“ON DECEMBER 20, 1989, THE YANKEE (U.S.) MILITARY INVADED THIS COUNTRY (PANAMA) AND KILLED INNOCENT PEOPLE. TIL THIS DAY, IT IS STILL UNKNOWN HOW MANY WERE KILLED AND THE WOUND REMAINS OPEN.” ..Manuel Noriega, the CIA, and the White House were all bedfellows in the U.S.’s dirty wars in Central America. Noriega assisted in the U.S. efforts to prevent the spread of communism in Latin America.
“For more than a decade, Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega was a highly paid CIA asset and collaborator, despite knowledge by U.S. drug authorities as early as 1971 that the general was heavily involved in drug trafficking and money laundering. Noriega facilitated “guns-for-drugs” flights for the contras, providing protection and pilots, safe havens for drug cartel officials, and discreet banking facilities. U.S. officials, including then-CIA Director William Webster and several DEA officers, sent Noriega letters of praise for efforts to thwart drug trafficking (albeit only against competitors of his Medellín cartel patrons). The U.S. government only turned against Noriega, invading Panama in December 1989 and kidnapping the general, once they discovered he was providing intelligence and services to the Cubans and Sandinistas. Ironically, drug trafficking through Panama increased after the U.S. invasion.”
After Noriega was detained and the rubble cleared, the Panamanian people got little help from its government in rebuilding their housing or livelihoods after the invasion left a third of the population unemployed. The U.S. military along with the Panamanian police continued to terrorize marginalized and predominantly Black communities, sealing off areas with razor-wire barricades, raiding and searching door-to-door for fugitives, weapons, drugs, undocumented foreign laborers and resistance fighters. We highly recommend “The Panama Deception” documentary available on YouTube...SOURCES: Oral history, institute for policy studies as in quotes in above caption, Eric Jackson.
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