Almost a third of the government's arms sales machine is dedicated to selling to a single regime, Saudi Arabia. A Ministry of Defence publication circulated to defence firms and obtained by the Guardian shows the extent of Saudi dependence on Britain to run its air force. According to the document, no fewer than 161 of the department's 600 officials work for the "Saudi Armed Forces Project". The team is headed by Air Vice-Marshal John Thompson, based in central London. He has a place on Deso's [Defence Export Services Organisation, the Whitehall department which sells British weapons round the world] main board, headed by Alan Garwood, a former executive of Britain's biggest arms company, BAE. Stationed on the ground in Riyadh are two senior military men, Air Commodore Ray Hodgson and Air Commodore John Chandler. They are the British team commander and logistics chief respectively. The two RAF officers head a squad of 54 British officials who are permanently based in Saudi Arabia. The files show that they are distributed between the capital, Riyadh, a navy base at Jubail, and three big Saudi air bases at Dhahran, Khamis and Tabuk. These figures do not include the significant number of RAF air crew who are seconded to the Saudis to fly the Tornados and Hawks which Britain has sold to Riyadh under its longstanding Al Yamamah arms contract.