From time immemorial, the 3 O-mile-wide isthmus of Panama has connected two continents and divided two oceans. In 1914, the United States completed a canal thereon which connected the oceans and divided the cotitinents. The "Big Ditch” solved a transportation problem, but it created many new problems—some of which now seem almost unsolvable.
P
JL resident Gerald Ford was reacting to the barbs of Republican challenger Ronald Reagan when he proclaimed last April, "I can simply say—and say it emphatically—that the United States will never give up its defense rights to the Panama Canal and will never give up its operational rights as far as Panama is concerned.”
Only two days before, on 8 April, the President’s special representative for the Panama Canal negotiations, Ambassador Ellsworth Bunker, appearing before a congressional committee in closed session, gave an account which did not square with Ford’s two-fisted statement. Instead, Bunker testified that the President had instructed him in writing to negotiate a treaty which would "give up the Canal Zone after a period of time” and the canal after a "longer period of time.”
The news media quickly noted that Ford’s statement varied from the eight principles pledged by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to Panama’s Foreign Minister Juan Antonio Tack in February 1974. In essence, the United States agreed that the forthcoming treaty would end after a fixed number of years. It affirmed that the United States would no longer retain its exercise of sovereign rights and jurisdiction in the Canal Zone. Further, the United States would share with tiny Panama the operation and defense of the waterway while Panama would grant to the United States the rights, facilities, and lands necessary to continue operating and defending the canal. Additionally, the two nations would provide for any future expansion of canal capacity as needed, and Panama would receive a larger share in the tolls and revenue accruing from the canal and the Canal Zone. Clause 6 of the agreement summed it up, "... Panama will assume total responsibility for the operation of the canal.”
Because the State Department had reckoned without the reaction of U. S. public opinion, the Kissinger-Tack pact must be regarded as less-than-adroit diplomacy. As President Ford learned two years later, a large segment of the American people was not psychologically prepared to "give up” this cherished possession that for 60 years had represented a symbol of U. S. security and a boon to world trade.
A leading opponent of the administration’s policy, Representative Gene Snyder of Kentucky, had grilled Bunker at the congressional hearings. He announced that if a U. S.-Panama treaty were concluded, the United States would abolish the Canal Zone Government in six months, relinquish jurisdiction in the Canal Zone within three years, and turn over the waterway to Panama in 25 to 50 years. Out of the welter of conflict- [1] ing statements, it seemed clear to many voters that the Ford administration was planning an eventual pullout from Panama. The question was whether the U. S. people would accept such a withdrawal, a concept which many Americans could not reconcile with the beliefs that they had been taught from childhood. Others doubted that the canal’s security and operation would remain unimpaired under joint control.
During the next week, the President and his press aide Ron Nessen were put to the embarrassing task of explaining that since 1964 U. S. Presidents had accepted the premise that the United States should modify the old treaty of 1903 and thus give Panama a greater voice in canal operations and defense by recognizing its sovereignty in the zone. Nessen sweepingly declared that all of Latin America backed Panama and that the issue was too important to be made a political football. It was charged that violence and bloodshed would erupt if the United States broke off negotiations, a course of action termed irresponsible. The Democratic nominee, Jimmy Carter, remained clear of the Panama boil-up but publicly stated, "we’ve got to retain that actual practical control” but could "yield part of the sovereignty” over the Canal Zone and increase the U. S. annuity (now $2.3 million).
For the past six years, Brigadier General Omar Torrijos, the chief executive and virtual dictator of Panama’s approximately 1.6 million people, has generated mixed emotions in the United States. The U. S. administration evidently assumes that he can maintain law and order and can guarantee the terms of a new treaty. Perhaps because he controls the media, brooks no political opposition, and is likely to be in office for a long time, it is considered sound business to deal with him. There is little doubt that Torrijos knows that his political future is riding on the outcome of the treaty and that he desperately needs it in order to survive as chief of the Panamanian Government. Apparently, Washington holds him in some regard. The press reports that he has developed warm ties with Bunker and with William Jorden, U. S. Ambassador to Panama, in spite of the "war of nerves” that some observers feel he has conducted.
The 48-year-old National Guard officer, who frequently wears jungle combat garb and packs two guns, has predicted that "serious trouble could erupt” unless the United States turned the Canal Zone over to Panama. As reported in Newsweek, he has insisted that the U. S. military presence must be gone within 25 years and that "the year 2000 is a sacred number.” If diplomacy fails, he is quoted as saying that in the event of an outbreak of violence, "either we crush the people or we support them. I am not going to crush the Panamanians.”
to the
entire exclusion of the exercise by the Republic
On another occasion Torrijos warned, "There are tW° routes in the philosophy of liberation. One is the jnute of Gandhi. The other is the route of Ho Chi ln,, Until now we are following the route of Gan*' Such remarks could be interpreted as political <jt°nc tailored for Panamanian consumption. Less Pu icized is the fact that such chillingpronunciamentos are resented by many North Americans who regard ^m as the posturings of a banana-belt dictator. It is Pro ably true that the counterproductive effects of his ery blasts are indiscernible to Torrijos and to the Panamanian people.
Students of the technique of political negotiating rte, t^lat> consciously or not, Torrijos is using the can t lose” ploy practiced by Communists for years in 1 cir negotiations with the West. As they interpret his tactics, he makes "impossible” demands from which he uses to budge, and he confronts the United States n predictions of dire consequences. However, some atm Americanists claim that his bellicose behavior stems more from his precarious plight in walking a P° meal tightrope between his radical supporters, on °ne side, and the moderates who want no part of V1° ence, on the other.
Back in Washington, the advocates of a new treaty, *n justifying their policy to the public, have placed a eavy emphasis on Panama’s legal right of sovereignty, coupled with a benevolent belief that times have anged and that nations are all interdependent on each other. Thus, the proponents of this view stress that if | e United States is to retain the friendship of Panama, at'n America, and the rest of the world, it has no c °ice but to get out of the Canal Zone within the next three decades. Underlying the administration’s Policy is its foreboding that the canal is a time bomb *'hich must soon be defused. Moreover, they believe at if Panama has a stake in protecting the waterway, terrorist attacks against the locks and dams could be e d m check, an assumption fraught with uncertainty.
briefly, the United States obtained the Canal Zone in 03 by payment of $10 million to Panama. In addition, Washington agreed to an annual payment of 0,000 for assuming ownership of the Panama Rail- °ad. Previously, the American financiers who ran the . 1 road had paid that annual fee to Colombia, so ashington continued the payments which have risen to $2.3 million per year. What did the United States 0 tain for the $10 million? The answer lies in tticle III 0f the treaty which grants "all the rights, Power, and authority . . . which the United States w°uld possess and exercise if it were the sovereign . . .
°f Panama of any such sovereign rights, powers and
authority.”1 Article III is still very much in force.
U. S. policy has been gradually revised from the sovereign-rights-in-perpetuity concept of 1903 to the acquiescence in 1974 in Panama’s claim of total jurisdiction in the zone. This policy change stemmed from the worldwide rise of nationalism and the revolt against colonialism that erupted after World War II. Western powers such as Britain and France were compelled to yield up their long-held territories in order to retain the cooperation of Third World nations. Ironically, Soviet Russia, which loudly trumpets Panama’s claim to the canal, has held onto Esthonia, Latvia, and Lithuania and maintained thousands of Soviet troops in eastern Europe. Panama was not long in sensing that it, too, could enlist Third World support by labeling the United States a colonial aggressor which was violating its sovereignty.
As the State Department points out, as early as 1905,
U. Si A.
177
117
13
USSR.
ZOO
380
WORLD’S MARITIME CHOKE POINTS
1. Straits of Florida
2. Windward Passage
3. Mona Passage
4. Iceland Strait
5. Iceland Strait
6. Barents Strait
7. Persian GulF a Red Sea
9. Strait of Gibraltar
10.Danish Straits
11. Mozambique Channel
12.Strait of Malacca
13.Tsushima (Korea) Strait
14.Cape of Good Hope 15 3uez Canal
16. Panama Canal
WM Soviet Footholds
HOOVER INSTITUTION. COURTESY OF PAUL RYAN
The U. S. goal of retaining unimpeded passage through the "choke-points ” of the world becomes more critical as the limitations of territorial-sea boundaries continue to grow and politically-motivated interpretations of the right of free passage increase.
U. S. officials acknowledged that Panama retained at least titular sovereignty over the Zone. "Titular,” as construed then presumably meant the dictionary definition, that is, existing in title or name only. William Howard Taft, Secretary of War at the time, referred to Panama’s titular sovereignty as a "barren scepter” and as a concession with a "poetic and sentimental appeal to the Latin mind.” That is to say, Washington agreed to recognize "titular” sovereignty to placate Panama’s sense of dignity and "face.” Over the years, total—not titular—sovereignty became the primary cause of Panamanian discontent, even though the United States Government had acquired substantially all of the some 550 square miles of property in the Canal Zone by purchase from individual owners at fair prices.
Scholars generally agree that, economically speaking,
we do not "need” the canal. Various studies show that if the canal were closed to traffic or if the tolls were raised excessively, the United States would survive. Admittedly, the costs and disruptions to world maritime trade would be severe, but probably could be accommodated, after a five- to ten-year period, by acceptable but very expensive alternatives. That is, the United States, after vast initial costs, could use rail and trailer truck transit to carry commodities cross-country, thus eliminating need for the canal. In other words, if there had never been a Panama Canal, there still would be large-scale world trade—but at a greater expense to the consumer.
It is in the more important area of national security that proponents of the treaty encounter opposition. While granting that in certain crisis scenarios, the canal is not essential to the survival of the nation, critics assert that such a line of reasoning ignores the international psychological consequences certain to follow if Washington announced an intended relinquishment of control. Consider the words of Hanson W. Baldwin, now retired from a distinguished career as the military editor of The New York Times.
Baldwin states that if Washington shows signs of a. andoning the canal, we may be sure that such indications would cause worldwide political and psychologies reactions damaging to the United States. Our allies, °ur adversaries, and the neutral Third World would see such a move "as renewed evidence that the U. S. is a Paper tiger.” Any announcement of a pullout from stiama measured against the American setback in Vietnam could "encourage penny-dictators and minor aggressions everywhere.” So wrote Baldwin prophetic- a y only two months before the Cuban-Soviet takeover 0 Angola in late 1975. He also sees a parallel in the status quo of the Canal Zone and the U. S. Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, which by implication could e extended to other U. S. land bases around the world. e notes that once a retreat is started (say, by a U. S. Withdrawal from Panama), it would be hard to stop. gUch would be the unacceptable aftermath if the United tates relinquishes "what many consider to be well-nigh Vltal [U. S.] interests in Panama under threat.”2 A second argument used by advocates for ultimate anamanian control of the canal relates to its purported senescence in the sense that the waterway cannot accommodate the Navy’s 13 aircraft carriers. In their utterances, the term "13 aircraft carriers” sometimes comes "many major warships” or "our largest war- tps, expressions which lead to distortion of the facts. ere are now some 475 ships in the fleet.
Offhand dismissal of the canal in strategic impor
tance for the U. S. Navy has prompted a sharp rejoinder from Admiral David L. McDonald, Chief of Naval Operations in 1963-67:
"The fact that carriers cannot transit the Canal is a typical know-nothing State Department view. Carriers, as such, do not operate independently but as the core of striking forces; and all other units of these striking forces can transit the Canal including the very vital logistic support forces [oilers, ammo and provisions ships]. And with Angola plus USSR actions in general I certainly do not think we should permit our presence in the Canal to be diluted.”3
That is to say, fleet operational flexibility will be maintained in the Atlantic and Pacific so long as some 460 "smaller” ships can transit the canal to beef up a task force on the other side of the waterway.
Admiral McDonald is mystified by the administration’s reported proposal for joint operation and defense of the canal by Panama and the United States. Such an arrangement he feels is patently unworkable. He warns
In the photograph below and on the opening page of this artide, the USS Tarawa (LHA-1) is seen transiting the canal. As this view of her stern suggests, the outcome of the ship’s transit, like the outcome of the battle for which she was named, must have been occasionally in doubt in the minds of some participants.
that the United States should reject any agreement "which deals with matters way out in the future.” For the United States to contemplate naval operations without full control of the canal is inconceivable to this former member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
A third critic of any proposal to dilute U. S. operational control of the waterway is Admiral Thomas H. Moorer, Chairman of the JCS during 1970-1974 and a former Chief of Naval Operations and Commander- in-Chief successively of the Pacific and Atlantic Fleets. Admiral Moorer has expressed to the author his belief that the United States should never accept a weakening of U. S. control or defense of the canal.
Writing in Strategic Review, a retired Marine officer, Lieutenant General Victor H. Krulak, declared:
"In truth, the Panama Canal is an essential link between the naval forces of the United States deployed in the Atlantic and in the Pacific. It is only because of the waterway that we are able to risk having what amounts to a bare bones, one-ocean navy.
"However, without absolute control of the Canal and the essential contiguous land, the United States could not accept the hazard of a one-ocean navy. It would be essential at once to initiate construction of fleets independently able to meet a crisis in either the Atlantic or the Pacific—a massive expenditure which we are now spared only because of our control of the Canal.”4
These several opinions do not imply that the treaty of 1903 cannot be changed or replaced. Like other man-made instruments, treaties eventually wear out and must be modified, but the modification should not be done at the expense of basic U. S. interests.
At the root of the extreme reluctance to relinquish control of the canal is the time-tested precept that the nation’s security is inseparably linked to that of the Western Hemisphere. Consequently, it is a principal mission of the U. S. Navy to control the sea-lanes of the Caribbean-Gulf of Mexico sea frontier as well as the South Atlantic narrows between Brazil and Africa.5 The huge oceanic oval formed by the Greater and Lesser Antilles contains the strategic choke points through which 13 major trade routes lead directly to the canal. Millions of tons of strategic cargo are transported over these sea-lanes en route to the United States and its allies. Bauxite from Jamaica and Surinam, copper from Chile and Peru, manganese from Brazil, and petroleum from Venezuela are only a few of these strategic materials, all vital to the U. S. economy as well as defense needs. To protect these nautical lifelines the U. S. Navy historically has maintained air and sea surveillance and control of the area.
Admiral James L. Holloway III, Chief of Naval Operations, is painfully aware that economic interdependence is a fact of modern-day life. As he has publicly acknowledged, the United States has defense treaties with 43 nations, 41 of which lie overseas. By volume, 99% of our overseas trade is carried by ship. Therefore, Holloway warns, any threat to our friends and suppliers overseas or to the connecting sea-lanes is a direct threat to U. S. security. Have these considerations been lost sight of by proponents of the view that interdependence means that the United States has no choice but to turn over the canal sometime in the next uncertain 30 years? Apparently they fail to see that America’s national survival and that of its allies may depend on protecting the sea arteries which safeguard this economic interdependence. In this complex picture, the canal plays an important, if not key, role, as the Soviet planners presumably realize more fully than much of the American public.
Following the canal negotiations with fascinated interest are the Kremlin’s Americanologists, including those Soviet leaders who determine the frequency of naval cruises into the Caribbean. These cruises, which
U. S. analysts identify as political tests of the extent of American toleration, have prompted Washington to monitor carefully any Soviet naval ship visits to Cuban ports.6 Let us note, too, that the continued appearance of Soviet naval units has the ominous result of "conditioning” Washington and Latin American governments to view such visits as routine and ultimately to accept them without protest. It is evident that under our noses the Soviets have managed to secure de facto naval bases in Cuba.
There is little doubt that Moscow understands the strategic importance of the Caribbean-Panama area. Two Soviet military writers, Y. Antonov and
V. Komarov, observe correctly that Latin American strategic raw materials such as petroleum, iron, copper, and tin are of "inestimable value to the Pentagon.” Another Soviet military expert, I. Yermashov, notes the importance of Latin American silver, antimony, zinc, and manganese to the U. S. economy. All of these materials are carried by sea to the United States. That is to say, the United States would be severely, not to say fatally, damaged if it were forced to fight a war while the Caribbean sea-lanes were sealed off by prowling Soviet submarines, surface ships, and aircraft operating from bases firmly established in Cuba, Panama, or elsewhere in the area.
It may be assumed without question that astute Soviet strategists have assigned as a principal mission of the Soviet Navy in war the interdiction of the maritime highways connecting the United States with its allies
ar>d its sources of strategic raw materials. We should not be surprised that Soviet submarines, aircraft, and surface ships appeared in the Caribbean beginning in the 1960s. The Cuban ports of Havana, Cienfuegos, and Antilla now are replenishment centers for the Soviet fleet. Soviet submarine commanders cruising in the Caribbean and South Atlantic are training their crews to operate in this prime hunting area against the same type of fat targets which drew the German U-boats in ^Corld War II. Significantly, the Soviets—with some 200 attack and 140 missile submarines and the Cuban bases—enjoy advantages not available to the Germans. The latter began World War II with only 57 U-boats, Vet sank some 2.3 million tons of shipping in the area.
Moscow’s interest in the canal assumes more significance now that Panama enjoys cordial relations with Castro. In January 1976, General Torrijos completed a triumphal five-day tour of Cuba. He was accompanied by an elated Fidel Castro flushed with the victory of his 12,000 troops in Angola. Torrijos acclaimed Cuba as ’’representing a beautiful tomorrow” and acknowledged its "just support” for Panama. In 1976, the Cuban Embassy in Panama boasted a staff of 60 people, a figure difficult to justify by the usual standards of diplomatic relations between two small countries with insignificant commercial connections. By comparison, the U. S. Embassy has a staff of 45, plus 44 others who administer the generous aid program supported by the Agency for International Development.
Moscow notes happily that Panama has joined the Third World and is an ardent advocate of "political pluralism,” a current catch-phrase in the lexicon of international egalitarianism. Pluralism has been described, accurately, if perhaps unkindly, as a philosophy embraced by a hodgepodge of small have-not states. As neutralists, they consider themselves exempt from any obligation to major power blocs. With seeming impunity, they can engage in aggressive politics against major countries, as Panama itself has amply demonstrated in its attacks on the United States in the forums of the United Nations and the Organization of American States.7
In August 1976, Torrijos attended the fifth meeting of the Bandung Conference of nonaligned nations at Colombo, Sri Lanka. Among the resolutions passed was one urging U. S. evacuation of Panama. A second resolution recommended that the United States grant independence to Puerto Rico. Such is the pressure brought to bear by the Third World on the Yankee "colonial power.”
The 1964 riots began when Panamanian students clashed with students of the U. S. high school over the raising of the Panamanian flag in the Zone. Twenty-five people died in the three-day-long rampage.
they assert that the nuclear threat is real and cannot be lightly regarded. Opponents of this view are equally correct when they argue that to overplay the nuclear threat is just as wrong as to downplay it. As regards the likelihood of nuclear war, any evaluation becomes, at best, a judgmental one, as the following comments suggest.
Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt, Jr., who was Chief of
■rg'gj-r'V
Some State Department officials, journalists, and university scholars play down the strategic importance of the Panama Canal because of their belief that if war came, the canal would be wiped out by long-range missiles. Administration supporters are correct when
Naval Operations during 1970-1974, and must be considered well informed on Soviet matters, is one expert who views the missile threat in less than apocalyptic terms. He asserts that the dominating theme in the Kremlin is survival, a concept flowing from the "historic inevitability” theme of Marxist doctrine. Consequently, the Soviets will never enter a war unless they are sure they will win after acceptable losses.
Other military strategists reason that neither Moscow nor Washington is inclined to resort to a war of mutual su<cide, with its horrendous and unacceptable consequences. One military scholar, retired Navy Captain Raymond A. Komorowski, observes that both the •Americans and the Soviets will go to almost any Rngths, short of total defeat, to avoid a massive nuclear exchange. Proponents of this view ask why the Krem- l*n should risk a major war when it can continue to erode U. S. military power, first, by supporting limited wars of liberation” fought by proxies, and second, by Counting political operations designed to weaken control by other states of maritime trade routes and choke Points such as Panama, the Turkish Straits, Gibraltar, tue Suez, and the like. There is no cheaper way to cut °ff the United States from its allies and sources of strategic raw material. One may conclude that although the nuclear threat cannot be swept under the mg, Ueither can the strategic essentiality of the canal be downgraded. In short, the threat of long-range missiles as an argument for diluting U. S. control is, at best, Abatable and may not be valid grounds for a phased K- S. withdrawal in the next 30 years.
The administration’s idea that the United States c°uld protect the canal if Panama "had a stake” in it is Petsuasive. However, critics fault it because the ration- aR is flawed. The assumption that Panama, in the years ahead, could be counted on to remain steadfast in its formal "guarantees” to the U. S. for uninterrupted use and defense of the waterway is contradicted by the tecord.
Military officers and State Department professionals Such as Ambassador John Cabot have not forgotten the prolonged bickering on canal defense during 1940- *941. At a time when the Axis juggernaut was rolling 0ver Europe to almost certain victory, Panama raised Maddening obstacles as Washington tried to obtain defense sites outside the Canal Zone (as "guaranteed” ky the treaty of 1936). The sites were finally obtained, kot not until the United States had agreed to generous concessions which Cabot recently described as blackmail.8
Not apparent to the pro-treaty advocates is the simple fact that no one knows what lies ahead. Who could foresee that in 1950 the canal would suddenly resume lts wartime role as a link in the supply pipeline to
Korea? In June 1962, who could predict that in October ships of the Pacific Fleet would sail on emergency orders to join the blockade of Cuba? Again, in the summer of 1975 who could have anticipated the sudden emergence of Cuba’s foreign legion (with Soviet help) onto the battlefields of Angola? Or who would have known that Cuba would become a base for launching anti-Western missions into Jamaica and Guyana, both uncomfortably close to the canal?
Torrijos’ flirtation with Castro, coupled with saber- rattling warnings that Panama’s patience is running out, raise the specter of terrorism and sabotage. Violence in Panama is nothing new. The last major disorders were in January 1964 when riots flared up after an initial clash between Panamanian and U. S. students over the display of a Panamanian flag at an American high school in the zone. Failure of the Panamanian President to call out the National Guard from its barracks to quell the outbursts resulted in a three-day street battle which claimed some 21 Panamanian lives, some of them by Panamanian bullets. Four Americans also died.
Cuban Communist organizers were linked to this managed violence. In 1977, as in 1964, there are probably hundreds of students and urban youths who are susceptible to urgings by radical leaders to declare "war” on the gringos. As in 1964, Castro-trained subversives, acting independently of Torrijos and possibly backed by Soviet funds are standing by, ready for the signal to create chaos by sniper fire, Molotov cocktails, arson, and bombings. This is the nightmare which haunts Washington policymakers who profess to dread "another Vietnam.”
Left unsaid in most public discussion of the controversy is the sobering fact that Panama needs the canal for its very existence. The Panamanian business and industrial community certainly would condemn any acts of bravado which could turn Panama into a battleground. Many of the 62 international banks upon which Torrijos depends for financing urban development and other "nation-building” programs are well aware of what has happened to their branches in the devastated city of Beirut, Lebanon, and would be quick to evacuate their wealth and their staffs. American aid would end. Torrijos probably knows better than anyone the tragedy which would result from a quixotic and ill-starred guerrilla campaign and would move to prevent it. It is safe to say that middle-class urban Panamanians feel the same way.
A terrorist war against the United States would mean that all life-sustaining revenues from the canal would end for a period of years. The fate of Egypt and the Suez Canal is all too recent. No one knows what the future holds, but Torrijos’ threats of another Vietnam comprise what is probably a "worst-case” scenario, broadcast more for their value as rhetorical blackmail than as credible possibilities.
The unknown factor in this picture is Panama’s National Guard. In Latin American countries, the military almost always determines the eventual fate of controversial leaders. Traditionally, the Latin American military caste considers itself the guardian of the nation’s soul. Thus did Torrijos as an obscure lieutenant colonel justify his coup d’etat against President Arnulfo Arias in 1968. What is the attitude of the National Guard’s senior officers? Would the regime’s failure to maintain stability create alarm among them? Would these officers permit anti-Yankee radicals to launch a self-destructive wave of terror against the Canal Zone? Or would they turn against Torrijos in favor of a more moderate leader? Such are the forbidding uncertainties of Panamanian politics.
Torrijos’ claim that all of Latin America supports him is challenged by retired Ambassador Willard Beaulac, who, during his career, headed four different U. S. embassies in Latin America. He judges that most Latin American nations, while rendering ritualistic support to Panama on the canal issue, are privately reluctant to see the benefits of orderly U. S. administration transferred to an uncertain fate in the hands of an unstable Panama.9 Robert Corrigan, a former U. S. Foreign Service officer, wrote in The New York Times that Latin American diplomats privately assure their American colleagues of their hope that the United States will hold onto the canal while publicly siding with Panama, largely out of an imperative of "Latin American solidarity.”10 However, if Panama persists in flaying the United States in the forums of the United Nations and Organization of American States, then seasoned diplomats such as Beaulac say that negotiations should be suspended. Americans have a deep- rooted aversion to diplomacy under blackmail, even though such oratory may be directed primarily at Panamanian voters.
Meanwhile, Torrijos may be learning that political leadership sometimes imposes on one the necessity to accept an unpleasant choice from among several undesirable courses. If he backs down and agrees to U. S. control and defense, then the radical students and his left-wing supporters will condemn him. In addition,
In their debate of 6 October 1976, Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford, took strong positions on the Panama question and, predictably, General Torrijos charged them both with ”great irresponsibility” in their statements.
many of Panama’s conservatives are against a Torrijos- sponsored treaty because they believe that a joint defense means continued Washington support for the dictator and his National Guard. If he maintains his stonewall position past 1977 (his "year of decision”), radicals may plot his removal. But, in the final analysis, if revolts against his regime break out, moderate officers may fly him out on the first plane to Miami. His standoff with Washington may have put Torrijos out on a limb from which there is no safe return.
One need not doubt that Torrijos is acting in what he perceives as his nation’s interest. Panama wants the canal for riqueza, dignidad, and soberania (wealth, dignity, and sovereignty). These justifiable goals, regrettably, clash with the cruel reality that small nations, like innocent bystanders in a street brawl, are sometimes unwillingly caught up in great power struggles. Pragmatists of the realpolitik school will reason that Panama’s lot can be roughly equated with that of Finland, Sweden, Vietnam, Cambodia, and other small nations. It is linked inexorably to that of a major nation, and whether that major nation is a "good” democracy or a "bad” totalitarian state is beside the point. Unfortunately, national weakness and small size do not necessarily endow a tiny nation with immunity from global wars, whether cold or hot. Finlanders, for example, have accepted the truth of impaired sovereignty with resignation, while Panamanians probably do not recognize the sense in which their situation can be compared to Finland’s.
Some diplomatic confrontations have no ready solution and must be endured by both parties. To date, so far as can be learned from press reports, the United States has offered reasonable concessions to Panama, including substantial material benefits and Panamanian participation in running the waterway. When Washington will have made its last concession, then pru-
dence requires that we draw the line. If this action seems harsh to some Americans, others may perceive that our long-range interests demand it. To do otherwise may commit this nation to a diplomatic quagmire from which we could extricate ourselves only with the greatest of difficulty.
Is there any way out of this impasse? Obviously no mstant answer has yet been found. Probably to many Americans it goes against common sense for Washington to agree to entrust the canal to a caudillo whose support by his people is in question and whose actions demonstrate that he is not a warm friend of the United States.
Meanwhile, during their televised foreign policy debate on 6 October 1976, President Ford and Governor Carter took strong positions. Said Carter, "I would not relinquish practical control of the Panama Canal Zone anytime in the foreseeable future.” President Ford responded with a forthright declaration that the United States "must and will maintain complete access to the Panama Canal” and that U. S. "national security interests” would be maintained. Predictably, General Torrijos charged both of them with "great irresponsibility” in their statements. Clearly, U. S. interests, as affirrned by the two candidates, were not congruent with Panama’s goals.
A basic dictum of U. S. foreign policy holds that Pb S. security rests upon the defense of the western hemisphere. Rightly or wrongly, many Americans undoubtedly believe that this defense is linked to the continuous security of the Panama Canal. In its capacity as protector of the hemisphere, a role it now carries out with defensive diffidence, the United States has proved time and again that it will not hesitate to act as arbiter in Latin American flareups. As recently as 1965 President Lyndon Johnson ordered 25,000 troops to the Dominican Republic to end a bloodbath which cost the lives of some 2,000 people.
What has this to do with Panama? The point to be drawn is that when the final chips are down, the strategic importance of the waterway makes improbable a U. S. surrender of de facto control. Painful though the thought may be, the chances are that if the circumstances so require, the United States will not hesitate to act firmly if its defense interests are in jeopardy.
H Captain Ryan is a research associate at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University where he is currently working on a monograph dealing with the Panama Canal controversy. He has traveled widely in Latin America (including Panama) in connection with service as Naval Attache, Havana, and as Latin- American desk officer in the Pentagon’s division of International Security Affairs. He has held three commands at sea. A graduate of the U. S. Naval Academy in 1936, he holds two master’s degrees (international relations from Stanford and history from San Jose State University). Captain Ryan has written a number of Proceedings articles. His most recent was "USS Constellation Flare-up: Was it Mutiny?” in January 1976.
l'T'i .
ne issue of sovereignty has been a legal thicket since 1904 when Panama asscrted its rights shortly after the treaty. The facts are these. Panama granted (°r conveyed) complete legal rights to the United States in perpetuity. The • S. courts in some areas (extradition, tax collection, narcotics laws) treat Canal Zone as part of the United States. But for other cases (mail, lffiport, citizenship for children born of foreign parents), the courts treat the 2°ne as non-U. S. territory. The House of Representatives and the State tcPartment refer to the zone as "U. S. property.” See Michael D. Simpson,
Panama: The Proposed Transfer of the Canal and Canal Zones by Treaty,” Ge°rgia joUmal of International Law, Vol. 5, 1975, Issue 1, p. 198, footnotes
2t
^tter to author, 21 October 1975. Baldwin’s views on the canal’s impact on ^aritime strategy are described in Cuba and the United States: Long-Range
erspectives, John Plank, editor (Washington: Brookings Institution, *9(37), pp 200-222; also Strategy for Tomorrow (New York, Harper and 1970), pp. 121-129.
Admiral David L. McDonald, USN (Ret.), letter to author, 19 April *976.
lieutenant General Victor H. Krulak, USMC (Ret.), "Panama: Strategic Pitfall/’ Strategic Review, Winter 1976, p. 70.
P°r a full analysis of the strategic value of Latin America, see Captain Ptymond A. Komorowski, USN (Ret.), "Latin America—An Assessment of S* Strategic Interests,” U. S. Naval Institute Proceedings, May 1973 (Naval Review issue), pp. 150-171. I have drawn freely on Captain Komorowski’s excellent summary. For a second valuable analysis, see Captain John W. Haizlip’s (USN) unpublished thesis, Panama Canal Defense—Influence of ^ntemational Law (U. S. Naval War College, Newport, R.I., 1968).
6For a comprehensive analysis of the Soviet naval presence in the Caribbean, see Barry M. Blechman and Stephanie E. Levinson, "Soviet Submarine Visits to Cuba,” in Naval Institute Proceedings, September 1975, pp. 30-39. See also Lieutenant Commander Jack L. Roberts, "The Growing Soviet Naval Presence in the Caribbean: Its Politico-Military Impact Upon the United States” in Naval War College Review, June 1971, pp. 31-41.
7This they did with some success until U. S. Ambassador Patrick Moynihan’s outraged reaction in the United Nations in 1975 dispelled any notion that the United States was a helpless Gulliver. Episodes which led the world to believe that the United States was a paper tiger were this country’s failures in the 1960s to react strongly to North Korea in the capture of the USS Pueblo (AGER-2) and the shooting down of the EC-121 electronic surveillance plane, the Bay of Pigs fiasco, and the setback of the Vietnam War. All of these incidents may be perceived by other nations as symptomatic of a fundamental national weakness of will.
8For an account of Washington frustrations caused by President Arnulfo Arias and others, see Lester D. Langley’s "The World Crisis and the Good Neighbor Policy in Panama, 1936-1941,” in The Americas, October 1967, pp. 137-152. See also The Washington Post, 15 May 1975, "Misleading Canal Debate,” article by John M. Cabot, former Chief of Division of Caribbean and Central American affairs and chief U. S. negotiator for the treaty of 1955 between the United States and Panama.
9 Letters to author, 23 September 1975 and 11 February 1976. Willard Beaulac has served as U. S. Ambassador in Paraguay, Cuba, Colombia, and Chile. He later was Deputy Commandant of the National War College.
10Robert F. Corrigan, "Panama Canal: The U. S. Stake,” letter to The New York Times, 12 June 1976, p. 36.