Spring 1984: Rolf Kiefer, owner of a small metal-construction firm in Wiesbaden, West Germany, receives a request to bid on the construction of a technology park in North Africa. The man soliciting the bids calls it a "big contract." Kiefer is intrigued, but as he says later, "when someone comes in with a suitcase full of money, you feel wary." When Kiefer learns that the "park" is to be built in Libya, he bows out. "I assumed from the outset that the man was talking about a weapons factory," recalls Kiefer, "and we didn't want to get involved."
February 1985: Imhausen-Chemie,...