- "State of Siege" is also the name of a thriller by Eric Ambler.
State of Siege (French title: État de Siège) is a 1972 French film directed by Costa Gavras and starred by Yves Montand and Renato Salvatori.
Summary
In Uruguay in the early 1970s, before the military dictatorship, an official of the US Agency for International Development (a group used as a front for training foreign police in counterinsurgency methods) played by Montand, is kidnapped by a group of urban guerrillas.
Using his interrogation as a backdrop, the film explores the often brutal consequences of the struggle between Uruguay's government and the leftist Tupamaro guerrillas and expose the American intervention in Latin America Dictatorships and her central role in the violation of human rights on those dark times.
This is a true story based in real events that took place in 1970, though the real name of the American agent was Dan Mitrione.
From 1960 to 1967 Dan Mitrione worked with the Brazilian police, during a time in which political opponents were systematically tortured, imprisoned without trial and killed. He returned to the US in 1967 to share his experiences and expertise on "counterguerilla warfare" at the Agency for International Development (AID), in Washington D.C.. In 1969, Mitrione moved to Uruguay, again under the AID, to oversee the Office of Public Safety.
In this period the Uruguayan government, lead by the conservative Colorado Party, had its hands full with a collapsing economy, labor and student strikes, and the Tupamaros, a left-wing urban guerilla group. On the other hand, Washington feared a possible victory during the elections of the Frente Amplio, a left-wing coalition, on the model of the victory of the Unidad Popular government in Chile, led by Salvador Allende, in 1970. The OPS had been helping the local police since 1965, providing them with weapons and training. It is alleged that torture was already practiced since the 60s, but Dan Mitrione is reportedly the man who made it routine. He is quoted as having said once: "The precise pain, in the precise place, in the precise amount, for the desired effect.". He also helped train foreign police agents in the United States in the context of the Cold War. In his torture teaching experiments he used homeless wanderers.
As the use of torture grew and the tensions in Uruguay escalated, the Tupamaros kidnapped Mitrione on July 31, 1970. They proceeded to interrogate him about his past and the illegal intervention of U.S. government in Latin American affairs. Besides, they demanded the release of 150 political prisoners. The Uruguayan government, with US backing, refused, and Mitrione was later found dead in a car, with two shots in the head and no signs of any maltreatment (in fact, during the kidnapping, Mitrione had been shot in one shoulder and healed afterwards in the "Cárcel del Pueblo", "People's Prison").
Mitrione was married and he had 9 children. His funeral was largely publicized by the US media, and it was attended by, amongst others, David Eisenhower and Richard Nixon's secretary of state William Rogers. Frank Sinatra and Jerry Lewis held a benefit concert for his family in Richmond, Indiana. Though he was characterized at his death as a man whose "devoted service to the cause of peaceful progress in an orderly world will remain as an example for free men everywhere" by White House spokesperson Ron Ziegler, and as a "a great humanitarian" by his daughter Linda, evidence of his secret activities would later emerge, mostly through Cuban double agent Manuel Hevia Cosculluela. One of his sons, Dan Mitrione Jr., also joined the FBI and later got involved in a scandal involving bribes in an FBI drug investigation. Today, although recalled by few Americans, Dan Mitrione Sr. is still a controversial Cold War character.
Awards
The film was nominated to the Golden Globes as Best Foreign Language Film and won the UN Award at BAFTA Awards.
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