American manipulation in Panama

(Last week's) ceremony handing over control of the Panama canal to the Panamanian government marks the end of a century of U.S. manipulation of this impoverished central American state. At least we hope it does. That gaudy American imperialist, Teddy Roosevelt, was the man who started it in 1903 when he sent marines and a battleship to support Panamanians seeking independence from Colombia. In truth, the leader of Panama's "freedom fighters" was the chief engineer of the New Panama Canal Company, controlled by the U.S. President Roosevelt, like presidents McKinley and Taft, fervently believed that America's manifest destiny was to civilize the uncivilized, be they in the Philippines, Cuba, Puerto Rico, or east Asia. But the canal was his proudest foreign achievement.

It was not until 1977 that President Jimmy Carter controversially persuaded his fellow Americans that restitution was due. But even then there was no stopping the U.S. military which used its Panama bases as the headquarters of a more modern imperialism, waged through proxy wars in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Cuba and beyond. At the center of this web stood a succession of Panamanian stooges who did Washington's bidding while their country stagnated. The last of them, Manuel Noriega, turned on his CIA paymasters and his old lunch partner, George Bush, thereby provoking the murderous U.S. invasion of 1989. As the handover takes place, Panamanians worry about security now the gringos are finally going. They might do better to ensure that Roosevelt's heirs are never given an excuse to come back.

-- The Guardian, London