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According to this article in Clarin, an average of four trucks a day are being attacked by the infamous
“piratas del asfalto”.
I’ve written before about the asphalt pirates, gangs
that operate by robbing trucks usually on highways when traveling between
cities. Road Priates have been around for decades but their activity increased
after the crisis just like all other criminal activity. Generally they attack
trucks or convoys and they frequently do so disguised as cops or even putting
up fake checkpoints.
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Truck Carrying Dog Food got attacked in Berazategui, Buenos Aires this Friday. |
It used to be that they
looked mostly for expensive cargo such as electronics, but in recent years expensive
food such as milk, cheese and other dairy products that keep going up in price
due to inflation, are also being targeted by criminals. Due to the amount of
robberies, electronics are now being transported in armored Cash in Transit
trucks. Food isn’t transported in armored vehicles and besides, dairy has to be
transported in refrigerated trucks.
Another interesting fact
seems to be that electronics are just too expensive now and harder to resell,
while mass consumption items are easier to “move”. Electronics are now just 8%
of the robberies, while food (31%), perfumes (20%) y medicine (11%) are the
favored ones. Cigarettes are also valued cargo that is easy to sell.
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| Many stores have poorly stocked shelves. Rationing of certain products like flour and sugar is common. |
A good hit may land the gang
with 300.000 USD in merchandise or more.
The assaults usually happen
in the conurbano and the roads around Buenos Aires, especially to the south.
It is sad to think that a
country that produces enough food to feed several times its population has food
prices that are more expensive than USA and most European nations.
FerFAL
FerFAL
5 comments:
1) This is one of the factors that destroyed the Roman Empire in the West (i.e, Italy and Gaul vs Byzantium).
A shrinking economy means there are less resources for police so the government diverts those resources to protecting the rich.
2) Here in the USA, response time of police in bankrupt Detroit is now around 1 hour. Two-faced Obama does nothing even as his Democratic operatives and media relentlessly attack George Zimmerman as a "racist, armed
vigilante" and try to railroad an innocent man into prison in order to divert black Democratic voters attention away from the 15% unemployment they have endured in the four years since Democrats were given control of the White House and huge majorities in the House and Senate.
3) The problem with protecting the Rich is that criminals then attack the transport corridors --the arteries that sustain the cities-- and you get a downward spiral of decline as trade shrinks , the economy shrinks, police coverage shrinks and the criminals get even bolder.
4) I don't even blame the criminals -- why should desperate men respect the laws of a corrupt ruling elite that differs from the criminals largely by scale not methods?
An elite that chooses to rob due to greed, not necessity.
It seems hilarious to me that Obama would talk about youthful black criminals (like those breaking into George Zimmerman's housing complex) when former Democratic Governor and Senator Jon Corzine is still walking around free after $1.6 Billion of customer money went missing at his MF Global firm:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_corzine#MF_Global
1) The Democratic news media has largely ignored the massive collapse in real median incomes across all working age groups in America -- a major sea change from the preceding 50 years.
http://www.oftwominds.com/photos2012/income-by-age9-12.gif
That's not bad luck -- that's Democratic policy.
2)Around 440 AD the Catholic priest Salvian explained why the Roman Empire was collapsing: the common people were defecting to the Germanic invaders for protection from the predations of the corrupt Roman government:
" the state has fallen upon such evil days that a man cannot be safe unless he is wicked] Even those in a position to protest against the iniquity which they see about them dare not speak lest they make matters worse than before.
So the poor are despoiled, the widows sigh, the orphans are oppressed, until many of them, born of families not obscure, and liberally educated, flee to our enemies that they may no longer suffer the oppression of public persecution.
They doubtless seek Roman humanity among the barbarians, because they cannot bear barbarian inhumanity among the Romans.
And although they differ from the people to Whom they flee in manner and in language; although they are unlike as regards the fetid odor of the barbarians' bodies and garments, yet they would rather endure a foreign civilization among the barbarians than cruel injustice among the Romans.
So they migrate to the Goths, or to the Bagaudes, or to some other tribe of the barbarians who are ruling everywhere, and do not regret their exile.
For they would rather live free under an appearance of slavery than live as captives under an appearance of liberty. The name of Roman citi'en, once so highly esteemed and so dearly bought, is now a thing that men repudiate and flee from "
Silvan's reference to the "Bagaudae" is interesting -- they were armies of impovished peasants who fought the Roman Emperor's tax collectors in the end stages of the collapse.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagaudae#Recurrences
The Roman government referred to those insurgents as brigands -- but the military term for stealing from the enemy is not "thievery" --it is "commandeering".
That appears to be Argentina's fate -- and possibly America's future.
The closest thing we have to this in the U.S. is in urban areas where 'flash mobs' ransack stores and dissappear on foot into the city. The loot isn't very valuable, but the chances of getting caught appear to be slim.
yeah it's really a shame, did not know food in argentina is so expensive.
Alma
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