Hi there, Noite,
Of course there was some onitial and mild general press reaction questioning the convenience and/or need for a multi-billion dollar order for the new subs. Their curiosity was probably spiked by the unforseen change of preference from the German U214 towards the French Scorpene derivative… Actually if you recall it was nothing too momentous…
I’m not here to defend the Folha newspaper by any means, but… Isn’t this just the main role one should expect from serious, reponsible journalism? To permanently cross check all the expensive investment programs decided upon by our elected officials to be payed for with our taxes? Don’t you agree?
What they did is beyond their role. For example, Mr. Janio de Freitas kept saying over and over that the building of a new naval base and shipyard were a french imposition over Brazil, despite the Navy reassuring and showing evidence that the need existed way before. If they thought the Navy commander was lying they should find evidence of it, not simply telling the same thing every week out of basis. Every article would generate a an official response from the Navy PR only to be ignored. If that was not with second intentions then i don’t know what is.
But also do remember that once the Navy PR Dept came forward and answered all these very reasonable concerns promptly all objection simply vanished overnight even at the “conservative” Folha de São Paulo newspaper.
It only vanished when the deal was done. They kept their campaign until the last minute.
As a Brazilian you do know that when the local “big press” catches a whiff of “blood in the water” they’ll immediately behave like frenzied hungry sharks untill the whole issue is uprooted and exposed. Do you agree that nothing as such ever happened in the French Submarine deal?
I think they sometimes throw blood in the water, or even catchup, just to make noise.
Regards,
Hammer
P.S.: I do not agree with your take on the Blog Naval editors bias on this subject.
I understand your simpathy towards a fellow blogger, and maybe i would do the same if I was in your position, even if you make a way better work in being unbiased at Base Militar. I still visit Poder Aereo and find their content overall interesting. But Galante often crosses so much the line, in stablishing his opinions, that is hard to defend him. Poder Aereo was always pro-Gripen (or anti-Rafale to tell the truth). But after his visit to Sweden it became really annoying. When someone writes “tremble infidels, it exists” it’s hard to take as unbiased. Or when he published photos of a presentation showed by SAAB and wrote that critics who said the plane didn’t exist or was incomplete would have “their arguments destroyed by it”. Really?!? By a SAAB presentation? That’s my final take on it, already spent too much on this issue.
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