Terrorism and The Carlyle Group

The recent uproar over the Bush administration’s screening of international financial data for terrorist links revealed the existence of the SWIFT program. Information showed the top secret effort to be based in Brussels, Belgium.

Given the Bush mantra that the private sector can do things much more efficiently than government, rest assured the feds contracted out this work. That the Bush leadership style insures poor operational results is the topic for another story.

Who might be conducting this work on behalf of our federal government? Could a recent news release shed any light on this question? The Carlyle Group just closed on a deal giving them part ownership of FRS Global, a financial services and software company based in Brussels, Belgium.

FRS markets a unique set of enterprise risk and regulatory compliance solutions for financial institutions. Sharing data with the feds certainly fits under “regulatory compliance”. The base of their unique video shows data capture, data foundation and analytics specific to regulatory requirements.

In summer of 2005 FRS purchased a software product with unique capabilities from Providus. The press release states “As a combined entity, we will be well positioned to play a role in facilitating the pending convergence of regulatory compliance and risk management practices around the globe”.

Just last summer The Carlyle Group closed another acquisition, LifeCare Hospitals. Several weeks later, Hurricane Katrina struck and 24 patients died in the LifeCare Unit in Memorial Medical Center. President Bush chose to leave this important fact out of his White House Lessons Learned report. That likely will help the Carlyle attorneys facing wrongful death lawsuits.

If FRS does provide the SWIFT analysis, this case serves as another example of the expansion of the military industrial complex into the government industrial monstrosity. That Bush’s buddies get large chunks of the business is just the way the ball bounces.

The recent British airport security scare will likely help another Carlyle affiliate, QinetiQ. The company was born out of British intelligence several years ago. It specializes in using human science in the provision of more secure travel environments. How might their homeland security division make out with the new revelations of chemical bombs? Swimmingly, would be my guess.