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AP
Almost nothing is known about the Swiss Heinrich Thomet (53). In 2005, his name came up in connection with international arms deals, but no one has been able to accuse him of anything over the years. The Bernese farmer went unnoticed to become a powerful arms dealer. Even today, the mysterious businessman has his way.
The New York Times mentioned Thomet in 2008 when the Swiss tried to move Albanian weapons to Afghanistan. The Bernese went unnoticed and became one of the most powerful arms dealers in the world, as the investigation by “NZZ am Sonntag” now shows. And even today no one can prove anything to him.
Even in the 2016 Hollywood movie “War Dogs”, the lead role, played by Bradley Cooper (45), is inspired by Thomet. The unscrupulous gunman Thomet is described as a light-skinned, blue-eyed Swiss arms dealer, of whom there shouldn’t be a single photo available. According to “NZZ am Sonntag” there is only one photo of the Bernese. It comes from a press conference in October 2011 at the Tara arms factory in Montenegro, which broadcast “TV Vijesti”.
Farmer’s son from Riedbach BE
The world first learned of the alleged international arms dealer in 2008. A businessman named Kosta Trebicka was killed in a car accident in the interior of Albania. There were no witnesses. Trebicka was hunting and not wearing a seat belt, he told himself. Many did not believe this official version. Albanians demanded a fair investigation into Trebicka’s death, a newspaper headlined: “It was murder.”
Trebicka was not just any businessman, but a key witness in a multibillion dollar arms deal. “This deal was so spectacular that a Hollywood producer turned the case into a feature film. Right in the middle: a Swiss. Heinrich Thomet, son of a farmer and businessman from Riedbach, near Bern ”, investigated the“ NZZ am Sonntag ”. It is said that he was involved in the deal. Several of those implicated were later convicted. Thomet was never charged and his participation was always denied.
The 53-year-old built a Swiss arms company at a young age, and was attacked by the US secret service and suspected of bribing an Israeli military officer. The Bernese is none other than “one of the most important arms dealers of the last 40 years”. That’s what Andrew Feinstein, author and expert on global arms deals, says. Thomet, Feinstein is quoted, was cunning and reserved.
Thomet acts more internationally
Thomet became a farmer like his father. At the age of 20, he founded the company “Comando Arms” in 1988 on his parents’ farm with a childhood friend. Object of the company: Import, export and trade of firearms and accessories. It is the beginning of the increase in the international arms trade. Then Thomet finds a new partner: Karl Brügger. You found the “Brügger & Thomet” arms factory in Spiez BE. “At first they produce silencers for various police units”, knows the “NZZ am Sonntag”. “Later the company also manufactured its own weapons: submachine guns, sniper rifles, tear gas cannons.”
The arms factory now exists under the name “B&T”, employs around 100 people and is one of the largest Swiss exporters of war material. Thomet left the company in 2005 and was apparently no longer operational prior to that. Brügger never wanted to comment on his former business partner. Back in 2011, he told the news portal “Infosperber”: “We have nothing else to do with him. We work diametrically differently and we have police and authorities in Europe as clients. “Even then, Brugger did not know where Thomet was.” Montenegro, it was heard.
Thomet’s arms deals became more international after his break with Bruges. Thomet changed the name of his arms company “Comando Arms” several times, finally to “BT International”, as the company is still called today and is based in the greater Bern area. Thomet can still be found there. However, his family lives abroad, writes the “NZZ am Sonntag”.
The Hollywood-style gun deal
Over the years, Thomet has had a branching structure of companies with which it is involved in arms deals around the world, such as the Tara Aerospace arms factory in Montenegro, which was temporarily closed in 2018 and is said to be Thomet owns as a partner. As early as 2005, the names of BT International subsidiaries appeared in Albania, Bulgaria, Israel and Ukraine. In Israel he founded a company specializing in weapons and security systems.
It is moving weapons from Serbia and Montenegro to Iraq, according to a 2006 Amnesty International report cited in the article. The managing director is the former Israeli military attaché in Switzerland. He is later investigated for corruption in Israel. The February 2011 indictment speaks of a Land Cruiser as a gift and payment of 30,000 francs to the wife of the military attaché. The Israeli makes a deal with the prosecutor. In return, the bribery charge is dropped. When asked, Thomet said: “There was no bribery.”
The Federal Prosecutor’s Office was also active in Switzerland and carried out preliminary investigations into Thomet’s possible violation of the War Material Act. However, these will be discontinued. There are not enough suspicions. Thomet remains undisturbed, a pattern that runs through his entire life. The “NZZ am Sonntag” writes it like this: “People around him conflict with the law, but he keeps the slate clean.” This is also the case with his most sensational business, the Hollywood-style gun business, which was later also made into a movie. An Afghanistan weapons store that sold more than fifty types of ammunition: rifle, pistol and machine gun cartridges, hand grenades, mortar cartridges, tank ammunition and more.
The “very polite Swiss”
Thomet is said to have entered into the deal in 2007 through its supplier Meico, Albania’s state arms export agency. An intermediary describes him in the article as “a very polite Swiss, with a very professional appearance.”
Thomet later denied being involved in the deal and sent a message through his law firm that he was not involved in the transactions in question. But his name is later mentioned in an investigation by the United States House of Representatives and the Albanian Attorney General. And the aforementioned Albanian businessman Kosta Trebicka, a key witness in the case, was killed under suspicious circumstances.
Heinrich Thomet was never charged or convicted, and there is not a single investigation against him in Switzerland. By the way, the Bern arms dealer is said to have expanded his reach in recent months. Since the beginning of the Corona crisis, he has also been selling hygienic masks and antibody tests, and distributes them through his recently established Swiss company “BT International”.
