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Chiquita and Terrorism; from the WSJ 8/2
Topic Started: Aug 3 2007, 03:34 PM (57 Views)
Dominic Guglieme
the human MICROscope!!



The 8/2 Wall Street Journal had a front page story about Chiquita Bannana Company facing a 25 Million Dollar penalty for dealing with terrorists.


In a nut-shell, Chiquita was threatened several years ago. If they did not pay the terrorists, the terrorists would attack/kill/kidnap Chiquita workers. Think of it as an old style mafia protection racket, and you will not go far wrong.

Chiquita paid. Howerver, in '03, the company reported this to the US government. No action was taken, despite the payments being illegal. (The mere act of giving the terrorists money, just shy of 2 million, would qualify as supporting a terrorist organization.) The article quoted some people as saying that punishing the company sets a bad precedent, as it will discourage self-reporting.

While agree that it does not make sense to punish self-reporting as severely as other offenders, there still has to be a penalty for the misdeed. I can see diminishing the penalty, but not eliminating it.

Eliminating the penalty for dealing with terrorists, or any crime, merely encourages the crime. Offenders do not commit crimes for the hell of it. They determine that crime does in fact pay. The reward could be financial, or it could be a "security" cost, as was the case with Chiquita. If penalties were removed for self-reported crimes, offenders would rationally conclude that they could commit an offense provided they reported it before they were caught. (And, they are already assuming that getting caught is unlikley.)

Some people may argue that Chiquita should not be punished. After all, nobody denies that Chiquita was threatened. What could they do? Well, they could have spent their black-mail money on enhanced security. They could have reported the threats. Hell, with the 25 million they had to spend on fines, they could have hired a whole mess of security officers.

Why should Chiquita not be allowed to deal with this as they see fit? Simple. If Chiquita pays, what next? What group will make what demands next, expecting (based on precedent) their demands to be met? If Chiquita is not penalized, and harshly, then other companies may decided that it is easier to simply buy-off terrorists (thus making terrorism even more appealling) than to confront them. After all, they could honestly claim "self-defense".

Appeasement, (be it the paying of black-mail money or surrendering small contries to rapacious neighbors), does not work. Paying terrorists to release hostages, or simply to refrain from taking the, simply makes kidnapping and extortin good business moves. In the 1930s, sacrificing Austria (and Poland, and.....) did nothing to sate German lust for territory, power and blood. (The sound thrashing of Germany at Stalingrad, the bombing of Dresden and the seizure of Berlin did far more on this front than anything else.)

Dealing with terrorism must remain a serious offense, if only to keep the potential penalty equal to, or greater, than the potential rewards. Should Chiquita get a break? Yes. Should they be forgiven? No.

Dom
-would be okay with imprisoning collaborators under some circumstances.













































Keep it local.


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