Air Force second sergeant Manoel Silva Rodrigues, 38, was arrested in Seville, Spain, with 39 kg of cocaine in a suitcase and now the case is generating international embarrassment for president Jair Bolsonaro and the Armed Forces.
He was part of the team that supports the entourage of President Jair Bolsonaro (PSL) on his trip to the G20 summit in Japan.
The military has made at least 29 trips in Brazil and abroad since 2011, several of them with the president's staff.
The president said the episode is unacceptable. The deputy, Hamilton Mourão, who holds the presidency temporarily, called the military a "qualified mule," alluding to people hired by traffickers to transport drugs.
Mourão said that Rodrigues would be part of the presidential flight crew, but later he stepped back - the Defense denied the information.
According to Bolsonaro's assistants, the prison smears the image of the country abroad and demonstrates flaws in the surveillance of those who travel in aircraft to support the president, among them the lack of police searches and detectors when onboarding.
At the top of the government, there is little doubt that the detention of the sergeant will reveal a broader scheme of drug trafficking.
Translated by Kiratiana Freelon