Brazil: violence in (merged thread)

[bourbon]

Brazil police occupy Sao Paulo slum after clashes, The Associated Press, February 3, 2009.

Paraisopolis and the PCC - history and symbology, by Samuel Logan. Security in Latin America, February 04, 2009.

Video - The Vice Guide to Travel: The Slums of Rio.
The High City - Shopping in Brazil's favelas.

[Jedburgh]

JSOU, Sep 09: Irregular Warfare: Brazil's Fight Against Criminal Urban Guerrillas

In this monograph Major General Alvaro de Souza Pinheiro contributes to the discussion of urban guerrillas, their impact on society, and the role of the armed forces in countering criminal elements. The rise of urban guerrillas is a result of an evolution in command and control capabilities, weapons, and doctrine that has given them strong influence over the daily lives of citizens living in neighborhoods where government support and control is limited or absent. The favelas (ghettos, slums) of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo are ready examples that provide the setting for General Alvaro’s monograph. The urban guerrilla, however, is emblematic of a wider-felt problem, not limited to Brazil. What makes General Alvaro’s monograph compelling is that this Brazilian story has universal application in many locales that are under-governed and under-supported by constituted authorities.

[Mike Burgoyne]

I will be in Rio shortly looking at the security situation with the favelas.

Any advice, contacts, and/or questions I should ask would be great.

Thanks

Mike

[davidbfpo]

The BBC has had a couple of reports on a new police "surge" (sorry, could not resist that) into gang territory; link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-11838472

There are linked stories and the Marine Corps have provided the police with logistic support and a small number of APCs (M113 in the photos seen).

[AdamG]

*Shudder*

Justin Bieber has groupies where you'd least expect them. An army of Brazilian cops raided the Rio headquarters of one of the country's most notorious drug gangs.

http://www.1035superx.com/cc-common/...rticle=7889026

[Tom Odom]

*Shudder*


http://www.1035superx.com/cc-common/...rticle=7889026

That is just so...wrong

In too many ways

[AdamG]

Now *this* is a war on drugs.

(CNN) -- The Brazilian Air Force on Friday dropped eight 500-pound bombs on a clandestine airstrip in the jungle near the Colombian and Venezuelan borders, part of wide military operation that goes beyond targeting drug traffickers.
Video of the scene, released by the air force, showed craters on the destroyed airstrip, which they say was used to move drugs.

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/am...ary.operation/

[AdamG]

The government of Brazil sent 3,000 troops into Rocinha, the hillside shanty town overlooking Rio de Janeiro, in an effort to drive out crime and violence in advance of the 2014 World Cup.

They encountered little resistance as they moved in at 4 a.m., The New York Times reported, despite the neighborhood's "notorious" reputation. Indeed, the move by the government, blessed with the dissonant formal name "Shock of Peace," is as much public relations as police work. Troops alone won't correct bad infrastructure and endemic poverty.

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/globa...st-slum/44921/

[bourbon]

Rio: the fight for the favelas - Brazil’s most famous city has launched a huge offensive against drug gangs and militias before the next World Cup and Olympics, By Misha Glenny. FT Magazine, 2 November 2012.

The integration strategy and efforts by the state and city hall are divided into two stages: UPP Policing and UPP Social.

The first stage sees crack forces storm the favelas in an intentionally intimidating act of urban shock and awe, followed by the establishment of a large civilian police presence inside the favelas for the first time in history.

When occupying Complexo de Alemão, in November 2010, the authorities decided against taking any chances: the army and navy were deployed to secure the perimeter of the entire area as the special forces went in search of the drug kingpins.

Everybody knew that the pacification of two of the city’s largest favelas, Alemão and Rocinha, was of overriding significance. “We chose those territories that were the critical nodes of criminal activity quite specifically, by assessing the fire power of the factions running them,” explains Beltrame. The greater the firepower, the higher up the list for pacification.

Interesting read.

[ccmaximus]

Another wave of attacks in Sao Paulo has been going on. Bus burned today, with all attacks emanating by one single criminal organization that has some readily identifiable political objectives:

http://noticias.uol.com.br/album/alb...to=2#fotoNav=2

The leaders of the said organization have been commanding murders of law enforcement agents. 90 so far this year.

A very shocking video of an attack against a police sergeant:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kalcxLjh4ts

These murders were commanded from within prison cells. This was an electoral year, and similar attacks have been constant in every other electoral year.

[davidbfpo]

A critical comment on 'Pacifying Rio', which has some interesting points I have not seen before. For example the Brazilian foreign policy goals being expressed in their military role in the UN Haiti mission, with the lessons learnt coming home.

Link:http://www.opendemocracy.net/opensec...-security-oper

[davidbfpo]

Amidst the limited reporting here of the protests against bus fare rises and then with a wider theme a report on how Brazilian police can act:

A security force operation in northern Rio de Janeiro has left eight people dead, as the country struggles to contain a popular uprising partly fueled by police brutality.

I suspect this fact may explain a lot:

a Special Operations Battallion (BOPE) sergeant was killed

Not seen these figures before, they are rather sobering:

Police in Rio and Sao Paulo, Brazil's two biggest cities, have killed 11,000 people in the last ten years - in 2008 one person was killed for every 23 arrested, compared to the US police average of one death per 37,000 people arrested.

Link:http://www.insightcrime.org/news-bri...favela-protest

If you're thinking of visiting Brazil for the World Cup in 2014, time to rethink?

[davidbfpo]

Not unexpected I fear, the opening passage from a NYT report:

A Brazilian police officer who spoke at a technology conference in New York on Tuesday about the potential of a new smartphone app to aid in the “pacification” of Rio de Janeiro’s lawless favelas was indicted the same day by prosecutors back home in connection with a notorious case of torture and murder by her unit in July.

Link:http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/201...new-york/?_r=0

The lady officer did return home. Yes being a police officer in such places is very hard, torture is not the response.

I had not realised the pacification effort was partly privately funded:

In August, the embattled Brazilian business tycoon Eike Batista — whose annual contributions of nearly $10 million had paid for U.P.P. equipment, uniforms, weapons, ammunition and training — withdrew his financial support for the project.

[davidbfpo]

The title comes from the closing line in the linked article, which was headlined:

Gang gunfights loom over Rio de Janeiro's World Cup preparations

It appears that not every favela likes pacification:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...parations.html

[davidbfpo]

Not what one expects, let alone the Brazilian military police:

Brazil's military police have killed six people in response to a gang assault against a Rio de Janeiro Police Pacification Unit, as the city's "pacification" program wavers in the face of regrouping gangs and a lack of progress in resolving social problems.Men in one of the cars opened fire, shooting two police officers, one of which later died.

Link:http://www.insightcrime.org/news-bri...cation-program

[flagg]

On the topic of Kilcullen/"Out of the Mountains" would Brazil's hosting of both the FIFA World Cup and the 2016 Olympics represent a great opportunity to see how the "conflict entrepreneur" and un/self-governed spaces issues are dealt with?

To me, Brazil's favelas seem like the best laboratories to see how megaslum governance and management solutions play out(or don't).

Such as the Brazil's Pacifying Police Unit(UPP).

If there's one place I'd like to be on the ground to learn and understand in the next two years would be Brazil's favelas.

[davidbfpo]

This thread is at the suggestion of Flagg. Using David Kilcullen's latest book and theory - what will happen in Brazil's slums / megacities / favelas in the next two years when two international football events take place there?

Can the Kilcullen theory be applied? So watch and comment on Brazil as an example.

There are a number of relevant threads. Notably The David Kilcullen Collection:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ad.php?t=12934 and the Brazil violence in (merged thread), which has a number of news reports on the usually para-military policing of the favelas:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ead.php?t=2602

There is the small example of into the slums cited by Kilcullen, the multinational effort to detain a drug lord in Jamaica:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ad.php?t=10451

Mexico of course already has an increasingly violent problem:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ead.php?t=5370

It is worth reading a recent SWJ article A Proposed Framework for Appreciating Megacities: A US Army perspective:http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art...-perspective-0 One of the authors commented:

We've looked at the recent favela ops, and certainly there is a lot to study there.

Flagg's post will come first after the thread is created.

[TheCurmudgeon]

Interesting idea. Watching events unravel and testing ideas against reality BEFORE it happens rather than in hindsight.

little information:

Key Facts

Here is a brief look at some of the facts and figures about the cities' slums:


1,000 – approximate number of favelas in Rio de Janeiro


18 – number of favelas that have seen Police Pacification Units (UPPs) installed to drive out crime since the first was established three years ago


40 – number of UPPs police aim to establish by 2014


20 – percentage of the six million people in the city's metropolitan region who live in favelas

3 – times more people killed on average per year by police in Rio than in the entire United States

37 – murders per 100,000 people in Rio per year compared to 1.9 per 100,000 in London

69,300 – number of inhabitants of Rocinha, South America's biggest favela, according to 2010 census

150,000 – estimated approximate true number of inhabitants of Rocinha

Facts and Figures.

60% of Rio de Janeiro’s new favelas are in the West Zone.

Favelas in the North Zone occupy a greater portion of the city; more than one million people live in communities in this zone.

Large favelas in Rio are prone to real estate speculation. The implementation of services inflated property prices.

Apartments are now common in favelas. Many investors take advantage of irregularities to be able to build apartments and then sell or rent out the units.

Rental price depends on the favela and the property. Monthly rental prices range from R$150 to R$ 500. In Rocinha, people line up to rent a house. Shacks in Pavão-Pavãozinho are sold for R$30.000 to R$40.000.

There is an enormous difference in household income between those who live on the asphalt and those who live in the favela. The average asphalt income is R$1,500, compared to R$352 in the favela. One can see all this inequality in Barra da Tijuca and nearby areas. In Barra, a head of a family earns an average salary of R$ 5,175 while the average income of a family in the Angu Duro community is R$ 382.

Brazilian favelas are considered a consequence of unequal income distribution and the lack of housing across the country. However, according to research by Professor Alba Zaluar, partly funded by the city of Rio de Janeiro, only 15% of favela residents would like to leave their hills. The survey revealed that 97% of these Rio favela homes have a TV, 94% have refrigerators, 59% a DVD player, 55% a mobile telephone, 48% have a washing machine, and 12% own a computer.

Favelas represent 3.5% of the city’s land area.

Between 1999 and 2008, the area of favelas grew by 7%, which corresponds to the entire Ipanema neighborhood.

From 2004 to 2010, 218 new favelas emerged in Rio.

Rio das Pedras favela already has 3,000 apartment buildings.

Favelas have a strong illegal market. Estimates show that irregular businesses generate R$ 3 billion per year.

[TheCurmudgeon]

An interesting paper, but still in Draft - Please don't quote without permission of the author

Criminal Governance and Insurgency: The Brazilian Experience

Abstract
The issue of non-state armed groups' governance has recently gained increased attention from various social science disciplines. In my paper I try to look at the territorial governance and authority of armed gangs in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro through the David Kilcullen's notion of insurgency as competition for the support of population through establishing the resilient system of control and subsequently gaining legitimacy from it. Although organized crime groups in favelas are not ideologically motivated to oppose the state as other insurgents are, their engagement in illegal activities and control of population based on „their“ territory make them armed opponents of state and de facto insurgents. In this paper I argue that their authority among favela citizens could be understood by the lack of Brazilian state institutions' capacity to ensure security and social order, which is crucial part of state „output legitimacy“ (and therefore de facto failure. The criminal groups are, on the other hand, viewed by many favela inhabitants as more capable to fulfil at least the most basic community needs. Therefore they are able to „outgovern“ the state and present an effective and in some sense legitimate alternative to its institutions.

[flagg]

Here's a YouTube link to a decent documentary about a favela in Rio, Brazil:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fP9eYxELA8Y

I particularly like the part from approx 15:00 to approx 21:00 minutes.

It follows the local slumlord(urban warlord meaning of the word) "Spiderman" in his unenviable tasks that seem to include:

Mayor
Police Chief
Judge/Arbitrator
Bank Manager
Public Works CFO
Drug Dealer

He's wearing a lot of hats filling the vacuum left by a failure of legitimate local governance.

To me, after having seen this and then reading Kilcullen's "Out of the Mountains" it really struck home the points of "conflict entrepreneur" and illicit networks where drug revenue is A, or possibly THE revenue stream(of the moment), NOT the purpose of the network.

It also helped better define for me forum member Bob's World's description of self-governed/ungoverned spaces that I've seen in his previous posting.

I've been following the UPP(Brazil's Police Pacifying Unit) project with great interest, and look forward to more in-depth analysis targeting those with a professional interest in the growing megaslum future.

So far, what little has made it into the mainstream has been less than promising:

Rio Police Officer Is Indicted for Torture While Lecturing on ‘Smart Policing’ in New York

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/201...ype=blogs&_r=0

Brazil's favelas are in big trouble, despite the World Cup marketing push

http://www.theguardian.com/commentis...lings-security

As an interested amateur, I'm left thinking that some source material worth researching for future solutions, might include a look into certain directions from the past.

I think if I had the opportunity to visit and understand the Brazilian favela ecosystems or Karachi slum ecosystems I'd want to do some homework in areas such as:

Shanghai Municipal Police(pre WWII) for low-tech historical efforts and innovation to quell organised crime in urban ghettos that has a foreign/colonial component

Northern Ireland 1970's-to present for more modern efforts to counter a capable insurgency with an urban component that covered the gamut of old school manual coal face work up through and including more modern interagency efforts leveraging technology

Political Machines(Tammany Hall as one example) in US urban ghettos from late 1700s to early 1900s for examples of networks leveraging their power to transition from illegal to quasi legal to legitimacy and recognition as one of the political centres of gravity/influence/control.

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I sometimes wonder if the life cycles of insects may be an analog to illicit megaslum networks?

embryo
larvae
pupa
imago/maturity/legitimacy

Comparing the favela video above with the Vice series on Karachi found here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgIl1vmIchA

It would superficially appear that Karachi's slums/ghettos are well into the transition to political machines

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Are developing world megaslums simply echoing our own western history of slum/ghetto development with two adjustments for sheer scale and the catalysing effects of technology?

IF that is the case, and while I am a big fan of David Kilcullen's book and derived great value from it(particularly his conflict entrepreneur and "city as biological system" perspective), I don't see enough emphasis on what I see as the life cycle of illicit networks on the journey from criminality to legitimacy.

Using Kilcullen's own biological system viewpoint, I wonder if the illicit networks can be viewed as a parasitic/symbiotic biological system within a system?

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I look forward to seeing how this thread develops in the exciting times ahead!