The story of possible corruption between BAE and the Saudi government, and how the British government ignored it, is shocking. But we should not regard this episode as an aberration. Instead, it should force us to question the way foreign policy is thought about and practised in government today.For decades British policy towards Saudi Arabia has been dominated by al-Yamamah, the massive BAE deal to provide aircraft and supplies. When I worked on the Middle East at the Foreign Office in the mid-90s, it was widely assumed that, along with uninterrupted oil supplies, this was what Britain's Saudi policy was "about". Any other concern, whether of human rights or the export of radical Wahhabi Islam, was by and large secondary.
This assumption was never questioned by officials or ministers. It was just the way things were. To think otherwise, that British policy - "our" policy as we called it (though it was never democratically debated, of course) - should be about human rights or Saudi Arabia's contribution to global security, would have been dismissed as naive or fanciful. We were just being realistic.
The size and controversy of al-Yamamah make it stand out. But British diplomacy worldwide remains dominated by such realism. Most large embassies have staffs of military attaches tasked to sell arms for British companies. The Defence Export Services Organisation is paid for by the taxpayer, not BAE. It is taken as a given within government that selling arms is in "our" national interest. Unquestioned by many officials inside the machine is the belief that British "interests" are about exports and jobs, even though not once have the British people been asked if they agree. These assumptions have never been subjected to serious scrutiny within government.
Recently, the notion of security has been added to the British national interests at stake in Saudi Arabia. We are told by the prime minister that had the corruption investigation continued, Saudi cooperation on anti-terrorism would have been jeopardised. We do not know the extent of that cooperation: that is secret. But it should be part of the calculus of how we behave towards Saudi Arabia.
Though not permitted to know about it, we can question the paramountcy of security in our relations with Saudi Arabia. It has one of the worst human rights records in the region; its record in imprisonment without trial and denial of political rights is at least as bad as that of Iran or Syria. A simple question for those who affirm the realism of British policy towards Saudi Arabia: are political repression and autocracy likely to feed terrorism?
If yes, then our policy is precisely wrong. We are supporting the very thing that will perpetuate our terrorist problem. For decades, western policy towards Saudi Arabia has been about arms sales, oil, and deference to the autocrats. The recent history of Saudi-origin terrorists - 15 of the 20 September 11 hijackers - suggests at the very least that this policy may not be working.
The BAE episode is serious for several reasons. A British company has escaped criminal investigation on grounds other than the evidence; this has been admitted by the prime minister, attorney general and head of the Serious Fraud Office. The law in question is the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act - note the date it was passed: November 2001. That the government has ignored this act tells a story of double standards, to the world as well as to us.
Foreign policy should not be calculated according to some abstract collection of invented "interests": the reductive boxes of "our" economic or security interests. These things are never clearly defined or debated, even in government; they are just assumed. These unquestioned and frankly lazy assumptions of what really matters in our relations with the rest of the world do not stand up to scrutiny.
Our interests in Saudi Arabia cannot be seen in isolation. This episode has undermined and will continue to undermine British credibility in supporting the rule of law across the board, not just on corruption. The short-sighted belief that security cooperation with Saudi Arabia matters more than the law may not ultimately serve our cause in combating terrorism. When measured in terms of its broader ramifications, this belief may well weaken the cause.
This episode shines an unforgiving light not only on the actions of the attorney general and prime minister. It also shows the mental landscapes of those who frame and make our foreign policy. Their assumptions about what foreign policy is "about" and which priorities to choose are simplistic and arbitrary - they may be right, but they may also be terribly wrong. At a minimum, these choices and those who make them demand scrutiny, transparency, debate. Foreign policy should not be made according to the unscrutinised whims of a tiny few officials and ministers. It is far too important for that.
Carne Ross, a former diplomat, runs Independent Diplomat, a non-profit advisory group. He is the author of Independent Diplomat: Dispatches From an Unaccountable Elite.