More Stories about Canals Not in Minnesota

Third in our series of “Hope is Studying by Writing Crap on the Internet” posts, I bring to you…

The Invasion of Panama: A Primer

A little background. Panama is a country. A country made famous by a hat. A hat that was made in Ecuador. A country that is not Panama. Theodore Roosevelt wore one such a hat while checking out the Panama Canal, thus creating the slightly misnomered hat craze.

Oh, that’s right. Panama has a canal. It always comes down to canals. We should really get rid of canals. There would be so many fewer international incidents if we would go ahead and do that. Of course, once you outlaw canals, only outlaws will have canals.

Speaking of outlaws, one General Manuel Antonio Noriega was a Panamanian dictator who just so happened to also be a druglord. A really swell guy, if you know what I mean. Despite his propensity towards torturing and killing political opponents and his flourishing illegal drug business, the United States had been working with him for years. He might have been a sadistic outlaw, but he was our sadistic outlaw. Sadly, this has been a recurring theme in recent history.

US to Noriega: “Umm… would you mind not killing so many of your dissidents?”
Noriega to US: “Stop being such a pansy. Oh look! Fidel Castro! And he’s coming this way!” *runs*

Of course, Noriega screwed himself over by not cooperating with the US as much anymore. And by being a sadistic drug trading bastard. But mostly by not cooperating. So, he and President Bush (the first) kindof got up in each other’s grills.

Noriega: “You’re mom’s so fat, she sat on the rainbow and made skittles. Also, you’re a wimp.”
Bush: “You’d better watchout, or I’ll sic Donald Rumsfeld on you.” *cries*

A bunch of military guys in Panama decided that they had enough of Noriega and they tried to overthrow him. What’s up with these militaries and overthrowing their governments? I guess they get bored if they don’t have someone to shoot and they decide to start shooting each other. Good thing the US always has plenty of quagmires to distract its own military with.

Noriega was all, “Hey! You can’t overthrow me. I’m going to overthrow you!” The US decided to send some troops down to help out (remember, he was our sadist), but they took their sweet ass time and he took care of things himself. So, 13,000 US soldiers just hung out wearing hats and checking out the canal.

Things took a turn for the awkward when an American soldier was killed by Panamanian troops. Then they got worse when a Navy officer and his wife were captured and abused. It’s pretty darn stupid to attack Americans in your country. Attack and kill each other all you want, no problem. But, shoot a couple of Americans? That’s just asking for trouble.

Bush Senior sent in 11,000 more troops and overthrew Noriega.

(Hands up who saw that one coming)

Bush, who was better at justifying this stuff than his illiterate monkey of a son, gave four reasons for why he sent in the Marines:

1. The US personnel in Panama were in danger
2. Noriega was a threat to the canal (see! it always comes back to canals!)
3. Noriega was smuggling drugs. And those are bad, m’kay?
4. It was about gosh-darn time that Panama got some democracy already.

(bear in mind that, while Jimmy Carter had negotiated a treaty to give the canal back to the Panamanians, we were still in possession of the canal at this point in time. The canal didn’t fully revert back to Panama until 2000)

Most people looked at these justifications and called, ummm, bullshit. Because:

1. You’re worried about troops? Move them! This isn’t exactly rocket science
2. Noriega is a big canal fan. He hasn’t gone anywhere near the canal. Why would he hurt an innocent canal? He loves that canal!
3. Noriega’s drug pushing had been greatly exaggerated. Besides, we’d been putting up with it for years! Also, the drug trade actually went up when Noriega was ousted.
4. Like what usually happens when the US sticks its nose in other countries business, no democracy appeared.

Basically, nothing changed. Except that a bunch of troops and civilians got killed.

Conclusion? The US invasion of Panama was about as effective as D.A.R.E.

As for Noriega, the shipped him up to Florida where he was forced to eat dinner at 4pm, his grandkids never visited and then they put his ass in jail.

The End.