'Just Cause' examined
Berryman, Phillip
REPORT FROM PANAMA 'JUST CAUSE' EXAMINED A SOMEWHAT SOVEREIGN NATION My people had been praying," said the Protestant minister, a black of West Indian descent. When U.S. forces overthrew...
...After the United States began its efforts to topple him in earnest, there seemed to be only two alternatives: Noriega or the opposition Civic Crusade, which had U.S...
...I could not verify this...
...Although the Panamanian Catholic bishops initially called the invasion a move backwards, they did not condemn it...
...From the banking community: "The reality of our country is always in doubt...
...The larger number of those displaced have found shelter with relatives or friends, or have perhaps built a shack on the city's outskirts...
...More recently, I heard that some U.S...
...Nineteen people reportedly had been taken from Panama, presumably in connection with accusations against Noriega...
...I heard many expressions of frustration and chagrin...
...Still, most businesses were reopening, newspapers were reappearing, and here and there the renamed Panamanian Public Force was undertaking minor police functions...
...one such building had 251 people in forty rooms with six toilets and showers in common patios...
...troops as liberators...
...This is a small proportion of the Bush administration's proposed $ 1 billion aid package...
...Whole families occupied single rooms...
...much of the zone was occupied by the bases of the U.S...
...until mid-century the Canal Zone collected the city's garbage...
...Noriega's worst crime in the view of more than one person was to have wrapped himself in the banner of nationalism...
...If 4,000 are built, the cost would approach $50 million...
...We were told that these fires were deliberately set by the Dignity Battalions, the civilian militias formed under Noriega...
...officer praised the Panamanians' ability to get organized, but he described the function of their leaders as that of "interfacing" with U.S...
...military control...
...troops...
...Panamanian nationalism had to define itself against this presence, especially after the 1964 flag riots, when a group of Panamanian high school students, in accord with the treaties in force, tried to raise their flag in the Canal Zone...
...many shops damaged in the looting remained closed...
...forces overthrew General Manuel Noriega and seemed to end the prolonged crisis, "they saw it as the answer to their prayer...
...authorities...
...Many signs of the invasion two weeks earlier were still visible...
...Unquestionably most people accepted or welcomed the arrival of U.S...
...flag to welcome the invading troops and all she could do was hastily hang out a Panamanian flag...
...Panamanians are trying to gather information and eye-witness accounts...
...One figure for rebuilding the area was $35 million...
...According to U.S...
...Those unwilling to commit to either were left isolated...
...Some Panamanians spoke of the arbitrary actions of the troops...
...backing...
...That contrast alone must raise questions about proportionate means even among those who do not object to the invasion in principle...
...Another woman remarked that given all the damage Noriega had done, she thought he must still be a CIA agent...
...Southern Command...
...In the early seventies General Omar Torrijos, Panama's populist leader, began to evoke latent Panamanian nationalism in order to raise the issue of the zone and the canal...
...A friend of mine remembered how impotent she felt as she saw her neighbor hang out a U.S...
...The country owes its existence to President Theodore Roosevelt who in 1903 sent warships to provide protection for Panamanians who wanted independence from Colombia and were willing to give the U.S...
...At the emergency camp, a U.S...
...Myself, I see it as a necessary evil...
...Most of the territory of the zone passed immediately into Panamanian administration and gradually the administration of the canal has been assumed by Panama (the chair of the Canal Commission passed to Panama this past January 1...
...But by what right, some Panamanians asked, could the United States abduct their fellow citizens...
...The new government is eager to begin work...
...snipers...
...In conversation with these homeless, I had the impression that they expect the United States to build permanent concrete apartment buildings in Chorrillo at rents they can afford...
...However, even the official U.S...
...and Panamanian government authorities and of informing the army of the people's needs (like keeping toilet paper stocked...
...Americas Watch believes the U.S...
...The Confederation of Workers of Panama condemned the invasion, echoing the statement of their body's regional president in Mexico...
...the airport was under heavy guard...
...troops, their faces painted for combat, were to be seen in military vehicles or patrolling the streets in groups...
...Again, there is no doubt that many embraced the U.S...
...invasion of Panama" (The National Coordinating Body of Support and Solidarity, a network of groups doing grassroots work...
...The economic and material costs are easier to quantify...
...Those who opposed it do not deny that fact, but try carefully to explain it: "When you're saved from drowning, you don't ask who your rescuer is...
...From someone on the left: "We're not starting from zero but from less than zero...
...Their efforts were thwarted by angry Zonians and over twenty Panamanians were killed by U.S...
...Thoughtful Panamanians, however, are concerned about the consequences...
...a free hand in building a canal...
...There was far more zeal to count weapons and provide details of the Noriega regime's financial corruption...
...His words express the ambivalence of Panamanians toward the invasion...
...Not surprisingly, the United States was a primary point of reference for many Panamanians: the U.S...
...One estimate of physical destruction was $100 million, much of which was in Chorrillo, adjacent to the main headquarters of the Panamanian Defense Forces...
...In any case, I was not surprised to see that virtually all of the wooden houses were destroyed, since on Christmas Eve, 1972, I witnessed a fire that within an hour destroyed fourteen houses and left almost 300 families homeless...
...Physically rebuilding Panama will be easy in comparison to restoring its sovereignty and self-determination...
...AID officials were proposing a voucher plan that would enable those entitled to new housing to choose from a variety of designs...
...Faced with these options, at least some upright people chose the Noriega framework...
...An architect estimated that cheap apartments might cost $10-12,000 per unit...
...Around midnight the night of the invasion, helicopters flew over the area advising people to leave...
...was the largest employer outside the Panamanian government...
...I doubt that congressional hearings will show much concern for their human rights...
...The buildings were meant to be temporary, but most of them were still standing in the sixties and seventies, when I served as pastor of the neighboring church...
...The network of grassroots organizers cited 2,000 deaths, but had only hearsay evidence...
...My visit to Panama began the day after General Noriega walked out of the nunciature and was arrested by U.S...
...For decades after constructing the canal, the U.S...
...estimate is probably correct...
...before 2000 the treaty requires the United States to relinquish its military bases...
...and the embassies of Cuba, Nicaragua, and Libya were surrounded...
...Their papers, including their water bills, will sit in cardboard boxes as U.S...
...troops sometimes entered the rest of the country to impose order...
...They are scheduled to be moved to a hangar at Albrook Air Base...
...The invasion was] not the most fitting way to resolve the crisis" (The Ecumenical Committee...
...intelligence agents pore through their new treasure trove of information on the Latin American left...
...Panamanians were not part of the crucial initial negotiations with the U.S., which were carried out by Philippe Bunau-Varilla, a French promoter of the canal...
...No doubt many others are left with such grief and frustration...
...figures are far higher than the number of people Noriega had murdered for political reasons, which human rights agencies would count in the dozens...
...In that context to be a nationalist seemed equivalent to being a Norieguista...
...Panama's peculiar historical experience helps explain such reactions...
...A Lutheran minister told us he was still looking for his grandfather who had lived in Chorrillo...
...The seeming lack of concern about how many Panamanians had died was quite disturbing...
...The two-story wooden houses of Chorrillo were built in 1913-14 to shelter the workers who had built the canal, but had to leave the zone...
...The viability of Panama as a nation is much more in doubt than ever before...
...occupied a ten-mile swath of land that divided Panama City from the rest of the inhabited part of the country...
...One couple reported to me that the troops had ransacked their apartment and taken away all their papers and diskettes...
...Nevertheless, for long periods the issues of the canal and the zone have remained dormant...
...The result was the 1978 Carter-Torrijos Treaty, which sought, in effect, to decolonize the U.S.-Panama relationship in phases...
...As far as I could tell, they were not mourning the loss of a community and a way of life, but are counting on returning to Chorrillo with decent housing...
...There were occasional sniper incidents...
...Their crime was probably having worked in Nicaragua...
...estimates, 314 Panamanian combatants and slightly more than 200 civilians were killed...
...Vice-President Guillermo Ford said Chorrilleros would be hired immediately to clean out the rubble...
...Of the estimated 13,000 people currently left homeless, some 4,000 are in the makeshift camp at Balboa Junior High School under U.S...
...Rapid reconstruction of El Chorrillo would be a politically powerful symbol for the new government of President Guillermo Endara and for the United States...
...Some fires broke out then, but much of the barrio was still standing at dawn, and burned down only later...
...The few public challenges to the invasion were expressed in measured language: "We cannot approve the U.S...
...A revised version of his Inside Central America (Pantheon) will be published this fall...
...From the newspapers one would hardly know anyone had been killed...
...As one labor leader put it, "We're still drunk, but the hangover is coming...
...It is an open question whether these homeless will have meaningful participation in plans for the new El Chorrillo...
...Perhaps their optimism is not entirely misplaced...
...PHILLIP BERRYMAN Phillip Berryman, a writer and translator, lived in Panama and Guatemala for twelve years...
...most did, perhaps during lulls in the shooting...
Vol. 117 • February 1990 • No. 4
