A devil in panama

Abstract

In 1978, the United States and Panama signed a treaty to give the latter sovereignty over the Panama Canal by 1999. The canal had diminished in importance because of technical advances in transportation. But the United States remained concerned about its fourteen military bases in Panama and its Southern Command headquarters, which was the site for U.S. military and covert operations in Latin America and the Caribbean. Washington was also uneasy about the Panamanian government under General Omar Torrijos, who, unlike most Latin American military leaders, was a populist‐reformist. He maintained friendly relations with Cuba's communist government and extracted monies from banks and businesses to fund social programs, some of which really benefited the people. In 1981, Torrijos died when his plane mysteriously blew up in midair. His place was taken by the head of Panamanian military intelligence, Colonel Manuel Noriega. Either Noriega or the CIA likely engineered the crash that killed Torrijos. Noriega blunted the progress made by the Torrijos administration. He also collaborated with Oliver North to create corporate fronts to finance the Nicarag‐uan contras and establish a Costa Rican airfield to supply them. Noriega received $200,000 a year as a CIA agent—even when George Bush was the agency's director. But there were limits to Noriega's willingness to serve Washington. He reasserted Panama's independence over the control of the Canal Zone and the leases for U.S. military bases. He reportedly refused to join an invasion against Nicaragua and maintained friendly relations with both Managua and Havana. Before long, hostile reports about him began appearing in the U.S. media. In 1987, the Justice Department indicted Noriega for drug‐smuggling. A crippling economic embargo was imposed on Panama, a country of two million people, causing a doubling of unemployment and a drastic cutback in social benefits. Despite tough U.S. sanctions and troop buildups in the Canal Zone, Noriega refused to step down from power as Washington demanded. In the U.S. press, our erstwhile friend and ally, Manuel Noriega, was swiftly transformed from “military leader” to “strongman dictator.” A media blitz demonized the Panamanian leader as a drug dealer, thus preparing the U.S. public for the ensuing invasion. During the aborted 1989 Panamanian elections, the U.S. press widely publicized the beating of an opposition candidate by Noriega supporters. It repeatedly referred to Noriega's “goons” and “thugs.” Never did it refer to “Botha's goons” in South Africa or “Duarte's goons” in El Salvador or to the other thugs who practiced torture and murder in a host of U.S.‐supported client states. In mid‐December 1989, just days before Bush's invasion of Panama, ABC's Ted Koppel reported that Noriega had declared war on the United States. Others in the media made the same unsupported assertion. Instead, Noriega—who was just then making peace offers to opposition leaders—was quoted by Reuters as saying that the United States, “through constant psychological and military harassment, has created a state of war in Panama.”