie,ek, where the
seats were?..ri ed out, para-
chutes, and czgl-rollers loaded,
and tl GlAal,an letters painted
up 41 the. gt moment Julius
Graber, P. ett's Swiss ac-
countant, went along "because
we wanted a heart-to-heart talk
about Csair's financial pros-
pects."
The Constellation was four
hours late whertit crossed the
Czech border at die it Cheb
into Corridor1T-ea_ 11?but
Pickett's message to" file Avia-
tion Ministry worked dramatic-
ally well. As the aireraft slid
Continued
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Approved For Release 2000/05/24: CIA-RDP75-00149R000100430022-3
onto the snow-covered field at
12.10 a.m.: a jeep appeared to
escort it to a deserted runway.
A convoy materialised and, in
int.actly 40 minutes, 17 tons of
arms were on board.
Only burger was allowed off:
to file a flight-plan for Benina
field, Libya. Pickett tipped a
100-elo1lar bill to the head loader'
(who bowed), and the aircraft,
took off amediately. In the
tillow and 18 /. per cent. over's'
fowled, take-off was critical, Mit.
inhoriously the Constellation
-
clambered to 20,000 feet
beaded outalong'5 ,Red 11.
Now the plan for evadingstb
gstinfiterranean flight-controllers .
eame into action. After passing
over Munich, the Constellation
skirted Genoa: and informed
Genoa flight-control that it wa.
bound for Benina in Libya, bu
had suffered buffeting over the
Alps. Building up the picture o
an aircraft in difficulties; Pickett'
radioed Rome at about 4 a.m. to
report No. 3 engine feathered..
The scheme then, when the
aircraft got south of Sardinia,
was to ask Rome for permission
to divert to Palma, instead of
soing to Benina. Permission
eranted, the plan was actually to
turn towards Bone control-zone,
penetrate it by going in at
500 it. above sea-level to avoid
possible radar-detection.
There was an agreed landfall
on a small cape just inside the
bone control. The ConsteRaL
?ion, maintaining 500 -,f,tnc1
with its doors opened, was then
to make a timed run toward
the foothills of Case'ade. -? d
Krefrida, 15 kilometres . ifitanHd.
Several runs would have been
got south of Cagliari tho ere \
found themselves in a hopeless
tangle. Engine trouble was mos/
perfectly genuine, and they ,were
so late that thy would come
over the la pone in daylight.
Also, there was cloud over the
target, making the low-level run
through the hills dangerous.
The plane was so jammed with
s/41.1ris that the crew could hardly
s,.....,move about the hold--and they
.44onnd that they had only enough
ss" ope on board to tie one-quarter
'The crates to parachutes.
skett?who had never been
-On on the operation--decided
,ciabort the mission.
He /advised Rome and Malta
conttso),S that he was going on
t ' enina: then, as he ap-
hed Malta, requested per-
911 to /.land. Pickett had
riefed by Drew and the
thmen that he was on an
-1 mission: that the US
h Flegt were monitoring
'h.e...,.cbuld go into Malta
anS, time. Conceiv-
but for Picketts' believing
,the operation might have
ained secret. Certainly he
astounded when the Malta
ce arrested him.
MUCH, in fact, did the
urity services of the various
onsinvolved know about the
ration? One thing emerges
early: in the words of a senior
tch intelligence man, 'there
:far too little consultation
t, tbese matters." .
is no doubt that Dutch
was aware Of the pur-
of Pickett's flight before it
'Wok off. Drew had been under
stirvilillance since he arrived in
Amsterdam, because the Dutch
had been warned by American
intelligence about him.
His sudden activity after his
meeting with Starkmann was
investigated. (Drew made
several attempts to get a Strato-
cruiser aircraft from America to
do the job.)
Dutch security circles rriaim
tam n that information was passed
to the Americans before the
flight took place. So far as In-
sight's inquiries could ascertain,
this information failed to get
through to appropriate Amen-
can agencies. :
,flowever, it 'also seems that
:iimparatively little could have
been done to prevent,the arms-
flight. The Constellation left
Holland empty.
It seems that one of the things
that delayed the aircraft taking
off from Beek, though, was
extreme difficulties in 'getting
fuelled-up. Gossip on the 'air-
port was that the Dutch Air
Security division of the State
police had delayed the fuelling.
The division's h e a ii , how-
ever, Commandant E. Gerritsen,
Parachutes at Ilstastable k con-
vertible tar arnia-drook
necessary for the :creW'tri get
the cargo out: the artfbikwas
then to turn north .'Ordr',Afalce
for Palma, empty. ?
Palma was selected becatise
it was reckoned one of the less
inquisitive" airports around the
Mediterranean. The story that
the Constellation had been
slowed-up crossing from Cagliari
by engine-trouble was more
likely to go down there.
But by the time the aircraft
?
merely smiled blandly when
this was put to him.
Dutch Intelligence, whose
interest is chiefly in preventing
unscrupulous opera tors from
using Amsterdam's Schipol air-
port as a base of operation (this
is difficult, because it is one of
the major centres for charter-
fliehts) are completely satisfied
that the motivation behind the
operation was a substantial sum
of ex-O.A.S. money. However,
they have been able to build up
only a shadowy picture of Paul
Bonte and. Georges Starkmann,
the ,two Frenchmen chiefly in-
volved in the operation.
Bente seems to have been a
fixer and interpreter, while
Starkmartn was the cashier.
Altogether,. Starkmann paid
61,600 dollars over to Drew to
mourt the Algiers operation.
,
,5hadOWy figure
Theretwas another Frenchman
who appeared from time to time
mimed Pierre: he, however, re-
mains completely shadowy. The
Dutch are puzzled by the fact
that the French seem able to
throw comparatively little light
on the matter. Insight, however,
managed to locate Starkmann
and Bonte. The police in
Roubaix, where Bonte's family
are in business?and where he is
known as " an eccentric "?say
they have heard nothing of the
matter.
'Last week, Bonte was traced
f-Ol'slieuports in Belgium, where
at first he denied all knowledge
of the matter, except that he
hadspet Drew, Pickett and the
otlwrs. Faced with the positive
evidence of his involvement, he
said: " You seem to know all
about it. Why do you ask me?"
and refused . to comment.
Starkmann, traced to an .address
:in Rue Monceau, Paris, said he
was "fed up with ,the whole
-affair," and also would make no
adniiksion beyond the -fact that
he also knew Drew and Pickett.
They did admit, however, that
they had " heard of ", the
Algerian operation. Bonte ? went
so far as to say that there was
"definitely no similar opera-
tion planned for the future."
Starkmann, however, has been
staying in Brussels recently,
and conversations have been
proved in .,vhich he expressed
interest in setting up a similar
operation. Since January, the
Ben Bella Government, which
was presumably meant to be
harmed by dropping arms to the
rebellious elements, has fallen:
however, Dutch security men
believe that the organisers of
the drop Were not activated by
political gonsiderations: they
were trying simply to set up an
arms trade with guns obtained
in Czechoslovakia and trans-
ported to any customers.
IN THIS context, the question
arises of the group's activities in
England. Just after the abortive .
February deal, Bonte, Starkmann
and the third Frenchman,
Pierre, arrived in London. Pierre
carried a briefcase full of
dollars, and they held a series
of meetings (which went on into
April) in some of London's best
hotels, including the Hilton and
the Grosvenor Hou-se.
But although the Frenchmen
talked in terms of big Money?
$80,000 to set up the first flight
and a $2 million deal in the long
term, they could get no takers.
"1 realised they were up to
something when they asked for
aircraft with doors opening
inwards," said Mike Keegan, of
Keegan Aviation.
Pickett had nevertheless
bought equipment for the new
drop. his agents in the deal
paid ?1,200 for 100 unused,
expired white nylon parachutes.
An invoice dated February 10
requires that they be delivered
to Pickett at Schipol, but by
February 13 they were back in
Britain?in storage at Autair of
Luton.
When Autair began to
ask questions, the parachutes
were moved to the equally
innocent Williams Transport at
Dunstable. It was there that
Bonte tried to recover them on
Thursday claiming they be-
longed to him. In view of his
past activities, the question in-
evitably arises as to whether
the plan, originally mooten last
autumn to take 1,000 tons of
arms out of Prague is still a
workable proposition.
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