The Nexus of Organized Crime and Terrorism: Two Case Studies in Cigarette Smuggling

Abstract

This article examines two case studies that illustrate how two different types of actors were involved in a cigarette smuggling-terror nexus. The first case examines R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company’s alleged deliberate sales of its products in Iraq in contravention of the UN embargo and U.S. law. R.J. Reynolds used criminal actors as suppliers and provided financial compensation to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a recognized terrorist organization, and Uday Hussein (Saddam Hussein’s son) to facilitate this transport. The second case examines a Hezbollah cell operating out of Charlotte, North Carolina. The cell trafficked cigarettes from North Carolina to Michigan, reaping significant profits by ex-ploiting the difference in cigarette tax rates between the two states. The two case studies revealed that terrorist financing occurs in the United States and as a result of the actions of a terrorist support cell and a U.S.-based company. In both cases, a legitimate commodity was used for illicit purposes. This paper focuses on an aspect of terrorist funding that has not been accorded sufficient attention the illicit use of a legitimately produced commodity to provide terrorist financing. Scholars have studied terrorist funding from such