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I love this bit:

"In the best selling Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, published in 2004, John Perkins claims that a bomb was planted aboard the plane by U.S. interests, with Panamanian control over the Panama Canal being the point of contention. This is disputed, as Colonel Diaz Herrera, a former associate of Noriega, claimed that Noriega was behind the bombing."

First of all: Poor Writing.

Second of all: Can someone explain how "Noriega was behind the bombing" and "by US Interests" are mutually exclusive? How is this a "dispute"? To pose these as contrary and/or mutaully exclusive scenerios is misinformed and misleading.

For the record:

It has been reported that Noriega was recruited by the Defense Intelligence Agency while still a young military cadet studying in Peru as early as 1959- (See Life Magazine article "Our Man In Panama" 1990 by Seymore Hersch).

And whether or not that is true, it plain public record that Noriega has been on the CIA payroll since 1967, that CIA Director George H.W. Bush arranged to pay Noriega $110,000 a year as an agent, that Carter cut him off financially but alledgedly turned a blind eye to his drug trade to America, and that the Reagan Administration had put him back on the payroll, to the tune of $200,000 per year, for his 'services'- (ummmm, see the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Commitee Report entitled: "Narcotics Review in Central America" - Washington D.C. U.S. Govt Printing Office, 1988)

Not to be redundant but to summarize...

The article clearly poses that the notion of Noriega being "behind the bombing" (of Omar Turrijos' plane) is somehow contradictory to the concept that the U.S. was involved. While Noriega's loyalty has been openly questioned by U.S. officials as well as Fidel Castro (o yeah, he paid him too), the notion that Noriega's involvement discludes U.S. involvement is erroneous, ...not to mention counter-intuitive. --JB

The one fact that no one seems to dispute is that Noriega was personally close to Torrijos. The idea that he would have Torrijos killed is a bit far-fetched. --HK 21:55, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

I am in no way claiming Noriega did the deed but his loyalty to anything or anybody is the most far fetched thing I've heard yet. He played Fidel and the US simultaneously and the man was an obvious sociopath... A cursory look at his career leaves me doubting his ability to be genuinely close to anyone. He sold out anything or anybody around him again and again.

But my original point was simply that his involvement was asserted as 'spoiler' proof that the U.S. was not behind the explosion on Torrijos' plane. Thats laughable.

That said, Its also hard to overlook the fact that Torrijos' plane blew up as soon as he began to get serious about nationalizing his country's oil. Its got CIA written all over it thats for sure, Not proven or even claimed known by any credible source I can find but fairly obvious. At the same time Noriega was a paid CIA "dirty deeds" guy in South America. ...I'm not claiming that he did it, but If I'm investigating this case, he's on my short list. --JB

I agree with JB and in fact came to this discussion page in response to this exact point. The lines: "He was initially a strong ally of the United States, and also worked for the CIA from the late 1950s to 1986." in the intro and:

"Omar Torrijos died in a plane crash in 1981. In the best-selling Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, published in 2004, John Perkins claims that a bomb was planted aboard the plane by U.S. interests, with Panamanian control over the Panama Canal being the point of contention. This is disputed, as Colonel Diaz Herrera, a former associate of Noriega, claimed that Noriega was behind the bombing."

Cannot both be correct. If he worked for the CIA in 1981, then he could very well be behind a CIA planned bombing. I would change it now, but since this page seems to be controversial I will come back in a few days.--Chinawhitecotton 06:51, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

The article should not speculate about whether the bombing was done by the CIA. As I recall, Perkins does not make that allegation. "U.S. interests" does not equal CIA; it is a common error to conflate the two (as Maxine Waters did with the crack cocaine scandal in Los Angeles.) The article can include properly sourced theories from reputable sources (such as Perkins), but should not feature the opinions or theories of Misplaced Pages editors. --HK 08:16, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

I am not imposing my own theories here - read my comment carefully. Regarding the CIA issue, well, Perkins says:

"I had no doubt that Roldos's death had not been an accident. It had all the markings of a CIA-orchestrated assassination...The jackals were back, and they wanted Omar Torrijos and everyone else who might consider joining an anti-corporatocracy crusade to know it..." (p. 185)

"I could not have known that on another dark night would be killed during a routine flight...or that most of the world outside the United States would have no doubt that Torrijos's death...was just one more in a series of CIA assasinations." (p. 188)(Perkins, Confessions, 2006 Plume paperback edition)

Read the chapter 27 as a whole and Perkins's allegations are clear, so this is a published source. I agree that "U.S. Interests" is wrong - it should say, "CIA" when discussing what Perkins suggested.

But really, HK, you do not respond to my actual objection (and JB's), which is that of the contradiction: if Noriega worked for the CIA, than the idea that Noriega was involved in Torrijos's death does not contradict CIA involvement. Read the sentence in the article - it does not make sense.--Chinawhitecotton 09:14, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

I removed the words "This is disputed" because they didn't make sense given other material in the text (see discussion above). --Chinawhitecotton 17:54, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

An event in this article is a January 3 selected anniversary

What's a flamer? --Heron

That's American derogatory slang for "obvious homosexual"; it was just a childish bit of vandalism. --LDC

Where is Noriega now (2004)? Is he still in jail in US or extradited to Panama or released or dead? (Most articles end with his conviction.)

This article is full of a lot of nonsense. First of all, Noriega was running guns (to Contras etc.) and smuggling drugs with the knowledge, support and (the extent of which could be debated) involvement of US military and intelligence for many years. It was OK for Noriega or his allies to run drugs while they followed the US central American foreign policy line 100%, but as soon as he deviated from it he became a "drug runner" and a lot of other nonsense. The ludicrousness of it is on so many levels, imagine if the Panamanians invaded the US and kidnapped Bush for Phillip Morris exporting tobacco to Panama.

I love this paragraph "In December 15, 1989 Noriega declared a state of war with the U.S. government. His forces soon after shot and killed an U.S. Marine stationed in Panama City." I know there's a propaganda need to always say that some tiny little country declared war on the US so the US just had to respond, but obviously no leader in their right mind would declare war on the US until the US invaded his country which is exactly what happened. As far as the Marine supposedly stationed in Panama City, that is like a Panamanian soldier stationed in Chicago - there are no Marines stationed in Panama City. The US soldiers are stationed in the canal zone, his group had wandered into the sovereign nation of Panama and began stopping cars in the middle of Panama City with machine guns (oops, a little point that people forgot to make).

These Misplaced Pages articles all look like they were written in the bowels of the US State Department. Of course, I'm the bad guy since I am not following the party line that has been put out and that all the good little white yuppie US Misplaced Pages commissars are trying to hold to. That way, Misplaced Pages can just spew the same crap that the US corporate media lords decide to put on their TV channels all day. HectorRodriguez 07:45, 19 Feb 2004 (UTC)

You sound like you're regurgitating poor Panamanian textbooks. Your notion of history is badly mistaken, and seems most reasonably explained as the result of a shitty education in some America-hating backwaters. I'm not American, by the way, just commenting on some more idiotic anti-Americanism.

HectorRodriguez added blatant NPOV comments to this article, and when I reverted them, Wik re-reverted them because he wants to spite me. The information that was added is ridiculously POV and should be changed, but because Wik is stalking me, it's impossible for me to do so. RickK 04:32, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)

HectorRodriguez generally makes more sense than Anthony DiPierro. Rick said I couldn't revert Anthony without explanation so let's have Rick explain each of his reverts too. --Wik 04:35, Feb 20, 2004 (UTC)

This is utterly disgraceful. I'm restoring the last stable version of this article, going back as far as 22:34, 30 Jan 2004. Since Hector is not a hard-banned vandal, RickK and VV can't go around removing large chuncks of text without backing up their actions.

There are several approapriate courses of action. First, they can systematically prove why Hector's additions here are all rubbish and warrans quick removal. Second, if some of the facts are indisputably correct, they can salavage select portions after a major copyedit. And finally, if they're just acting on a huntch that the content's invalid solely by virtue of the source, their best option is putting up a neutrality dispute heading and a facutal accuracy dispute heading, allowing users better versed on the subject to jump in.

However, their revisions are clarely arbitary. From time to time, I notice that they remove straight-forward, fairly well-known facts presented by Hector. In the French Communist Party article, e.g., either RickK or VV (I forget who in particular) removed a sentence stating that the party was once the largest in France. Why did this have to be removed!??? 172 06:16, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)

First of all, I consider this page to be incredibly POV before I made any edit. Here is the prelude to Operation "Just Cause" given in a paragraph.

"In December 15, 1989 Noriega declared a state of war with the U.S. government. His forces soon after shot and killed an U.S. Marine stationed in Panama City."

This is like saying the US declared war on Japan without mentioning Pearl Harbor. Why would the leader of a small country whom the US could crush in a few days (as it did) declare war on the US unless he was completely insane? This makes absolutely no sense. I try to add some POV and make many statements here and put facts in the page. What is the response, to start a discussion going? "HectorRodriguez added blatant NPOV comments". You know, like that the US gave millions to Noreiga's opponents, or that there ARE no US Marines stationed in the sovereign country of Panama, including Panama City. That the Marine and his buddies had wandered off to sovereign Panama with machine guns and had been pulling over cars and searching them I guess was too POV of a fact to include. Currently this article reads like it is a dossier on Noriega out of Reagan's State Department, I try to fill in some background on what happened and I am suddenly "blatant...ridiculously...POV". Whatever. HectorRodriguez 07:41, 20 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I think we should explain the cause of Noriega's declaration of war (as Hector argues). However, Hector's revisions were somewhat biased: e.g. "the US wanted a staunch ally to Washington DC in place before that handover happened." (possibly true, but references are needed to prove this). Also, the description of troops "pouring" into Panama seems NPOV. I vote for: 1. Using lots of references (consider all claims to be false unless proven by fact). 2. Post proposed revisions here in Talk. Have fun! Connelly 22:51, 8 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I like the little info box thing on the right, with the stats and so forth. But according to what style guide was it implemented? I have not seen any other article with similar boxes. Should it be added to other pages? And if so, what sorts? user:J.J.

I'm putting all of you on notice. If I see even one bit of unfounded anti-American propoganda in an article about this oppressive dictator, I will remove it.

By definition, propaganda must be incorrect, and admixture of truth,lies and half-facts placed in such a light as to mislead. Therefore, by definition, propaganda is unfounded. Therefore by definition, pro-American propaganda has no place in any article. I do hope you are not suggesting otherwise? --BrianWalker 00:58, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Also, You know that the U.S. put Noriega in power and payed him millions of dollars for his services right? Thats fact, on public record. When we delete the facts that don't support a pro-American POV we start becoming a lot more like North Korea and a lot less like America. --JB

I think most of us can agree Noriega was a slimeball. But for years and years he was OUR slimeball. I think its important to view these facts with humility or risk making the same mistakes in places like Haiti. --JB

NPOV

This article, like any other, is subject to Misplaced Pages NPOV policy. Therefore, I have attempted to balance it with Noriega's views, as elaborated in his book. He is entitled to his side of the story. (I also removed more profanity -- there must have been a lot at one time.) --Herschelkrustofsky 03:58, 29 Nov 2004 (UTC)

School of the Americas

In the Biographie (first sentence) it says "School of the Americas in Fort Benning, Georgia", in the fact box under the picture it says "School of the Americas, Panama". Which one is right? BigBen212 16:32, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

School of the Americas and other items

The School was based in Panama (actually on the former U.S. Air Force Base in Albrook) for most of its history including when Noriega attended it. When the U.S. Bases reverted to Panamanian control, the School was moved to Fort Benning. It has since been renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC) in 2001, in an attempt to avoid the negative associations people have with its history. The way the sentence reads it implies he attended the school in Georgia, which is definitely wrong.

As for Hector's comments on the U.S Marine that was killed.... No he, was not stationed in Panama City, he was stationed at a US base like any other of the troops there. He and his party were returning from a Resteraunt in Panama City and got lost on their way back. It was not uncommon (indeed it very common) for U.S. Personnel stationed there to spend time off duty in Panama City or elsewhere in the country. They were stopped at a check point of some sort. Around that time Noriega had his forces regularly harass U.S. Citizens and there had been a kind of tense staring down situation going on in various degrees for some months leading up to that time. The way I understand it is the guy panicked and took off (running the checkpoint) and they shot him. I certainly have not heard in any version of the story in which he had a machine gun with him or was stopping cars.

Nicknamed "Pineapple Face" by the American Press? He was called "Cara de Piña" (Pineapple Face) in Panama long before he was more than a blurb in the American Press, both in the Panamanian Press (La Prensa in particular) and in common day-to-day speach in Panama just about anywhere except to his face.

This article has a lot of slant. For example:

" The U.S. media gave sympathetic coverage to accusations by a former colleague that Noriega had played a role in the killing of leading critic Hugo Spadafora."

is all it mentions of one of the biggest roles in the entire opposition campaign to Noriega. General Diaz Herrera's accusations, which broke in the Panamanian paper La Prensa (not the US Media), were what basically kicked off the civic crusade, in it he related how Noriega had Spadafora killed, and earlier how he had Torrijos killed. Spadafora had been brutally tortured, and his decapitated head found in a U.S. Postal Bag near the Costa Rican border. The calls for investigation and the repeated stonewalling by Noriega's regime on this matter were a key element in this story, slant or no, it needs to be mentioned in greater detail than I can go into here. A good accounting of the torture and murder of Spadafora can be found in the book In the Time of the Tyrants, Panama 1968-1990 (New York: Norton, 1990), by R. M. Koster and Guillermo Sanchez.

note - I'm biased, Hugo Spadafora was a classmate of my mother's in high school in Panama City.

- AApold (I'm not registered on here or anything, but was in Panama when this took place).

POV

Going from:

• By the late 1980s relations had turned extremely tense between Noriega and the United States government, and the general was overthrown and captured...

to

• By the late 1980s his actions started to defy the policies of the United States agencies that helped to put him in power, and he was overthrown and captured...'

does not seem to reduce the POV of the article. In fact it sems to present a definite POV. -Willmcw 20:09, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

POV terminology

Calling Noriega the "ruler" of Panama is contentious. Many might regard George Bush, or perhaps more appropriately Dick Cheney, as "ruler" of the U.S., but it would be an inappropriate term for Misplaced Pages. I have substituted "military leader." --HK 22:02, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

True

"After a demonstration a few days later by thousands of U.S.-paid Panamanians demanding he stand trial for human rights violations, Noriega surrendered on January 3, 1990."

Is this true?

Kurt Muse

Somewhere along the line the material about Kurt Muse was removed. I am restoring it, along with other deleted material that balances it. I'm not clear on why anyone would object to this material. --HK 21:55, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

2007 or 2029 ?

In the Drug Trial section the article states:

"His sentence was reduced to 30 years in 1999, making Noriega eligible for parole in 2029."

and then

"The Federal Bureau of Prisons website currently gives a projected release date of 09-09-2007."

So which is it? When is he eligible to be released from prison? 2007 or 2029 ? -- noosphere 17:37, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

Loud music, psychological warfare

The article had the formulation that the oud recorded music directed the Vatican embassy was "specifically Panama by Van Halen," which is misleading, since it makes it appear that there was a political message involved. In fact, various accounts provide a long list of songs that were played, including Twisted Sister's "We're Not Gonna Take It," and "Paranoid." It was also implied that the music was directed specifically at Noriega, when other accounts suggest that the psywar was directed against the Vatican staff. I have provided a source quote to that effect. --HK 15:32, 30 March 2006 (UTC)