I also agree with Tim Bones. Some of you guys are talking like all these 7000 marines will be swooping down on CR at one time but if you read the article carefully you'd see that it never really said that. What it actually said was that 7000 Marines may transit through CR over the course of the
6 month run of the program rather than at any one time. At any one time it could be relatively few. For example, in the very next paragraph it said that most of the ships are frigates with a capacity only two helicopters and 200 marines and 15 officers each. The largest ship that would be involved includes the USS Makin Island, which has a capacity to carry 102 officers, 1449 sailors and more than 50 aircraft, but nowhere did it even suggest that anywhere close to all 1551 personnel would be off the ship at any one time (leaving the ship totally unmanned). Besides, according to that ship's website, they have also made liberty calls in such other Latin American countries as Peru, Chile and Brazil during the past year, so this is probably not all that special an assignment for those guys (and hence the lack of much fanfare in the US press).
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El T,
I did find some links to articles about this deployment on english-language websites but they seem to be mostly translated reprints of the Nacion article:
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Newsfeed/Article/115564587/201007051156/Deployment-of-US-warships-and-marines-approved-in-Costa-Rican-parliament.aspxThis article from the LatAm Daily (not sure of its country of origin) provides a little extra info as well as some interesting commentary (though perhaps from a somewhat leftwing angle):
http://www.latamdaily.com/2010/07/03/us-warships-headed-to-costa-rica/. In fact, I liked the commentary so much that I just have to actually post it for you all to read:
LatAm Daily wrote:
La Nación quotes a document from the US Embassy that states that, “The US personnel in Costa Rica will be able to enjoy freedom of movement and the right to carry out the activities that they consider necessary to complete their mission.â€
Well isn’t that just permissively vague.
The legislation says the mission has to do with fighting drug traffickers, as well as a few humanitarian goals, though the humanitarian use of a Harrier jet is still somewhat unclear.
On a casual note, I would point out again that for all the Costa Rican smugness about not having an army, they do a pretty good job of borrowing one when they need it. On a more serious note, because this is bound to be extremely politically unpopular domestically, the government must have a damn good reason for inviting all this firepower in from up north.
My guess is that the government is secretly terrified it is losing control of the security situation. They probably should be.
A proportionally very large amount of cocaine is busted in Costa Rica every year, and the country has become something of a bodega for Mexican and Colombian drug smugglers, what with its good infrastructure, weak judicial system, ill-equipped police force, long coastlines, remote beaches, terrible immigration enforcement, and ample opportunities for laundering money through real estate transactions and layers of shell corporations.
I’m not sure how well-armed helicopters will change any of those factors, unless you could make the National Registry more transparent by slipping a few Hellfire missiles through the front door . Probably wouldn’t hurt.
Anyway, keep ironing around that wrinkle fellas. You’ll win the war on drugs any day now.
I also found this somewhat more recent update:
Quote:
Costa Rican opposition today (Saturday) rejected the resolution passed Friday by the Costa Rican Legislative Assembly (Congress) that allows 46 U.S. warships (along with 7,000 Marines) to come in and out Costa Rican ports, waters and the country as a whole from July 1 through Dec. 31.
The opposition said it would file a "recurso de amparo" against the measure. "Recurso de amparo" has no direct translation to English but it means an appeal on the grounds of inconstitutionality or illegality.
IMHO, the fact that the opposition parties are making political hay over this should be no surprise. Just as in the US, opposition parties don't exactly get back into power by saying how wonderful the current administration really is. OTOH, I think it is at least as interesting reading some of the comments by the average tico that appear after the Nacion article and there it seems to be pretty well split. Many are so upset by the rising problem of illegal drugs in CR and the concommitant crime that goes with it, that they're willing to accept just about anything to combat it. Meantime, there are also many others who see this as a disproportionate use of force and a foreign infringement of sovereignty on a nation that prides itself for being "peaceful" and having disbanded its own military decades ago.
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Pura Vida 
As for reddundantly using concomitant and then definning it on topp of that again annother time? 
Well, how else do you think I manage to make my posts so long? 
Semper Fi...
