Rude Awakening in Panama : Cocaine-Based Corruption Forces U.S. to Act

There are few uglier symbols of failed U.S. policy in Latin America than the presence of Gen. Manuel Antonio Noriega as the dictator of Panama. He makes the nine Sandinista commandantes look like Future Farmers of America. Fortunately for all, the thoroughly corrupt cocaine reign of Panama’s dictator appears to be coming to an end. But it won’t be easy.

Caught in a crossfire of broadening domestic protest and unexpected hostility from all three branches of the U.S. government, Noriega has seen his isolation and vulnerability grow with each rumor or report detailing his corrupt practices. Pressure on the general could become unbearable when one or another of the ominous ongoing investigations by U.S. agencies into Noriega’s past reaches a public conclusion or becomes an official accusation in the next few months.

A U.S.-instigated or -supported removal of Noriega from power would mean that for the first time in nearly 50 years, the United States would be tilting toward democracy as the basis for dealing with Panama. Over that period, the one truly consensus-supported president, Arnulfo Arias Madrid, was overthrown by the Panamanian military three times. The silent reaction from the Canal Zone and farther north was deafening; for democracy, it was deadening.

Unfortunately, an eventual removal of Noriega is unlikely to bring much early sanitation to the embedded habits of the Panama Defense Forces. For a generation, corruption in the military has proceeded without restraint. This has occurred in full view of the U.S. military and intelligence commands. A frequent and increasingly suspect excuse for such tolerance has been an assumption that the quality of Noriega’s intelligence data is unique. Although aware that he has been a double agent for Cuba since the 1960s, U.S. military intelligence has concluded that--until recently at least--the general’s performance has been a net plus for U.S. interests.

Whether a plus or minus, through Noriega’s unchecked power and unbridled greed the Panamanian military has become an awesomely corrupt militarized mafia. And the source of the corruption is cocaine.

Whether Noriega’s successor is an elected politician or appointed colonel, (the latter is more likely) the task of fundamental reform seems daunting. The roots of the cocaine cartel go deep, payoffs are high, the coercive pressures are relentless and the penalties for breaking ranks are severe.

It was nearly two decades ago when then-Col. Omar Torrijos seized power, and his long-time intelligence chief and bagman, Noriega, immediately began to build a lucrative network of “off-budget” activities. Principal among these was control of casinos and duty-free stores. It was not until shortly before Torrijos’ death in 1981 that the potential of Panama’s unique location, banking facilities, security control, communications and easily exchangeable dollar currency began to be exploited in the burgeoning narcotics trade. Early on, it had been only a minor setback when Torrijos’ brother Monchi, Panama’s ambassador to Spain, was disgraced for using the diplomatic pouch to transport cocaine to Europe.

More recently, it is alleged, Noriega has developed his country’s extraordinary drug-dealing potential shrewdly and coldbloodedly. Although the bulk of revenue has been extracted from laundering cocaine money (through the host of banks attracted to Panama by drug money), protection fees, brokering, transport, storage and transshipment of narcotics are also said to have netted the military enormous income.

All of this was going swimmingly for the Panamanian military until Noriega’s luck abruptly changed. It has been getting worse ever since. His vicious overreaction to growing public confrontations has further set the stage for his demise.

When Noriega fired his deputy, Col. Roberto Diaz (a relative of Torrijos) last summer, Diaz denounced him for murder, drug trafficking and election fraud. Democratic indignation had been rising, and in July it began to boil over. Led by the U.S. Senate, the Justice and State departments fell into line in penalizing, denouncing or announcing investigations into a variety of Noriega’s activities.

Noriega’s angry response has been to charge that the underlying objective of growing U.S. criticism and economic sanctions is to destabilize Panama. He argues that the ultimate and not so subtle intent of the United States is to so discredit the government of Panama that the Yankees will have a pretext for not turning over the canal to Panama in the year 2000 as stipulated in the Torrijos-Carter canal treaties.

In a sense, Noriega may be right. It would seem inconceivable that the United States could afford to abandon a facility as valuable to the world as the Panama Canal to a group as venal, irresponsible and undemocratic as Noriega and his uniformed thugs.

Over the past several decades, U.S. policy toward Panama has been flawed on three counts: Our most regrettable blunder was to negotiate the canal treaties with a de facto government; almost as serious in its implications has been our willingness to look the other way as Panama’s authoritarian regimes became ever more corrupt; finally, the United States has been poorly served by having the Pentagon call such a high percentage of our policy signals in dealing with Panama over the years.

It seems obvious that the cause of good relations between Panama and the United States would be democratically advanced by getting the military out of foreign-policy decisions.