Armen Takes Aim

Armen and the Stars

Armen with Jean-Claude Van Damme

Untimely End - 21st of October 2011

Roberto Kouyoumdjian

Many of you have enjoyed my father's essays over the years. Some of you have perhaps taken them more seriously than others but I'd like to think they'll be missed. It was important for my father to connect intellectually with people and give his opinions, however critical and self-consciously ironic they could sometimes be. My father had the talent of being able to discuss any topic and making it sound interesting by providing it with a different, unique angle. This essay will perhaps not be full of the quirky, cut throat remarks that you identify with him, but is a story that my mother has insisted I tell on his behalf. This will be the last essay you will receive from or on behalf of Armen Kouyoumdjian, following his sad death on Friday the 21st of October 2011.

This should never have been the last essay for the simple reason that my father should not be dead. We are all convinced that, had it not been for the inefficiencies in the health system in Chile, he would still be very much alive.

My father would never apologise for telling the truth but I feel I should advise you that the rest of this paper may be explicit and occasionally hard to accept, because we are dealing with someone we all knew that was sadly mistreated and ignored by the system.

It seems that, in Chile, if you require emergency treatment on a weekend you will find it very difficult. If it's on a long weekend, you are in the hands of the gods.

In May, this year my father became one of nearly 350 million people worldwide who has been diagnosed with diabetes. He had seen a specialist who recommended a strict regime of exercise and diet but just after that my father was experiencing various symptoms including nausea and severe constipation which were getting gradually worse..

On Saturday the 8th of October at around 6pm, my mother realised that his symptoms were reaching unprecedented levels and tried to convince my father to go to hospital and have him checked. My father insisted it would be a waste of time as it was on a Saturday, on a long weekend and no hospital would take him in as there would be nobody there with the expertise to treat him. Dismissing his attitude as another one of his outrageous rants she rang a good family friend, a doctor who works at the Hospital Naval in Vina del Mar, to explain the situation. Being such a well known and respected private hospital, my mother was convinced that he would be received in such a place and was desperate to have him seen. Our friend responded that it was on a Saturday, on a long weekend and hospitals would only have a basic, skeleton staff and there would be nobody there with the expertise to treat him properly. My father had it spot on. Undeterred, she rang the Clinica del Mar of 13 norte and had the same response.

My father then had the idea of calling the privately run ambulance/medical service 'HELP', with whom we have a contract, to send a doctor over. Being a long weekend, presumably they were short of doctors so could only provide a basic consultation over the phone so sent my mother to get some medicine that would help, which she did. When she returned, his symptoms had worsened and the medicine had absolutely no effect so she rang HELP again who said a doctor would come and visit as soon as possible.

Approximately two hours after, a doctor arrived, attached a drip, 'stabilised him' and said, unequivocally that he did not require urgent hospital attention and that on Tuesday, in 3 days time, she should contact a gastroenterologist and take it from there. My mother pleaded to take him to the hospital but she insisted there was nothing to worry about in the short term as he'd be feeling better soon. This all took place around 9pm.

At approximately 3.30am my father started vomiting blood uncontrollably due to a severe gastric haemorrhage. In a complete panic my mother called HELP and this time they told her that they would send an ambulance urgently which arrived about 20 mins after and again, 'stabilised' him, and the doctor (a different one) started to ring the various emergency units in the region's hospitals to get him checked in.

This is where the real nightmare begins. He called my father's preference, the aforementioned Hospital Naval who declined on the aforementioned grounds of not having the necessary resources to deal with such a case. Clinica Renaca said the same. As you can imagine, after that, it's all a bit of a blur for my mother but she knows he tried every other hospital in the region, all of which had the same response: it was a Saturday, on a long weekend and hospitals would only have a basic, skeleton staff and there would be nobody there with the expertise to treat him properly. On top of that she had to hear the doctor over the phone saying, ''si, tienen plata" (''yes, they have money'') and "se ve que es gente con medios" (you can tell these people have money). My mother was desperately trying to tell him that money was not a problem, that we did have an excellent international private insurance that would cover all eventualities.

My mother swears to god that when she got in the ambulance with my dying father, in the middle of the second largest city of one of the world's most 'up and coming' countries, they did not have a hospital to go to. At some stage on this journey, in a last ditch attempt to save my father whose blood loss was getting worse, the doctor tells the ambulance driver to take him to the Hospital Naval and just hope for the best.

Once there, they took him in quickly, someone examined him and the only surgeon there was overheard by my mother as saying that he did not want to take the responsibility on his own and needed someone else to help with the operation. As far as we know, they eventually managed, around 5.00am, to find someone to assist, and the operation finally took place.

The agonising waiting game for my family starts. A mixture of all sorts of emotions wrapped in a bubble of incredulity at how a developed country can fail to provide such basic service.

Just before 8am on Sunday, one of the surgeons, briefcase in hand and ready to leave, spoke to my mother and brother and family in the hospital hallway and casually remarked that my father's haemorrhage was contained, that it was caused by a invasive tumour in his stomach and that part of his stomach was taken out. The tumour was so invasive that all his organs had been affected, and that if he survived the aftermath of the operation he would not last long. 2 months were mentioned in case of a miracle.

Over the whole of Sunday and Monday, the same diagnostic was given to us again and again. Gastric cancer with absolutely no hope of a proper recovery. The biopsy, with the results would be ready in a few days but, as one doctor told us, the results ,in this case would only confirm their diagnosis.

On Tuesday, things started to change. Doctors started to appear in the hospital (incredible, I know). Nurses, support staff and general signs of life started to fill the wards and the place had changed completely. My father was put under the care of one of the hospital's best surgeons and examinations, scanners and a whole variety of treatments started to take place. The long weekend was definitely over and it was time to start work again. My father recovered well from the first operation and even came off the artificial respirator on this day. Despite the verdict, there were good signs. Then, this new doctor seemed to show doubts as to the initial diagnosis made by his colleagues after reviewing the scans.

Without going into details, my father's health started to deteriorate again and he made the decision to operate on him on Friday to find out what was causing the pain. After his intervention, he summoned the family and said that, in his opinion, there were no signs of any cancer and that his diagnosis was at this stage: peritonitis and that the haemorrhage must have being caused by a gastrointesntinal tract. In other words, a stomach ulcer. Although the first operation had been a mess, chances were that my father would, as you'd expect, recover from this. It was of course a far better scenario than the cancer that was going to kill him any minute.

On Monday the 17th of October, after seeing the results of the biopsy the doctor concluded that it was definitely not cancer.

He recovered exceptionally well from this second intervention but unfortunately only for a couple of days. On Tuesday the 18th of October things started to go downhill again and my father was put back in intensive care as his organs were again showing signs of deterioration. The doctor said that he had contracted an internal infection, but did not know where it came from. In light of this, my father was given heavy sedatives and was once again connected to all the necessary equipment. He was not responding.

The next day, the doctor decided to operate for the 3rd time as again many of his vital organs were deteriorating because of further infections, potentially caused by the other operations. Whether we admitted this or not, we were starting to realise that something, somewhere had gone wrong and that my father would not get out of this one alive.

The 3rd operation had gone well and they had filled his body with antibiotics to try and kill the infections but my father's body had, by this stage, stopped responding.

On Friday the 21st of October at 6.15am, my father was pronounced dead.

We got a suit ready for him and an Armenian cross to stay with him, took them to hospital and did all the necessary (is it?) paperwork. Next day we went to pick him up at the morgue at the designated time. Despite having given them notice the day before, my father was not ready, dressed or anything. To make matters worse, they had lost the cross. It all took over 2 hours to sort out.

We are convinced that my father died because of the failures in the system to give him the right treatment when he needed it, despite living in a large, urbanised and developed city.

For us, writing this is a chance to vent our feelings of frustration but also to fulfil, what, we believe, would have been his wishes. To tell this story to you. Such a tragic story, both on a personal and an institutional level. A story that digs deep into the very nature of human spirit. Is a human life really that worthless that a man can survive or not depending on what day of the week he gets ill? Are institutions morally obligated to look after us? Should the health care system be more closely regulated? And most importantly, what can we do to prevent this from happening again?

I, on behalf of my mother Pilar and brother David, would like to thank you for reading this and my father's many papers over the years. He took great pleasure in writing and for us, the very notion that there were so many of you out there reading them, fills us with joy.

FRANCE’S SECRET DIPLOMATIC WEAPON …Is none other than the Cannes film festival

Fourteen consecutive years of attending the Cannes film festival as a fully accredited journalist is an eye opener, not just on the international film industry. As this was not my real professional activity (though I am satisfied that I performed it well), I would benefit from considering the wider picture as an international analyst.

A series of events over the years, some of which will be detailed below, caught my attention. Though there is no doubt that the festival is primarily a cinema showcase, it is used regularly by the French authorities to score diplomatic points, taking political postures, and bear influence on world opinion with the smokescreen of the film industry.

METHODOLOGY First of all (and it would require a separate paper to detail in full), the Cannes Festival has a rigid and bureaucratic protocole and structure which are a mix between Louis XIV’s court at Versailles and the Chinese Communist Party. The people who run it, from CEO down even to the security apparatus, remained unchanged throughout the years I was present. Decisions are taken by half a handful of people at the top. You are subjected to strict behaviour, and if you step out of line, depending on the gravity of the offence, you are either called-in for a severe talk, or just expelled in perpetuity. Each year, you have to prove that when you attended last year, you actually wrote about it rather than spend your time on the beach. Still, if you are interested in the movie world and what comes with it, it is a unique experience.

However, the festival is sponsored by the French foreign ministry, and
that is where the discreet diplomat posturing comes in. Sometimes, the
“facilities” are also lent to friendly foreign countries who have agendas
of their own. It is an ideal place for putting across political points
linked to international events. Over 4,000 journalists from all over the
world are present, and not only are they not international affairs
experts, but they are avid to be fed with anything original. This makes
Cannes the third most covered event in the world after the Olympics and
the World Cup, except the the latter take place every 4 years, whereas the
festival is annual.

The system is well known to intelligence services and government image
building departments. Plant a story in a place remote from the event, and
wait for it to be picked up by the mainstream media. Even papers with no
personal correspondens give high coverage to Cannes, so the potential is
unlimited. We have the recent example of the London International
Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), supposedly independent but stuffed
with personnel from British and US intelligence services, publishing
negative reports about Ecuador’s president Correa, and the Peruvian
candidate Ollanta Humala (it seems talking on the phone to Chávez is now
an international criminal offence). The IISS, and I can vouch personally,
has no historical expertise on Latin America. The method even has a French
name: “intox”, short for intoxication (of the mind).


The practical way the positioning is made on specific issues depends on
the circumstances. If it is a matter which started well before the
programming is finalised (around mid-April), it is incorporated into the
official programme. On the other hand, if it is, to quote CNN, a “breaking
story” , then schedules are modified to add it on. This causes problems
not just for the organisers, who may find that there are no screens
available, but particularly for the journalists who are already facing
16-hour working days, and even then unable to cover everything they want.

THE CASE OF VICTOR LITVINENKO Let us start with the most blatant case,
though it is one where Cannes lent its facilities to “friendly
governments”. In late 2006, a Russian journalist, apparently with links
to the FSB (ex-KGB), but who had fallen out with them, died from a
difficult to identify radiation poisoning in London. The British
authorities accused the FSB of having engineered his death. Whatever the
case may be, in the middle of the May 2007 festival, we are suddenly told
that a documentary on his demise would be projected as part of the
festival, followed by a press conference attended by Litvinenko’s widow.
The film was obviously one-sided, aiming to prove the British theory, as
was, predictably, the press conference. The event, was not heavily
attended, probably due to the fact that it was not a hot story any more,
and the difficulty of fitting it in if you had an interview with Brad Pitt
scheduled at the same time (such things, if you can get them at all, take
three days of formalities and pleading with press agents, the most
obnoxious and arrogant bunch of tarts I have ever come across, who torture
journalists during the day, party all night and as a result are
unreachable until lunch time). Connasses!

Back to the Litvinenko event, and the funniest part. As we went out of the
room, a number of journalists who had not been present were waiting to
interview those of us who had. I myself gave three interviews in French,
Arabic and English. The English TV crew caught my attention. They were
over-eager, with short-cut hair, and a camera on which there were three
letters that, after living 20 years in Britain, I did not recognise as
belonging to any known channel. They grabbed me first, and asked me what
was my opinion of the Litvinenko case after this. I told them that I had
an open mind, which did not please them very much. They were obviously an
intelligence service “channel” (MI6-TV?). Their presence could not have
been possible without official complicity, if you know how hard it is to
get a journalist badge for Cannes.

THE LARS VON TRIER CASE AND RELATED MATTERS Fast forward to this past
week, where as some readers will know, the controversial Danish director
Lars von Trier was declared “persona non grata” by the festival
organisers, though he had a film in competition. This unprecedented
situation was due to his ramblings at his film’s press conference, where
he tried to say that he had some sympathy for Hitler as a person, and
after thinking he himself was a Jew, found out that he was a German,
therefore a Nazi. The sayings, however rambling, were taken out of
context, as he never said he agreed with the Holocaust or denied it, nor
proferred anything anti-Semitic (contrary to the Dior designer John
Galliano some months ago).

We live now in a world where you can insult the Arabs burn Korans, carry
out extra-judicial assassinations, deny the Armenian Genocide (as did
the Swedish Prime Minister who was in Santiago this week, and who when his
parliament passed a resolution recognising the plight of the Armenians,
sent a letter of apology to the Turkish government). However, it is
forbidden to criticise the State of Israel, nor any Jewish person or
institution, or even upset them, without at least being branded an
anti-Semite, losing your job, or even ending up in jail.. Voltaire was
certainly absent from this year’s film festival.

Now Lars von Trier is a clown, not a very common trait in Scandinavia, but
to use an untranslatable Spanish expression, a “tonto grave”. He came to
fame by founding the Dogma school of film-making, and after acquiring a
number of followers, suddenly dropped it. He pretends to be a Communist,
but lives like a bourgeois. The first time one of his films was selected
for the festival, and contrary to protocole, he said he would not be
attending. The organisers pleaded with him to change his mind, and he
finally ceded, driving all the way from Copenhagen because he has a fear
of flying. However, he imposed one condition: when going up the red
carpet, the music (which normally is something related to the film),
should be the Internationale. I can imagine the ensuing discussions, but
he got his way, and from the balcony of the press room, seeing all those
beautiful people going up the steps with von Trier raising his fist and
the Communist anthem playing, was rather surreal.

Within 24 hours, the festival authorities published a communiqué declaring
him “non grata”, and all the media concentrated on the fact that he said
he sometimes sympathised with Hitler. His film is unlikely to get any
prize, whatever its qualities. Would it have happened if he had said
instead that Muslims are promiscuous because they can hav up to four
wives? I doubt it. After all, it was in his country that a cartoonist got
away insulting the Prophet Mohammad. Would it have happened if instead of
him, it had been Jean-Luc Godard? Well, some years ago, there was a social
conflict in France involving temporary workers at artistic events (such as
Cannes..). Godard had a film at the festival. He came into the press
conference and said he was ceding his time to one of these workers, who
was shown in and delivered a political diatribe totally unrelated to the
film. Godard was not expelled, nor is ever Catherine Deneuve, who smokes
like a chimney at each press conference she attends, though it is strictly
against French law. Opening a Chilean parenthesis here, the death this
week of two more Carabineros in a car accident, because they were not
wearing seat belts as the law demands (FOR EVERYONE), is a ridiculous
waste. The police are supposed to enforce a regulation they themselves
they do not obey (most Carabineros drive around without belts). Too busy
clobbering pregnant women at peaceful sit-ins? Or protecting my psychopath
neighbour?

Now we know which side of the Middle Eastern conflict the sympathies of
the Sarkozy adminstration are to be found. This being said, and after
being criticised for their dilly-dallying in the early days of the Arab
protests, they had to appear to show sympathy to the cause. An “Arab day”
was added on to the festival, with Egypt as special guest. Now Egyptian
cinema has a long and honourable reputation, although contrary to the more
recent Iranian phenomenon, it has not circulated much outside its own
region. From time to time, a bone is thrown to Palestinians with the
screening of a rare film made by a Palestinian director. When that
happens, be sure that there are one or two Israeli films in the programme
too.

The Kurds have had their moments. Of course, it is only the Iraqi Kurdsh
community, not the much bigger and equally discriminated minority in
Turkey. Never mind that the Kurds have never had a country or national
structure at any time in history. There is an exiled Kurdish director
living in Paris who made the first Kurdish feature film. He was invited.

I shall not even dwell, for lack of detailed knowledge, on the African
aspect of French dilomacy, in a region with traditional links to its
former colonial power.

THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE After Israel, one of the darlings of the French
authorities, under various governments, is Turkey. The festival is pleased
to oblige. In 2004, the film Ararat, one of the few ever made dealing with
the Armenian Genocide despite 96 years having passed, was premiered in
Cannes, under the direction of the respected Canadian-Armenian director,
Atom Egoyan.

The film was eventually screened in Cannes, but at what price. It did not
take part in the competition section in case it won something, and that
would have upset the Turks. An anti-Armenian demonstration was organised
next to the red carpet, an area normally under strict security. The
following year, “in compensation”, two Turkish films were selected to take
part in the festival, and the former personal yacht of Ataturk was moored
just off the Palais des Festivals with a Turkish flag nearly as big as the
boat itself. In 2007, Turkish Nobel Literature prize winner Orhan Pamuk
was a member of the festival jury, though I am not sure what they meant by
that considering that he is one of the few Turkish intellectuals to have
condemned the Armenian Genocide.

In my 14 years there, not a single movie from Armenia itself was selected
for the festival. Last year, there were two shorts, but they were from
Diaspora Armenians (Russia and Lebanon). On four occasions, I sponsored
the presence of journalists from Armenia (there were none otherwise). The
problems I had to get them an accreditation and a French visa were
tremendous. On two occasions, staff at the French consulate hinted that if
the girls accepted to be “friendly” or paid a bribe, it would make things
easier.

For the 60th anniversary of the festival, there was a get-together of
many famous directors to speak about the present state and future of
cinema. I rose and asked why was there so little Armenian presence at the
festival since independence ? Roman Polanski walked out saying “he was
wasting his time here with stupid questions” (sure man,. we do not want
any competition for the Pianist). Next day, I was called before the
headmistress (I mean the head of the press office), and told not to
misbehave again. However, lo comido y lo bailado..

PUNISHMENT “Punishing” misbehaving countries whose actions are not
appreciated by France is also a regular feature. Iran and China, if they
have jailed or put any restrictions on film makers, are publicly pilloried
by various manifestations of public support for them during press
conferences, etc..

Sometimes, the tables are turned and France, as represented by the
festival, is the subject of criticism and boycott, particularly from the
Americans if the government has failed to support or criticised any aspect
of US policy.

So as you can see, in France, cinema is politics by other means, not just
local “engagé” film-making, but a way of scoring international diplomatic
points.

CHILEAN REACTIONS TO WORLD EVENTS - Strange Analysis & Unpublished Letters

Long protected by a chain of high mountains and a difficult sea journey

away in pre-Panama Canal days, the flow of information and knowledge about

faraway places and events has not been a forte of Chilean society. Even

after air travel and telecommunications made instant exposure possible,

the threat of the “foreign” and the “different” is set with clichés and

prejudices. When the main national cable TV franchise was owned by

Argentines, you would get channels from most of South America and Mexico.

Now you can only get Argentine TV and a Mexican variety channel. Sure, you

can, as I do every morning, view the whole South American press on

internet, but how many people do, even if it is up their professional

street?

The further and more different the events and culture behind it, the

bigger the ignorance. The sin is magnified with a compulsion to expose

that ignorance, feeling safe that as the rest of the population knows even

less, nobody will know better, and they will all praise the “expertos”

because they are famous or come from one or other institution.

From the various major events that have made the news in the past

fortnight, I have selected three examples whch I shall detail below.

THE CHILDREN OF THE ASHRAM Where have those who manage Chile’s economy

and finances studied? Chicago? Wrong! Harvard? Nope! MIT? No way!

Stanford? Cold! No dears, they have all been to a secret Ashram in India

specialised in Economic thought. They probably learned the words of

Kautilya “One should crush the sands forcibly and extract oil;a thirsty

person should drink water from a mirage; wandering ceaselessly, obtain a

hare's horn; but one should never try to reason with a fool who is

characterized by stubbornness." Ministers and undersecretaries, together

with their academic fan club, recite mantras. They could of course also

have gone to a Tibetan Buddhist monastery where prayers also have Sanskrit

roots, and it is less tiring because the Buddhists have the prayer wheel,

whose spinning is equivalent to reciting the mantras aloud. I have never

seen a Chilean official with a prayer wheel (I am sure their wives’ Opus

Dei confessors would not like it), but they certainly practice the oral

mantras.

The main object of recent mantras has been the exchange rate, with the

constant reciting of two texts: “The dollar is falling abroad and there is

nothing we can do about it”, and the other is “The answer to the strong

peso is productivity”. I will suggest another one “Why did they transplant

your Lingam into your brain?”.

Strangely enough, though the dollar has fallen everywhere, other

neighbouring countries have managed to limit the fall to a fraction of the

Chilean one? Maybe they have better traders. I wonder how many public

servants managing the economy in Chile have spent even an hour on a

trading desk?

When things really get dramatic, and most of the damage is already done,

they organise an intervention. Can you imagine a military operation where

the commander announces in advance at what time and where he is going to

attack, for how long, and the maximum quantity of ammunition he plans to

use. This of course allows the enemy to take cover and wait the passing of

the small cloud. Thus, pre-announcing an intervention with a fixed daily

sum (equal to no more than 5 % of market turnover), for a limited time, is

the most ridiculous thing I have seen in financial markets over more than

40 years of career.

Interventions should be like intelligence and commando operations. They

should strike by surprise, at moments of vulnerability, with variable

means as befits the daily situation. No wonder they do not work in Chile.

Productivity. The suffering sectors are led by agriculture and tourism.

They are both labour intensive. What “productivity” are they expected to

introduce. Reduce staff and create an unemployment problem? Put up dollar

prices and price themselves out in a very competitive market? Make the

berries smaller? Use contraband fuel to counter the authorities disgusting

hydrocarbons pricing policy? Can we please get some details of the

“productivity” measures learnt in the hills of Darjeeling?

I sent a very short version of this analysis, concentrating on the lack of

expertise in intervention methods, to El Mercurio. It was not published.

LACKEY OR GENERAL? The Royal Wedding gave mental orgasms to all the

media which in any case spends its time and resources, in Chile and

elsewhere, following the antics of the famous. This was their apotheosis

and they fully lived up to it .

It could only happen in Chile, but someone decide to use the event to

score a military point, though the pages of El Mercurio. Unfortunately, he

got it wrong. A former commander in chief of the Navy, admiral Vergara,

wrote a letter saying how pleased he was to see “so many uniforms” at

Westminster Abbey, contrasting it with the fact that in Chile, “the

military appear to be like an embarassment” adding that even the

presidential AdC at ceremonies took a back seat.

Taking that last point first, presidential AdCs at ceremonies ARE supposed

to be unobtrusive unless needed, so a very bad example to complain about.

As for the uniforms at the wedding, maybe admiral Vergara did not know

that all the British royals, including female ones, and I am sure many of

the crowned heads and princes invited from abroad, hold honourary military

ranks. In the UK, various other officials also have military-looking

uniforms (as do staff at the Palace). The bridegroom being a military

officer, it would also be normal to think that his fellow officers were

invited, and as they do in Chile, came in uniform. I would be very

surprised if the whole high command of the armed forces had been invited

to the wedding . You may want to check the guest list with the British

Embassy.

I am the first one to think that the military in Chile have been badly

treated, having had to do the élite’s dirty work by protecting their

privileges threatened by Allende’s regime. They then were the only ones to

be tried and imprisoned for human rights abuses, whilst their civilian

puppet masters enriched themseves on privatisations, became senators and

deputies, sometimes ambassadors, without a single one of them spending a

night in jail.

The final coup de grace on the horizon is the plan to repeal the Copper

Law, completely handing over major procurement decisions to venal

bureaucrats and politicians, helped by “advisers” of very dubious quality

and hidden allegiances.

The problem with admiral Vergara’s complaint (as I explained in another

letter to El Mercurio which similarly went unpublished) is basically

incorrect. I studied for three years in France and worked for 20 years in

London. I have been interested in military affairs since I was 8 years old

, but in all these 23 yearsin Europe, I did not once meet or even see a

military officer at a social event, inauguration, conference or seminar

(except when they specifically dealt with military affairs). It is true

that the presence of uniformed representatives at diplomatic receptions in

Chile has fallen since I first arrived, though I am not sure which part is

due to their not being invited, or not going. In fact, spouses are

generally not invited either these days (not even to the Royal Wedding, as

we heard). Can you imagine my wife writing to El Mercurio complaining as

to why she was not invited to the national day of Uzbekistan, though David

Beckham’s wife was at Buckingham Palace?

AFTER LENIN DIED Though Marx was the theorist, Lenin was the practioner

of Communism. He died in January 1924. The Soviet Union went on for

another 66 years without him, even surviving the demise of Stalin for 37

years. The USSR and the Communist system in general were very centralised,

with orders coming from the top and having to be obeyed. Al Qaeda is a

loose franchise, so why is it going to fall apart because Usama bin Laden

is dead? Not a chance.

I have mentioned in my two previous notes on the Egyptian and Libyan

upheavals, about the poor state of knowledge and analysis of the Middle

East in Chile. Despite the presence of a large community of Palestinian

origin, even culture and language among them are a minority activity,

whereas the rest of the population knows nothing about it. The only Middle

Eastern studies centre at the Univeristy of Chile is non-descript. One has

to say that Arab embassies have done little to counter this situation,

even letting the government palace host annual Jewish celebrations as if

it was a Chilean holiday (how many Chilean ministers have been to the

Santiago Mosque?).

Ah, but we have the “expertos”. They surpassed their performance on the

Arab crisis by commenting on the killing of Bin Laden. Among the three

comments I picked up, the best one was the analyst who placed Pakistan in

North Africa on a TV debate, but the others were also notably off the

mark.

“A Great Victory for the USA”, a columnist wrote. Really? What is great

about it? The fact that it took you 10 years to locate a guy sitting with

a large part of his family in a house 40 km from your embassy in

Islamabad? And that with a U$ 40 bn annual security and intelligence

budget and airport procedures which transformed air travel into a hellish

experience? Was it the great performance of the Navy Seals (parasail down

from helicopters onto a house full of women and children where nobody shot

back, and the main target, unarmed, was killed in cold blood)? This is

back to the times of the Far West posses and lynching of Blacks in the

Deep South. The law West of the Pecos river. It is now politically

incorrect to lynch Blacks, particularly if your president is one, so there

are the Arabs, neigh, Muslims in general (never mind that your president

holds the second name of Imam Husain, the most venered Shia martyr).

Can you imagine the scandal if during Pinochet’s detention in London,

Spain had sent a commando unit to shoot him at the London Clinic? Remember

the complaints high in the sky about the Bulgarian secret service killing

a dissident in London with a poisoned umbrella- high marks for

originality- or the more technically sophisticated disposal by slow

radiation poisoning of a Russian dissident, also in London. Let us not

even mention the breach to Pakistani sovereignty, however well or badly

exercised by its government. The US of A, like its devilish offspring the

State of Israel, has never bothered about legal niceties in international

relations. Full marks to Ricardo Lagos as the only Chilean politician who

did not deem it necessary to lick arse in his reaction.

Another academic declared that the killing of Bin Laden was good for the

prospects of the US economy. Wow! So the budget deficit and the bankrupt

Social Security system were all due to the wicked Osama, huh? Like with a

magic wand, the deficit is going to disappear and the unemployed will all

find jobs.

Though it has nothing to do with the subject, except to signal the level

of competence of the security services in Anglo-Saxon countries, a

headless corpse was fished out of an English river recently. The press

gathered and asked the senior police officer about more details. Sorry, he

replied, he could not confirm the person was dead until he had been

examined by a doctor. Just shows that you do not nned a brain after all.

FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION Though it was unplanned, I am proud that the day

of my birthday was chosen as the yearly celebration of International Press

Freedom Day. I shall continue to live up to the honour whenever I feel

like it, and that despite of the fact that me and my family have been

under undescribable pressure to make our lives hell. It takes more than

that to stop Armenians, but if something happens to me, do suspect foul

play.

A BASKET FULL OF CHILEAN EASTER EGGS - Otherwise known as Huevadas

“It was the first thing that shocked me about Chile: people only work

because they have to, for the money. Nobody really sought success, or was

passionate about what they were doing. If they find elsewhere a job that

pays the same money for less work, they leave.”

Yoel Gutierrez, Cuban-born trainer of Chile’s Olympic athletes

The unworthy and ungrateful readership of my deceased Chilean weeklies

supposedly enjoyed the Huevada de la Semana, which has also stopped.

However, as we are leading up to the Crucifixion of Our Lord later this

week, I thought I would crucify a few Chileans (though I fear it will not

save the world), and include some foreigners in the process too.

ECONOMIC HUEVADAS Because Chile is the only country in the world where

every aspect of life is ordered by economists (or the Church), what they

say is always headline news, and God knows they talk a lot, both in and

out of government. Among very fierce competition, the winner of the Golden

Egg competition is unanimously named as Central Bank president José de

Gregorio. Of course, he did not comment about the OECD report pointing out

Chile as having the most unequal education system among members, nor that

Chilean adolescents were the region’s second highest cosumers of cocaine,

but 90 % of them does not have even a basic working knowledge of English,

hardly surprising when in a voluntary testing of 11,000 public sector

teachers, 36 % were found as incompetent. There is no explanation as to

why the sale of cigarettes was up 13.3 % in the first quarter of 2011

either.

Here is a non-comprehensive selection of declarations made by the laureate

since the beginning of the year:

-“We shall not submit monetary policy to exchange rate considerations”

-“ We are surprised by the high level of consumer interest rates”. This is

a perennial discovery, as if all astronomers died every few years and

their successors “rediscover” Halley’s Comet. Finance ministers and

Central bank presidents beat their breasts from time to time as to why

with inflation and Central Bank intervention rates at around 5 %, stores

charge from 30 to 150 % to customers. In a country where they cannot even

calculate compound interest !

-“The intervention of the dollar was not meant to push it up, only to

relieve (sic) tensions”. Have you tried masturbation instead?

A very poor second comes Finance Minister Felipe Larrain in the

competition, though his single entry was of high quality: “ The cut in

expenditure for 2011 is to help the poor and needy”. This reduction is in

fact the most stupid economic measure taken by any Chilean government in

years. In a year where the budget will be balanced, cutting U$ 750 million

is pointless. He was also “economical with the truth” , by initially

saying that it would apply only to current expenditure, such as

travelling, paper clips, entertainment and new cars, but when he presented

the details (much later) it turned out to include a postponement of the

recruitment of new Carabineros (supposedly a government priority),

freezing defence procurement and kicking forward the already behind

schedule new army headquarters. There are probably more such surprises if

and when we see the full documents). How does all this helps the poor? It

is all in the Codex Chicageum, which replaces the Bible in Chile. If you

lower expenditure, you lower inflation so people have more money to spend,

goes to theory. Tell that to the unemployed who were going to join the

Carabineros or the building workers at army headquarters. Read the whole

book next time you are at a US university. It DOES NOT apply if the budget

is in balance.

Private sector economists also took part, and I shall single out as

consolation prize the pronunciation of Chicago Boy Francisco Rosende, who

said that “extending maternity leave was a tax on employment”.

NON-ECONOMIC DECLARATIONS Of course, as I said that all aspects of life

in the country were in the hands of a small coterie, there were other

themes too. One current hot debate is a government initiative to improve

health of young people and fight obesity ( which has become catastrophic,

particularly among women, most of whom now have bums the size of the

Hindenburg..a few spoonfuls of beans and they might fly). A law was

prepared banning the sale of junk food in and around educational

establishments. The business community, in typical Chilean fashion, the

business community objected and started lning up its congressional pet

dogs in defence of “free entreprise”. Forgotten were the “role models” of

Scandinavia which had taken the bull by the horns on such matter, with

very positive results.

That is what produced a declaration by senator “Spotted Dick” (imagine

that for years this guy was a heartbeat away from becoming president of

Chile. He described the uathorities as “Talibans who thought they knew

better as to what people should do”. Considering the senator’s own past

baggage, if I were him I would refrain on commenting. On anything.

THE HUEVADA THAT NEVER WAS The self-promoting crook (she should have

married Segovia of the SEK) and former Prefect Jacqueline Van Rysselberghe

was finally cornered into resigning, but she had barely left her office

with the cardboard boxes containing the witch’s brew, that some wise guy

started mentioning her as a possible replacement for her UDI congressman

colleague Mr Lobos who died in a car accident. In Chile, parties replace

any resigning or dying congress member at will without going through a

by-election or a pre-appointed stand-in. However, common sense seems to

have prevailed, and the idea abandoned. Talking of Mr Lobos, can someone

explain to me why the first reports said he was not wearing his seat belt

(his daughter riding next to him did, and survived), and then this was

“corrected” by the police who declared that both occupants were wearing

them?

DIVINE JUSTICE ON EARTH As some veteran readers know, in the early 90’s,

soon after my arrival in Chile, I was the victim of a theft, in fact a

scam, committed by one Fernando Hurtado Lambert. He is the nephew of

Carlos Hurtado, who at the time was minister of Public Works in the Aylwin

government, and his nephew carried out his scams (there were other

victims) from the offices of a construction design company owned by his

minister uncle.

I lost over U$ 20,000 in the episode, with no possibility of redress as no

press, lawyer, business organisation or consular authority would touch

such an “honourable” family. In fact, one of them, a lawyer by the name of

Sven Herlin Kaiser, brother in law of Fernando, rang and threatened me

with unspecified dire consequences if I even told the story about town.

Why am I bringing this up again? Because the Lord moves in mysterious

ways. The other day, Carlos Hurtado’s household was the subject of a

telephone scam ending up in around U$ 50,000 being stolen. I am genuinely

sorry to say I did not organise it, though I would have been pleased to do

so given half an opportunity.

NO CANNES, THANKS TO CHILEAN INDOLENCE In the past 14 years, at this

time, I would be starting making my bags to go to the Cannes Film

Festival. I did it as a serious hobby, to the extent that quite a few

people at the event started respecting me sufficiently to interview me

about films etc..One year, I was even co-presenter of a Chile day, at the

request of the festivalk organisers.

This was made possible because my sister and I had inherited a penthouse

there, and it reduced the cost (which I entirely covered) of the trip. I

reported for a number of Chilean media, which paid not a penny towards the

benefit of having their own correspondent at what is, after the Olympics

and World Cup, the world’s third largest mediatic event. It allowed me to

be there, so each side benefitted, though I think the Chilean media got

the better deal. Not that they were grateful. La Nacion, when it existed

in printed form, basically ignored all material sent over the week-end,

when all the interesting stuff takes place in Cannes. So exclusive

interviews that had taken days to set up would be wasted. El Mostrador

last year decided to cover Cannes on its online video system frm Santiago,

and did not even bother to tell me. I arrived in Cannes without anybody to

report to. Only Chileans can be so pendejos, though I also have to mention

that as one of only two or three people from Chile covering Cannes, I was

never invited at the pre-festival gathering for the Chilean delegation

(the rest all being paid by the taxpayer) given by the French Embassy (nor

to nay other event at the said embassy, soit-dit en passant). .

Alas, financial needs forced us to sell the apartment, but I did not lose

hope. By now, as I said, I was respected by the organisers, who already

paid all expenses for El Mercurio to be there. I heard that La Tercera was

not using its Paris stringer any more, so I hinted to the festival press

office that if they could treat La Tercera with an invitation as they did

El Mercurio, I could represent them. Though they did not give a firm

commitment, they were pretty positive in their reponse, and asked me to

get a letter frm the paper appointing me as their correspondent. I passed

it on to the power that be at La Tercera and waited, and waited, and

waited. I sent four chasers. Nothing, until 5 days before the process

closed, I was told that they had been “too busy”. My guess is that they

decided to send osmeone else and did not consider it was the minimum

courtesy to let me know. Adios Cannes!

LINGUISTIC AND FACTUAL EGGS The website of the newly created and

already under its second incumbent, the Joint Chief of Staff, has, like

all government departments, a list of staff, contract and consultancy

employees. They are an excellent osurce of information about perosnnel

movements and related matters. Currently, the list of consultants includes

one Ricardo Ibarra, whose job description is put as “labores de

extención(sic) docente”. He is thus involved in extra mural training

activities, which I hope do not include spelling.

I am not sure who owns the Citroen dealership in Chile, but they are also

in dire need of syntax advice, as their publicity describes their products

as “Créative Technologie”, supposedly in French and I am sure inspired by

the 1980’s Audi slogan “Vorsprung Durch Technik”. The problem is that in

French, you should write Technologie Créative in that order.

In one of the few occasions in my nearly 41 year career when I was

actually “dismissed”, the Stockholm Peace Research Institute SIPRI,

considered the standard reference work on military expenditure, took

umbrage at something I had written in one of my Chile weeklies (nothing to

do with them, or Defence), and declared that they “could not be associated

with me any more”. To the extent that I was not making any money out of

it, and they did not even allow me to say publicly I worked for them, It

was no big loss. A couple of weeks ago, they published their yearly

analysis, and the person responsible for working out Latin America, even

thought she should give an interview, widely reported by the international

press. This Argentine woman was obviously an expert. Citing the reasons

for the fact that Brazil and Chile had the highes procurement expenditure,

she referred to Chile as “wishing to project its power regionally”, and

for good measure that “the Copper law has been abrogated”.

The morale of all this, coming on top of the super huevadas written by the

IISS in London some years ago, again on Chilean procurement, is that you

should never take a declaration, statement or analysis at face value

however supposedly prestigious the source is. And I am not just talking on

military affairs.

HAVE A GOOD EASTER AND DO NOT PUT ALL YOUR EGGS IN THE SAME BASKET

UPS & DOWNS OF HANDLING CATASTROPHES - Are the Japanese the Chileans of Asia ?

“The world rightly seen is a burning house, and it is that because it's a

fragile world, it's made the more fragile because of human greed and

avarice and desire, and a way to deal with it is to curb desire if not to

suppress it entirely.”

The Lotus Sutra (Classical Sanskrit text)

STILL THE MEDIA In recent days I ran a mental competition as to who

would make the most asinine remark between the two current headline

grabbing stories, the Japanese nuclear situation and the attack on Lybia.

I have to say that in a very hotly competitive field, the Japanese

situation won, in the words of Eugenio Guzman, Dean of the School of

Government at the ultra-neo liberal Universidad del Desarrollo. His

argument in favour of nuclear energy was that in the past 10 years, 70,000

Japanese had died as a result of road accidents, as compared to a maximum

toll of 4,000, including indirect deaths, from Chernobyl. The numbers were

strongly in favour of radiation. From 2004 to 2005, Guzman was a member of

the Presidential Commition* on Public Ethic. Pouquoi riez vous?, dirait le

Canard Enchaíné. *The few literate readers I have may have noticed that

“Commition” is wrongly spelt. In fact, I took the sentence directly from

an OECD document. As the OECD is made up of developed countries (Chile,

after all, is a member), they must be right. Otherwise the OECD may wish

to employ me as a proof reader, as my other talents are obviously of no

interest to them.

On the Lybian crisis, and its wider Arab context, there is no real Chilean

angle but suddenly out of the woodwork came out a plethora of local

“expertos”, who, when they did not confuse “Lybia” with “Lebanon”, were

eagerly sought for their learned thoughts. On March 24, the Universidad

Mayor held a seminar on the subject. Main speaker was Vittorio Corbo, that

great gift to Arabic studies and Orientalism, as he is to exchange rate

management..

JAPANESE HANDLING OF RESCUE When the earthquake first happened, Chilean

and other media organs were in awe about the speed of the deployment of

100,000 rescuers in the disaster zone. They expected, no, they were sure,

that such an advanced, developed and disciplined country would set an

example of how to conduct a rescue operation. It already led the field in

educating its citizens in prevention measures against earthquakes.

Nearly two weeks after the quake, the mounting evidence points exactly the

opposite way. Far from being a model of efficiency, and just concentrating

on the humanitarian aspects, besides the nuclear consequences, the relief

operation has been shamefully inefficient. Yes, it was a big quake. Yes,

it was in difficult terrain. Yes, it was very cold. However, the handling

was closer to a show by ONEMI and its supporting cast, than from a

state-of-the-art exercise.

It just could be that however smart they may have been in inventing the

cassette player, the Walkman, the VCR, and Nintendo, they might just not

be very good at rescue operations. I remember that on August 12, 1985, a

Japan Airlines 747 jet crashed into a mountain near Tokyo. It took two

days for the authorities to pinpoint the location, after which they sent

the rescue teams..up the wrong mountain! There was little they could do

anyway. 520 out of the 524 people on board were dead by the time they were

reached.

On the March 11 quake and tsunami, the authorities have now admitted that

their preparations were inadequate with no plans to handle a disaster of

that magnitude. They did not have adequate equipment. The military had

idle capacity which was not put to use. Funnily, the head of the Japanese

Defense Academy decided to visit Chile recently. The sea walls that were

to protect the coast against the tsunamis were of insufficient height. The

foreign rescue teams were not taken advantage of, and there were long

bureaucratic delays to allow the rescue dogs in, on the grounds of health

safety (with millions of people crying out for help and risking radiation,

the authorities worried about importing fleas and distemper!) Funnily,

exactly the same happened on the Argentine border with Chile after last

year’s quake in Chile.

When action was taken, it looked about as efficient as Piñera’s house

rebuilding programme. Those helicopters throwing buckets of water over the

reactor were as ridiculously useless as the CONAF Polish-made fire

fighting converted crop sprayers that try to douse forest fires in Central

and Southern Chile. Have the Japanese not heard either of the

purpose-built Canadair or Beriev-200 aircraft?

The most criminal example of inefficiency came out of the interview at a

hospital in the disaster zone, where many refugees had huddled. The chief

doctor said he was running low on food and medical supplies. People were

getting a ball (not a bowl, but a ball) of rice as food for a single day.

What? Don’t tell me that the same helicopters spitting on the reactors

could not be better used for an air bridge to these hospitals, round the

clock, carrying food and medical supplies. Helicopters do not need a

landing strip. After all, the TV crew could get there.

Shameful. I think not just the government, but the Emperor should

abdicate. Pity Seppuku is out of fashion, as the disciplined young

Japanese have turned, like their Western counterparts, into Information

Technology addicts for the purpose of games and entertainment, and are

fast losing all what made the nation powerful (as it has no natural

resources, if it loses its people quality, Japan will end up like Greece

or Britain, a museum of past glories). People forgot too soon how badly

the Kobe quake was handled in 1995. Mishima was the last great Japanese.

NEGATION SYNDROME There are important socio-cultural aspects to take into

account. Japan is a corrupt society, and we know that not just nuclear

incidents but defects on other products such as motor cars, were hidden

from the public for long periods. Only after US lawyers start putting

their nose into the matter than they suddenly start recalling zillions of

vehicles. The contradictory remarks on how much radiation risk there was

are part and parcel of the same syndrome. One day the population is told

there is no risk, and the other day they advise not to give Tokyo tap

water to babies, hundreds of kms. away from Fukushima.

The Japanese character is hostile to spreading bad news, because it

implies criticism of someone’s acts. When I was working in the City of

London, it was well known that Japanese brokers never issued “sell”

recommendation on Japanese companies, even if they were in an ENRON

situation, because it did not look very gentlemanly. People who deal or

negotiate in that part of the world also know that they hear “yes” more

often than “no” from their interlocutors, though it never means that they

are in agreement and even less that a deal is done.

HOW OTHER COUNTRIES DO IT Major natural catastrophes are overwhelmingly

located in the developing world, with Japan being a rare exception. Other

countries do have disasters, small, big and medium, and they have

different ways of coping with it.

Starting with the region, China is also prone to major earthquakes with

death and destruction. There is less first hand information compared to

the live coverage of the latest events in Japan, but we know for a fact

that compared to the 10,000 houses that Piñera and his team of academics

from the sort of university Eugenio Guzman teaches at, managed to put up

in a year, the Chinese, headed by military construction group, rebuilt a

large town that was almost totally destroyed in 6 months. The Chinese also

showed long-range efficiency by evacuating in a few days, 30,000 of their

national from Lybia in a textbook operation involving a navy vessel, air

force transports and privately chartered planes.

Russia has a full ministry for handling disasters, and even though their

record may be patchy, at least there is a structure and their heart is in

the right place. France has a really integrated plan called PLAN ORSEC for

complete coordination of all institutions in case of an large

emergency (though I suppose they have not been tested after a force 9

earthquake).

Thank heavens that the UK rarely faces natural or man-made emergencies,

because it is an utter disaster. A recent public inquiry on bombings in

London’s public transport some years back reflected an amazing number of

shortcomings in the rescue services. Even their famed crack military units

are fast becoming a joke. Because, like many countries round the world,

the RAF preferred to buy expensive combat planes that are only used to

kill babies in Moslem countries, rather than logistical equipment, the

Foreign Office could not gather official transport to evacuate British

civilians from Benghazi (that is what the town is called and pronounced,

ignorant Chilean journalists, not Bengasi). Instead, they chartered from

someone like Air Uzbekistan a plane that broke down at Gatwick airport

before leaving, and delayed the operation by 24 hours. Those to be

evacuated by ship did not fare better. The frigate HMS Cumberland, which

was on its way back to the UK for cashiering off, was diverted to pick up

evacuees at Benghazi. They duly came on board, and than sat there like the

troops on the even of D-day because the ponzis that commanded the vessel

decided that the sea was “too rough”. These are from the same source as

half the frigates Chile has acquired. It is to be hoped that the Peruvians

rather than the Argentines will attack the Chilean high seas fleet,

because obviously they cannot tackle the Magellan straights, if they

cannot sail in the Mediterranean. Is it necessary to also mention the

“crack” (is that what they were on?) SAS unit which, accompanied by an MI6

agent, landed in the rebel zone without being invited and instead of being

welcomed as liberators were duly jailed for trespassing?

As Aristotle once said: “Excellence is not an act, it is a habit”. Sadly,

a habit that is fast disappearing.

NOTE In answer to several queries, my weekly papers have NOT resumed. I

only write some thoughts from time to time (it may be twice a month,

followed by nothing in two months), and I try to keep them as general as

possible so as not to provide free homework help for the readership. I

already know that my last paper on the Shortightedness of Defence Salesmen

was not taken seriously by anyone among those it was particularly destined

to. Lastly, the behaviour of some embassies, international organisations

and corporate readers is getting beyond the acceptable, and one of these

mornings when I get up on the wrong foot, I will say “Unchi” to all of

them.