Thanks for posting this, I was thinking the same thing!
If we think of the timeline when Desmond went back to 1996 on his most recent time travel, we ran into Mr. Widmore purchasing the lost ship's log from the Black Pearl. It was being sold from a Hanso, who we all know are relations to a degree. Which we also know that Hanso was the financier for the Dharma project.
Could Widmore be a subcontractor to any of the projects we don't know for sure, but we do know that Widmore "products" have consistently shown up in the show, from pregnancy test to a sign when Desmond time travelled the first time, well at least known to the viewers.
Back to the 1996 segment, when Widmore won the bidding on the ships log he had 8 years to figure out the islands mystery and look for it. That log must have some information about the island. His knowledge of the island could be even prior to Penny and Desmond breaking up. Because he hosts the boat race around the world. Was that in hopes to stumble on the island like other boats. So far there are three ships/boats we know of made it to the island the Black Rock, Danielle's boat (well as we know to date this is open to debate as we never saw her ship that ran aground..hmmm) and Desmond's sailing yacht.
As to the relationship between the two, we have been shown, not factual at this point, that Ben has multiple passports, various foreign currency and we don't know that he has never left the island. So he may have swindled, promised or whatever but why would Widmore want him dead if Ben hadn't pulled something on him. Also we know that Ben had that video of Widmore...if he didn't know him why would he have the video. He knew who was on that freighter when he was in the wheelchair speaking to Michael from his hidden room. If you recall the time line, that was last season after the spinal surgery. So yes, there is a connection.
We saw Widmore's disdain for Desmond when he wouldn't share a glass of scotch with him and called him a coward.
Widmore like Ben are men likely to seek revenge and do whatever they can to gain what they want.
Don't throw the baby out with the bath water on this one, in my humble opinion(IMHO) I have suspected that Widmore has been involved for a long time as well as Ben. IMHO Ben was capable having digging up bodies, buying plane shells etc. This is more than king of the hill viewers.................
