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After months of negotiations which involved overcoming Washington's reluctance to approve the sale of advanced medium-range missiles to arm 10 F-16s Chile wanted to buy from Lockheed Martin, the purchase was authorized earlier this month.
Back in November, the disclosure by Peru that the 19 Mig-29 it bought from Belarus in 1995 were equipped with Russian-made medium-range missiles served to dispel the U.S. concern that allowing Chile to buy the fully-armed F-16s would give it a military edge over its neighbors. Eventually the missiles were not included in the approved package, but permission was given to Chile to seek them elsewhere, probably in Israel.
This $660-million purchase is the biggest U.S. arms sale to Latin America since a 20-year ban was lifted in 1997.
"Even though the purchase does not include the weaponry," said Chile's air force under-secretary Nelson Haddad, "in its final configuration the aircraft will have all the capabilities from the point of view of systems, sub-systems, radars, electronic warfare and avionics in general to carry any type of weapon . . . All that Chile's air force requested initially in its technical specifications is there. There are no restrictions."
Both at home and around the region the acquisition of these state-of-the-art weapons has raised a tempest of criticism, specifically directed against Chile's president Ricardo Lagos, a socialist.
Domestically, opposition to the purchase has called it an immoral squandering of funds in times of economic hardship and proof of the military's behind-the-scenes privileges which they say are remnants of Gen. Augusto Pinochet's rule, which ended 12 years ago.
Actually, those privileges, such as they are, have been out in the open since 1958, when, under the democratically elected, conservative-liberal administration of president Jorge Alessandri, Congress approved "reserved copper law" that obliges the state-owned Codelco, the world's largest copper producer, to set aside 10 percent of its sales revenues to finance military purchases. Right after announcing the F-16 deal, Lagos instructed newly-appointed Defense Minister Michelle Bachelet to brainstorm ways of revamping, or possibly scrapping, the reserved copper law and restructuring the relationship between armed forces and civilian government.
The deal poured cold water on a proposal by Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo to regional leaders to redirect a part of military budgets to social programs. Last year, Toledo breached protocol and joined demonstrators outside a Latin American summit in Santiago to reject the arms sale, which has been characterized by observers in Latin America as launching an arms race.
Defense minister Bachelet denies Chile has expansionist intentions, as has been charged by newspapers in neighboring countries, particularly in Peru. But the fact is that Chile's purchase of F-16 has already driven Brazil to announce it will be purchasing 24 up-to-date fighter bombers.
On a visit to Moscow shortly after Chile's announcement, Brazil president Fernando Henrique Cardoso was offered 24 of the latest Mig-31s at the very convenient total price of $700 million, as well as the alternative of purchasing the Russian Sujois. However, Brazil will probably buy Mirages from French Dassault Aviation with whom Embraer, its state aviation company, has a long-standing association.
But is within Chile itself where the F-16 purchase has become a serious issue. "Right now, there are very strong negative sentiments," said Raul Sohr, a Chilean defense specialist. "There is a sense that the state is wasting money on toys for boys at a time when the public is far more concerned about the overburdened health care and education systems."
Meanwhile, Peruvian navy Rear Admiral Alfredo Palacios Dongo, former chief of naval operations, said to Lima's daily El Correo that Chile has available a $3 billion budget for arms purchases, and that by buying Leopard tanks, submarines, F-16 aircraft and frigates, Chile will overcome Peru on land, sea and air while Peru "continues to use torpedoes from World War II."
Chile's Interior minister Jose Miguel Insulza, in New York two weeks ago for the World Economic Forum, further fanned the flames of the controversy over the purchase of the F-16s by saying that "regional situations are never secure" and that "the armed forces have to be well equipped."
Chile's denials that it has no aggressive intentions towards its neighbors or even the more distant Brazil make sense in the context of its history. However, because President Lagos's administration is reluctant to admit publicly that the arms purchases are meant to sweeten relations with the armed forces-which is what everybody believes-the issue keeps on gaining serious attention in the region.
Claudio Campuzano (claudio-campuzano@hotmail.com) is U.S, correspondent for the Latin American newsweekly Tiempos del Mundo and editorial page editor of the New York daily Noticias del Mundo. He writes weekly for World Tribune.com