In most of the developing world/3rd world countries to get any contracts you need to bribe the politicians. So any western company that has got government contracts to build anything has given bribes then that black money (illegal money) is parked in real estate and banks of the developed countries. Then they provide loans through development banks like IMF etc to offset the trade imbalances that results because of the money going out of these poor countries. I personally feel one of the reasons western countries don't like China silk road initiative is that China used their own playbook and cut them out of this market of exploitation. For the countries being exploited they exchanged 1 for the other but because of competition the politicians now get better deals make billions and once loose the power move to the west where their money was parked.

Seems like international trade and bribery go hand in hand.

The EXIM bank can be viewed as a subsidy (and unfair trade advantage) for companies like Boeing. I assume there's an EU version of it that will do everything it can to put you in an Airbus today.

Let's say, international trade in low enforcement/low transparency jurisdictions

Then it's an issue of "complying" with the informal regulations or not selling

Of course, everyone is doing it, especially in developing country like mine. But Airbus need to be punished because of their action anyway.

Is there evidence of others?

Well, in the UK no less than PM Blair personally interfered to get to SFO to drop the in investigation into BAE bribery on the Eurofighter Typhoon project in Saudi Arabia.

Something about 5,000 jobs, ₤6 billion, and - of course - upset Saudi princes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Yamamah_arms_deal#Serious_F...

I’m more familiar with German companies doing it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siemens_Greek_bribery_scandal

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/LIVE-the-israeli-submari...

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-41109132

And a longer list mixed with money laundering https://www.transparency.org/news/feature/25_corruption_scan...

All the big companies are doing it.

https://www.reuters.com/article/snc-lavalin-court/update-3-c...

While I'll get a ton of down votes for saying this: any place where government has too much presence and authority over economy is riddled with bribery. It just cannot be other way. What is that saying? Power corrupts.

As for solution - not sure. It seems this is defense case so more transparency might not be an option

I think it's obvious that the opposite is true.

Any place riddled with bribery is one where government has far too little authority and individuals ostensibly working for it are running rampant.

Authority is not exactly the same thing as power though.

Bribery happens when people have power with little accountability. Any kind of power, government or not, should go hand in hand with accountability. It's the only way to prevent corruption.

Well, I certainly don't. I'm just amused at the level of whataboutism I'm observing in these responses.

What about whataboutism? Seriously though just calling whataboutery is so boring, I found it interesting how often this happens with all defence contractors, as if there’s something deeply immoral at their core...