George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography - Get a Free Blog

By a striking coincidence, it was in June, 1987, just one month after this glowing tribute
had been written, that the US government declared war against Panama, initiating a
campaign to destabilize Noriega on the pretexts of lack of democracy and corruption. On
June 30, 1987, the US State Department demanded the ouster of General Noriega. Elliott
Abrams, the Assistant Secertary of State for Latin American Affairs, later indicted for
perjury in 1991 for his role in the Iran-contra scandal and coverup, made the
announcement. Abrams took note of a resolution passed on June 23 by the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee demanding the creation of a "democratic government" in
Panama, and officially concurred, thus making the toppling of Noriega the official US
policy. Abrams also demanded that the Panamanian military be freed of "political
corruption."
These were precisely the destabilization measures which Poindexter had threatened 18
months earlier. The actual timing of the US demand for the ouster of Noriega appears to
have been dictated by resentment in the US financial community over Noriega's apparent
violation of certain taboos in his measures against drug money laundering. As the New
York Times commented in on August 10, 1987: "The political crisis follows closely what
bankers here saw as a serious breach of bank secrecy regulations. Earlier this year, as part
of an American campaign against the laundering of drug money, the Panamanian
government froze a few suspect accounts here in a manner that bankers and lawyers
regarded as arbitrary." These were precisely the actions lauded by Lawn. Had Noriega
shut down operations sanctioned by the US intelligence community, or confiscated assets
of the New York banks?
In November, 1987, Noriega was visited by Bush's former vice presidential chief of staff,
Admiral Daniel J. Murphy. Murphy had left Bush's office in 1985 to go into the
international consulting business. Murphy was accompanied on his trip by Tongsun Park,
a protagonist of the 1976 Koreagate scandal which had served Bush so well. Murphy
claimed that Park was part of a group of international businessmen who had sent him to
Panama to determine if Murphy could help in "restoring stability in Panama" as a
representative of the businessmen or of the Panamanian government, a singular cover
story. "I was really there trying to find out whether there was negotiating room between
him and the opposition," Murphy said in early 1988. There were reports that Murphy,
who had conferred with NSC chief Colin Powell, Don Gregg and Elliott Abrams of the
State Department before he went to Panama, had told Noriega that he could stay in office
through early 1989 if he allowed political reforms, free elections, and a free press, but
Murphy denied having done this. It is still not known with precision what mission
Murphy was sent to Panama to perform for Bush. [fn 40]
On August 12, 1987, Noriega responded to the opposition campaigns fomented by the US
inside Panama by declaring that the aim of Washington and its Panamanian minions was
"to smash Panama as a free and independent nation. It is a repetition of what Teddy
Roosevelt did when he militarily attacked following the separation of Panama from
Colombia." On August 13, 1987, the Los Angeles Times reported that US Assistant
Attorney General Stephen Trott, who had headed up the Department of Justice "Get
Noriega" Task Force for more than a year, had sent out orders to "pull together