With Robert Seldon Lady, America 'Humiliates' Italy (La Repubblica, Italy)
"For American diplomacy and for the White House, the case
is closed. Closed, with a smack in the face to Italy. Happily undisturbed and returning
home undeterred by Italy's demand for his extradition is Robert Seldon Lady,
the former CIA station chief in Milan, condemned to nine years in prison for the
'extraordinary rendition' of Abu Omar. ... Stopped in Panama and detained based
on an international arrest warrant issued by Italy, Lady got away. ... The humiliations the U.S. inflicts on allies are not uncommon. Italy is used to it."
A rare photo of Robert Seldon Lady, former CIA bureau chief in Milan, Italy, who came within a hair's breath of being the first U.S. official to face charges in connection with 'extraordinary rendition' last week, when he was detained in Panama on an Italian arrest warrant. Panamanian officials quickly released him without explanation.
“He’s
on his way back to the United States”
was all U.S. State Department Deputy spokesperson Marie Harf
had to say [watch video].
For American diplomacy and for the White House, the case is closed. Closed,
with a smack in the face to Italy.
Happily undisturbed and returning home undeterred by Italy's demand for his extradition
is Robert Seldon Lady,
the former CIA station chief in Milan, condemned to nine years in prison for the
“extraordinary rendition” of Abu Omar. Stopped in Panama and detained based on an international
arrest warrant issued by Italy,
Lady got away. The decision by Panamanian officials to release Lady was made
precisely “to avoid the possibility of his being extradited to Italy.”
So claimed TheWashington Post, the first newspaper to have provided the news.
It
was legitimate sleight of hand: the United States
interposed to prevent the CIA agent from being handed over (even all these
years later) to the justice system of an allied country and NATO member, Italy. The Washington Post, with great understatement,
observed that the means used by the U.S. to obtain the release and return of
Lady remain unknown. But recent reports concerning Datagate
and the Snowden affair have amply demonstrated the type of pressure Washington is ready to
use, and how effective it is, even when the recipients happen to be
anti-American governments. For the U.S. State Department, after a concise
statement from John Kerry's spokeswoman, the “Lady case” doesn’t even exist. It
is business as usual. National interest, which exists in every country, is so
much stronger when it is superimposed on an imperial mentality. Whoever the U.S.
president may be at the time, conservative or liberal, he would be judged as a
weakling and traitor to the national interest if he were to send “one of his
own” - in particular a soldier or intelligence operative - before a foreign court,
or to a foreign prison.
The
humiliations the U.S. inflicts on allies are not uncommon. Italy is used to it. Among previous
episodes, perhaps the most tragic was the Cavalese cable car disaster of 1998. Twenty killed, due
to the reckless antics of a would-be Top Gun or aerial Rambo. American pilot
Richard Ashby had taken off from the Aviano Air Base,
and while performing some insane acrobatics, sliced a cable supporting an aerial
tramway gondola. Unyielding, Democratic President Bill Clinton didn't hesitate
to apply the international
convention on the status of NATO forces - which guarantees that U.S.
servicemen are tried only by “their own” - against a friendly government (then
under Romano Prodi).
Another
serious case was that of Nicola
Calipari, an Italian intelligence agent killed by
U.S. soldiers in the aftermath
of the liberation of journalist GiulianaSgrena in Iraq in 2005.
An
episode of a different kind, one of the rare cases in which Italy
held its own
against the American superpower, took place at the Sigonella
Air Base in 1985. At the time, Bettino Craxi was in the Palazzo Chigi,
and Ronald Reagan the White House. An Egyptian aircraft with Palestinian
terrorist Abu Abbas aboard, was intercepted by U.S. Naval aircraft
and directed to land at
Sigonella,
in Sicily. Craxi ordered Italian airmen, with
reinforcements from the Carabinieri, to resist American Delta Force command
trying to kidnap Abu Abbas [in connection with the
hijacking of the cruise ship AchilleLauro]. What
followed was a long crisis in relations between Washington and Rome. It was, however,
an exception.
Posted By Worldmeets.US
Not
always and not toward all, does America
behave with equal insolence. Even if the national interest and the supreme law
that imposes protection for its own military and secret agents prevails - a
president and his secretary of state have a measure of flexibility in dealing
with other governments. In this department,
Italy does not enjoy the most
elevated credibility. Incidents as diverse as the “Kazakh affair” [see below] to
the Costa Concordia disaster trial, contribute to sowing
in minds of the public and American ruling class the image of a country with unreliable
institutions. Seen through the eyes of Washington,
a country where police take orders from the ambassador of Kazakhstan is in
no way incapable of inspiring fear in the U.S. State Department.
[Editor's
Note: The Kazakh affair
refers to the recent deportation of the wife and child of Kazakh opposition
politician and businessman MuktarAblyazov,
which has created a firestorm in Italy, particularly within the Interior
Ministry, which claims to have known nothing about the amazingly quick
deportation. Ablyazov has asserted - and with good
reason - that the deportation endangers their lives].
These
are things that spokeswoman Marie Harf and Obama’s Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategic Communications
Ben Rhodes would never say. These comprise the "background" considerations
when evaluating the costs and benefits, advantages and risks, of issuing a slap
to an ally. The handling of the Costa
Concordia disaster also matters more than one might imagine, due to the widespread
U.S.
media coverage of the trial and the reputation of the Italian justice system for
being slow and unreliable, which was reinforced by the coverage.
Of
course, we aren't the only ones to swallow humiliation. The president of Bolivia was diverted and nearly detained, just
because Washington
had a suspicion that he might have been transporting Edward Snowden on his aircraft.
When
America flexes its muscles, even Vladimir
Putin and Xi Jinping are moved to caution: the
Chinese president pushed Snowden to leave Hong Kong; the Russian president has
many reservations about granting him asylum. Even in a period of decline, this imperial
logic continues to allow the United States to follow
“different rules” from every other state.
That is, unless it is occasionally tempered by respect. As it happens, the only
foreign leader to whom Obama addressed heartfelt apologies for Datagate, offering ample explanations and collaboration,
was German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
