Word: panama
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Manuel Noriega spent the holiday season in a Miami prison awaiting trial for drug trafficking, but he didn't forget old friends and supporters back in Panama. The ousted dictator mailed out a Christmas card bearing a cryptic poem: "God is who makes the time/ the sole owner of eternity. Because He/ knows it all/ and knows/ how and/ when . . .! This is my thought/ of meditation/ and from the depth/ I give you today in/ Christmas." Could the former strongman be contemplating an insanity defense...
...want another Vietnam, everyone says, squinting into the desert sun. We want something swift and decisive, short and sweet -- a Panama perhaps. For these are the two poles of our collective military memory: on the one hand, the quicksand of Vietnam; on the other, the "brilliant success" of Panama, ; or so it was heralded at the time -- a military action so flawless, so perfectly executed that, as one of the generals responsible for carrying out the invasion boasted shortly afterward, "There were no lessons learned...
...will recall, the U.S. Army invaded the nation of Panama and soon thereafter arrested its de facto head of state. The U.N. General Assembly swiftly denounced the invasion as a "flagrant violation of international law," but never mind -- for most Americans, the lofty ends justified the brutal and lawless means. We had to stop the drug traffic. We had to restore stability and, as usual where guns and flag waving are involved, democracy...
...more than a year after the arrest of the loathsome dictator, it's fair to ask: What did we accomplish in Panama? Because if Panama is to be our standard for success and the yardstick by which any action in the Persian Gulf may be measured, we ought to know what "success" looks like -- after the smoke clears, that is, and the dead have all been laid to rest...
...fight is about upholding international law. Iraq should not have invaded Kuwait. No question. But this rings a bit false coming from the country that just last year was condemned by the United Nations for another "flagrant violation of international law": the invasion of Panama. the number of civilian deaths resulting from the invasion of Panama were of the same order of magnitude as the number of civilian deaths caused by Iraq's invasion of Kuwait...