Fifty years ago today, on June 9, 1975 (April 30, 1975), Lockheed suffered a bribery scandal. In June 1975, the chairperson of Northrop Associates' executive committee admitted to the Senate National Committee on Corporate Inquiry that the company had entered into many secret agreements with overseas consultants. When the company said it was following Lockheed's example, a hornet's nest was poked open. It soon became clear that Lockheed had paid millions of dollars to influential secret agents, industrialists, politicians, government officials, and senior foreign military officials in exchange for lucrative contracts to sell the company's military and civilian aircraft. All of this was done at the behest and with the participation of the company's chairperson, Daniel Horton, and its general manager, Carl Kochian, as well as their predecessors. The scandal was not confined to Senate hearings, but spread to foreign courts, where many bribe takers were tried and punished. In 1958, a veteran Lockheed salesperson was sent to Tokyo, where he set up an office and recruited a group of speculators. He also found a secret agent, Yoshio Koku. Japan ordered 230 Starfighters in 1960. Thanks to Yoshio Koku's efforts, he received a $1.70 million commission. In 1972, another huge deal was closed. This time it was Kochian who went to Tokyo to promote Lockheed's Samsung jets to JAL. Lockheed's official Tokyo agent told Kochian that it would be wise to offer 500 million yen to Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka; the company's secret agent, Yoshikawa, told Kochian that another 500 million yen should be given to Kakuei Tanaka's close friend, Kenji Yoshino. Kochian agreed to the two bribes. Although the Japanese decision was initially unfavorable to Lockheed, Yoshikawa later called the Minister of Industry and Foreign Trade and asked him to overturn the original decision. When Kochian offered 120 million yen to the minister, the president of All Japan Airlines informed Lockheed that it agreed to sign the purchase contract. In this way, $2 million in commissions, retainers, and other expenses were paid to government officials, industrialists, Yoshio and his colleagues. In 1977, when the results of Church's investigative committee were released, at least 14 people were interrogated in Tokyo. Lockheed tried to sell West Germany the Star Fighter in 1958 and persuaded West German Defense Minister Frances-Joseph Strauss to buy 96 aircraft the following year. In return, the chairperson of Lockheed's executive committee reached a secret "gentleman's agreement" with him, in which the company would pay Strauss' party, the Christian Socialist Union, a percentage of the aircraft's turnover as a commission. From 1958 to 1959, the Netherlands was also considering buying the Starfighter, and when the US Department of Defense cut 25 aircraft from its military aid budget, the Netherlands got its wish. Exactly how Queen Julian's husband, the influential Bernhard, made the purchase decision is unclear, but Lockheed did pay him $1 million through Swiss banks between 1960 and 1962. The prince resigned from all his public duties because of the scandal. Lockheed's activities also extended to Italy. In 1969, lawyer Ovidieu Lefobe and industrialist Camilio Crociani were selected by the company as secret agents to market the Hercules transport aircraft to the Italian government. Over the next two years, they spent more than $2 million bribing and collecting kickbacks from Italian Air Force generals, defense ministers and political parties and government officials. Lockheed paid generously to sign the purchase contract. When the Church Commission's findings became public, most of the Italian officials who had accepted bribes from proxies were taken to court, along with two proxies. Many were shocked when the Church Commission found that Lockheed's use of middlemen to bribe policymakers was repeated in Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Spain, Brazil and the Philippines. After an internal investigation, a special committee publicly condemned past wrongdoing and established a (new) set of business regulations for all Lockheed employees. Horton and Cochian were forced to retire early as the culprits in the bribery case.