First International Bank in Houston and would simultaneously become a director of First
International Bankshares Ltd. of London, a merchant bank owned by First International
Bankshares, Inc. Bush also became a director of First International Bankshares Inc.,
which was the holding company for the entire international group. Thus, less than two
years before Margaret Thatcher came to power, Bush acquired the status of investment
banker in the City of London, the home of the Eurodollar market and the home of British
imperial financial circles in which such figures as Lord Victor Rothschild, Tiny Rowland,
the Sultan of Brunei, King Fahd of Saudi Arabia, and the Emir of Kuwait were at home.
An annual fee of $75,000 as a "consultant" also sweetened this pot. During the 1988
campaign, Bush gave the implacable stonewall to any questions about the services he
performed for the First International Bankshares group or about any other aspects of his
business activities during the pre-1980 interlude. Interfirst was then the largest bank in
Texas and was reportedly running speculation all over South America, China, and
Europe.
Later, after the Reagan-Bush orgy of speculation and usury had ruined the Texas
economy, the Texas commercial banks began to collapse into bankruptcy. First
International of Dallas (or "Interfirst") merged with RepublicBank during 1987 to form
First RepublicBank, which became the biggest commercial bank in Texas. Bankruptcy
overtook the new colossus just a few months later, but federal regulators delayed their
inevitable intervention until after the Texas primary in the spring of 1988 in order to
avoid a potentially acute embarrassment for Bush. Once Bush had the nomination locked
up, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation awarded the assets of First RepublicBank
to the North Carolina National Bank in exchange for no payment whatsoever on the part
of NCNC, which is reputedly a darling of the intelligence community.
During the heady days of Bush's directorship at Interfirst, the bank retained a law firm in
which one Lawrence Gibbs was a partner. Two partners of Gibbs "joined three
representatives of the energy department of Interfirst Bank on a trip to Peking, where
they conducted a week-long seminar on financing the production of natural resources for
the Oil and Gas Ministry of the People's Republic of China." [fn 2] This visit was made
in the context of trips to China by Bush for the purpose of setting up a lucrative oil
concession for J. Hugh Lietdkte of Pennzoil, Bush's old bunsiness partner. Gibbs, a clear
Bush asset, was made Commissioner of Internal Revenue on August 4, 1986. Here he
engineered the sweeheart deal for NCNB by decreeing $1.6 billion in tax breaks for this
bank. This is typical of the massive favors and graft for pro-Bush financier interests at the
expense of the taxpayer which are the hallmark of the Bush machine. Gibbs also
approved IRS participation in the October 6, 1986 federal-state police raid against
premises and persons associated with the political movement of Lyndon H. LaRouche in
Leesburg, Virginia. This raid was a leading part of the Bush machine's long term effort to
eliminate centers of political opposition to Bush's 1988 presidential bid. And LaRouche
had been a key adversary of Bush dating back to the 1979-80 New Hampshire primary
campaign, as we will shortly document.
Bush also joined the board of Purolator Oil Company in Rahway, New Jersey where his
crony, Wall Street raider Nicholas Brady (later Bush's Secretary of the Treasury) was the