Customer Reviews

The Outlaw Bank: A Wild Ride into the Secret Heart of BCCI

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While most analyses of BCCI saw it as a banking scandal, Beaty and Gwynne correctly understood and colorfully present its true nature: as the deepest and most detailed glimpse anyone has so far had into the real workings of the underground economy. Their findings, which have never been challenged or refuted, have only grown more urgent with time. This book will not only tell you where Osama-types come from, it will tell you how and why they can thrive -- or not. That it was written before anyone knew who bin Laden was makes it all that more extraordinary.

The events that inspired this book occurred over 15 years ago, but if you want to understand what is going on now in the world politically and economically, especially in terms of US-European-Middle Eastern-Third World relations, this is still very timely.

Outlaw Bank is an excellent and far-reaching piece of well-documented investigative reporting that carefully uncovers the BCCI scandal and the ensuing US cover-up attempts. The sheer scope of the corruption, the deception, the narcotics and clandestine weapons trade involving US government agencies, personnel, and very well-known politicians is stunning. Not only is it as bad as you imagined in your wildest dreams, but many of the same people are still exerting influence (James Baker, Jimmy Carter). BCCI may be gone, but after reading this book and then looking around, you will conclude that not a thing has really changed.

The book for the most part stays away from hyperbole, and while I found it a little difficult going in some of the explanations of financial transactions, I realized often that's because I just couldn't believe what I was reading!

Beaty and Gwynne do an excellent job tackling the Leviathan that was BCCI. With so many labrynthine angles to pursue, this book does a terrific job of presenting them to the reader in clear and lucid terms. With a keen eye for crafting a good story, they keep your interest throughout by adding a bit of detective story flavor. Indeed, just investigating this story has always been dangerous for journalists and public servants--many deaths are associated with BCCI.
This book would be a timely read right now, as many of the players involved in BCCI still exercise huge influence on world affairs. Though published in 1993, the book details very accurately our current president's involvement with figures closely connected to the drug and arms dealing that was a huge part of the BCCI network, not to mention the funding of international terrorists, including the bin-Ladens.
Long before Michael Moore, and much more academic, these writers had no idea that they were doing the world a great service by helping to uncover the massive corruption of our own government and its decades of business dealings with terrorists and criminals throughout the Middle East and the world, despite their overt lying to the contrary. Read it before the election.

Not a bad report of what took place although the topic could be a bit dry for the average reader. The dust jacket tries to make the book out to be a bit sexier then it really is. The authors do a good job or moving the story along but I did expect more from Beaty. I think what is interesting is some of the same move movement issues covered within the book are now coming to the forefront with the current crack down on terrorists. If you are interested in the topic of international banking then this book will be interesting.

I think this is a well-written and important book, but boy is it a slog.

It's the history of the nefarious Bank of Credit and Commerce International, a Middle-Eastern bank that grew to vast power during the 80s and 90s. It's a story of an organization that might have been run by Dr. Evil, only without the humor. The bank was involved, it seems, in every manner of sordid financial activity: money laundering, terrorism, arms dealing, drug running, etc.

But you'd better be seriously interested in the situation if you want to tackle this book, a thick 350+ pages that was not written in a user-friendly style. Moreover, you'd better have your sea legs regarding the technical jargon of banking and investing, or much of this book will be opaque to you.