Found: One backbone. Location: Argentina!

Cristina, you’ve done it again. Besitos:

Argentina has accused the US of trying to smuggle weapons and satellite phones into the country after cargo on a US military plane was seized last week.

Argentine officials say the material was not properly declared.

The US says the equipment was intended for a police training course in Argentina and has demanded its return.

Bilateral ties have cooled since it emerged US President Barack Obama would not be visiting Argentina during a forthcoming tour of the region.

Argentine Foreign Minister Hector Timerman on Monday sent a formal protest to the US embassy, demanding a proper explanation about the seized cargo.

“The United States must understand that they can’t send war materials without informing the government. And now they refuse to co-operate with the investigation,” Mr Timerman told CNN.

[…]

But US state department spokesman PJ Crowley said they were “puzzled and disturbed” by the actions of Argentine officials, who had conducted an “unusual and unannounced” search of the aircraft.

Mr Crowley said he had heard that one serial number had not been documented properly, an issue that could have easily been resolved.

“For whatever reason, it was elevated to higher levels of the government and we find this puzzling,” he said.

He said the US was calling for its equipment to be returned. The training course which involved US military experts and Argentine federal police and focussed on hostage rescue techniques had been cancelled, he added.

Well, that’s typical. Hope? Change? As far as imperialist foreign policy goes, the US is still the same old same old.

Undoubtedly that cargo (which included not only weapons and sat-phones but morphine) was intended for the kind of uses one might see in State of Siege, the sort of “police training course” that Dan Mitrione taught until the Tupamaros served him in Uruguay. His Barackness is no better than Dubya on this front, and the State Dept.’s “puzzled and disturbed” whining (shut up, PJ!) was to be expected; they’re used to getting their way. Used to be they could smuggle in all kinds of weaponry and torture devices in the so-called diplomatic pouch, and no one would dream of questioning it. It’s how they kept their local vassals in line. As Yves Montand, playing Mitrione’s character, Santore, in State of Siege, said: “Régimes come and go, but the police stay.” Which is why the State Dept. has such an active interest in “training” them. The local police, as we’ve seen from Ecuador, are those who wield the big stick when talking softly with the elected leadership doesn’t work.

But at least the countries who have long been on the shit end of that big stick are now grabbing hold of it and yanking it out of Uncle Sam’s hand. That’s new, and if kept up consistently by everyone, it might just be the change these countries have long hoped for. Certainly there seems to be no other way of bringing it about.