U.S.A. AND PANAMA
By GEORGE BRINSMEAD
THE Americans have had a reminder that Panama is not only a canal, but also a country. The U.S. Government proposed to construct a new sea-level canal across the isthmus at a cost of £600,o0o,0oo. This would replace the present lock-and-dam canal. To protect the strategic waterway, they wished to lease for as long as possible fourteen of the 134 air bases which, by an agreement signed in 1942, they had established as a war-time measure on Panamanian soil, outside the ten-mile-wide U.S. Canal Zone. A *pew defence agreement was therefore drawn up by the Governments of the two countries, and was signed on December loth by the U.S. Ambassador and the local Acting Foreign Minister, the 'Minister himself having resigned after trying persistently to reduce the term of the lease from fifty years to five, in which endeavour he failed to arrive below ten years. After the signature, the students in Panama City went on strike as a protest. On December 22nd, while the U.S. authorities placed the city out of bounds to their troops this agreement was unanimously rejected by the National Assembly, whose action was in accordance with the constitution of the republic. General Marshall thereupon decided to withdraw all American forces from the bases which, by agreement, they had continued to occupy since the war. There the matter rests at present.
Panama, then, is a sovereign State, increasingly conscious of her nationality, and growingly resentful of the presence of the Colossus of the North within her frontiers. This country of humid and almost impenetrable forests, and • of tremendous and largely un- exploited natural resources, is still virtually inaccessible by land. Even Tschiffely, on his ride from Buenos Aires to New York, had to by-pass the tropical forests of Panama, travelling this part of his journey by sea. President Jimenez of Panama argues that his country would enormously benefit by the proposed rent and other U.S. expenditure, and by six hundred miles of roads that the Americans would construct thiough the undeveloped interior to link their bases. Many Panamanians feel, however, that the national sovereignty is already sufficiently impaired by the U.S.-controlled Canal Zone, which cuts right across their territory. They believe that the air bases would become permanent. Moreover, a high percentage of the population is negro, and the American attitude towards the coloured race is resented.
For their part, the Americans maintain that the Republic of Panama owes its existence to, and derives its livelihood principally from, the canal, and that therefore it should recognise the right of the U.S. Government to protect their investment adequately against the dangers of modern war. Many Americans also suspect that the resistance has been aggravated by. Communist propaganda. It is undoubtedly true that there exists anti-American feeling in
Latin America, and that Left-wing (though also extreme Right-wing) politicians and professors encourage its growth. In the past 1t--e years violent opposition to U.S. military and economic proposals has occurred all over South America. Usually the local Govern. ments have not only seen the advantages to be derived from accept. ing U.S. offers and of agreeing to grant the corresponding quid pro quo, but have managed to silence the objectors either by argument or by force. The Panamanian situation, however, is complicated by the fact that presidential elections are due to take place in May, 1948. With elections pending, the Government is naturally in a weak • 'Position to carry through an important long-term undertaking.
When the air liner crosses the Republic of Panama, the passenger, if there be a break in the tropical clouds, cart see simultaneously the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans. To the south and east he can discern a bulging continent of blue-black forest and mountain. Beneath him, lakes and canals form a silver chain, across the dark green isthrrius. Here Columbus had searched for a passage through to India. Here the Spaniards laboriously crossed in their journey to Peru ; Balboa's slaves carried two btiats overland to the Pacific shore ; and only a few years later Spain began to dream of a canal. But the natural obstacles were too great ; the individuals who derived profit from the busy overland route protested ; and the Church pro- claimed that God did not wish man to separate the two continents that He had joined together. Here, again, Bolivar planned to unite the whole hemisphere in conference and in a combined canal-build- ing venture. Here that amazing Frenchman, Lesseps, eager tq repeat the spectacular triumph of Suez, fruitlessly poured forth his shareholders' savings in machinery and bribery. Here the repre- sentatives of Theodore Roosevelt threatened and cajoled until the Panamanians broke away from Colombia to form, in 1903, their own republic, which obligingly granted to the U.S.A. the conces- sion to construct the canal and hold sovereignty over the Zone.
The geographical position of this slender piece of land has through four and a half centuries, caused men of many races to conceive fantastic visions of personal achievement. Thousands of men have died of tropical diseases on this small stretch of fifty miles, con- structing the highways, the railway and the canal. Yet, though the influence of underlying geographical reality has been constant, historical events have differed. There can be no greater contrast than that between the behaviour of Theodore Roosevelt and General Marshall, both of whom were faced with the refusal (in the first instance at Bogota ; in the second, at Panama City) to grant to the U.S.A. the facilities that she required in the isthmus. Roosevelt swore that the Colombians were " foolish and homicidal corrupt tionists " and " animals " ; sponsored a separatist revolution in Panama and obtained his requirements by methods that have often been deplored by the Americans themselves. General Marshall, by contrast, has respected the right of the Panamanian people to decide what shall and what shall not be done on their own soil. Within twenty-four hours of the rejection of the agreement by the Panamanian National Assembly, he announced that all U.S. troops would be withdrawn in accordance with the principles supported by the U.S.A. Therefore, while there will certainly be considerable. • satisfaction among anti-U.S. Latin Americans that Washington has suffered a severe diplomatic defeat at the hands of a republic of 630,000 inhabitants (of whotn only 69,000 are whites), there will also be great pleasure among the friends of the U.S.A. that the Secretary of State should have acted with such dignity and restraint.
Panama, however, in spite of her enormous undeveloped resources (only about one quarter of the 34,000 square miles of the republic is inhabited), cannot afford, no matter how strong her nationalist feelings may be, to allow U.S. attention to be diverted from hero territory. Already, as a result of the December incident, the old and oft-revived scheme for constructing an alternative canal between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of Nicaragua has been taken' out of cold ,storage. It is an attractive plan, which for a long time was preferred in Washington to the Panamanian project. Panama, with her astronomically unfavourable balance of trade, is not lately to allow this proposal to survive beyond the May elections. And then General Marshall's diplomacy will bear fruit.
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