Academic books give us a rich harvest of knowledge by synthesising what others have discovered and adding fresh information from the author. Peter M. Sánchez's book does this to a degree and will be appreciated by Panama specialists. Its biggest strength is his account of US-Panamanian relations, especially during the implementation of the 1977 treaty and the transfer of the canal to Panamanian sovereignty. Sánchez was working and studying in Panama during those years and developed a thirst for understanding how things had become the way they were.
The book has an ambitious scope, attempting to cover 150 years of Panama's history and especially the US role in that history. However, Sánchez's summary of the nineteenth century is superficial and based entirely on secondary sources, and it deals mostly with topics that would become important once the United States began building a canal there. His survey of the twentieth century, up to the 1977 treaty, is a fairly detailed narrative, also based on secondary works. This section, essentially an extended background for the later period, suffers from some shortcomings discussed below. It does, however, provide a useful synthesis of much of the extant literature.
The last two chapters, covering the Noriega years, the Christmas invasion of 1989, and the successful transfer of the canal to Panamanian ownership and operation in the 1990s, comprise the most valuable section of the book. Sánchez assembled detailed information on politics and parties, with ample doses of US diplomacy thrown in. His military career may have helped him to interpret the special kind of regime that had an army behind the scenes. He drew on most of the US and Panamanian authors who publish on this period, and his interpretation was informed by being part of the US country team. I would not hesitate to assign these chapters to any graduate student who wished to study this period.
The book's weaknesses stem from the author's lack of historical knowledge and excessive attention to theorising. A sampling of errors and oversights illustrates this: he miscasts the 1910 coup against President Mendoza and kills him off six years early; mislabels the Kuna uprising as the Yule rebellion; overlooks the importance of the 1920 strike against the canal; misses the strategic demotion of the canal and its reorganisation following World War II; and confusingly refers to the Torrijos regime as ‘personalistic, institutional military rule’. And it is simply not true that Torrijos forced the US government to negotiate the 1977 treaty, as he asserts on p. 143. Such lapses raise cautionary flags.
Sánchez's documentation is not all it should be. He treats all sources as equally authoritative (McCain's book, The United States and the Republic of Panama, for example, was originally published in 1937 but is listed as 1965 when it was reprinted); does not cite unpublished works and dissertations; relies on a newsletter for the recent period; and overlooks some important works, like Jaén Suárez's Las negociaciones sobre el Canal de Panamá, 1964–1970 (Bogotá, 2002) and Castillero Calvo's Historia general de Panamá (Panamá, 2004).
The political theorising does not, in this reviewer's opinion, add much value to the book. The overarching thesis, that the United States established hegemony over Panama because of the canal and cared little for encouraging democracy there, does not warrant all the space it gets. His assertion that the Panamanians cared deeply for democracy (or, as he often says, polyarchy), and were continually frustrated by the United States, is suspect. As he himself writes on p. 108, ‘In the immediate post-World War II period, democracy was stymied on the isthmus by an alliance between the weak oligarchy, the National Police, and the United States’. The seven pages devoted to the failed effort by the United States to have Panama authorise the creation of a Multi-National Anti-Drug Center do not seem justified. Finally, having worked in Panama, he knows better than to refer throughout to ‘Washington’ as a single, omnipotent actor.
My last critique concerns the title, Panama Lost? Despite the continuous discussion of hegemony and domination, the United States never ‘owned’ Panama, nor even wanted to. The US government was content to possess the Canal Zone for maritime and military purposes and ensure that Panama did nothing to threaten its interests. Therefore, should the turnover of the canal, which some regard as a consummate act of statesmanship, be interpreted as ‘losing Panama’ ? The constructive relations that followed the turnover would seem to suggest that a healthier, more stable situation has emerged. And why the question mark? The editorialising in the final section, entitled ‘Lessons for U.S. Foreign Policy’, seems only to say the United States ought to rethink its international priorities and then learn how better to pursue those interests, especially when dealing with small nations.
My last comment is not a criticism, because reviews should not decry what the author did not set out to do. Still, I would have appreciated a reflection by this former Air Force officer on the parallels between the 1989 invasion of Panama by President Bush senior and the 2003 invasion of Iraq by his son, the current President Bush. Could the latter have expected the Iraqis to respond the way the Panamanians did? Did he expect to remove the troops after a short time the way his father did? Food for thought …
