No Bargain

Plea bargains with accused criminals are often hard to swallow, but the worst we’ve seen in a long time is the deal that the Reagan Administration is trying to strike with Panamanian dictator Manuel A. Noriega. The U.S. offer to drop two federal drug indictments against Noriega in exchange for his resigning as commander of the Defense Forces and going into exile for seven months is a lopsided bargain at best. It would leave the Defense Forces, whose senior officers are every bit as corrupt and undemocratic as Noriega, in command of Panama; it would allow Noriega to return, all too soon, and resume playing a role backstage, and it would make a mockery of the Administration’s campaign against drugs.

It’s a little late in the day to say, as Vice President George Bush did last week, that the United States should not negotiate with drug dealers. The Administration is in this jam because, for so long, it so valued Noriega’s support for the Nicaraguan Contras and the intelligence he supplied about Cuba that it tolerated the booming business he did with the Medellin drug cartel. In the three months since two federal grand juries accused Noriega of taking payoffs from Colombian drug traffickers and laundering their earnings through Panama’s financial institutions, the Administration has repeatedly negotiated with him, all the time predicting his imminent departure.

If the Administration believes that Noriega’s departure alone will help restore democracy and economic health to Panama, then once again it is deluding itself. Electoral politics in Panama has been a sham since the military coup of 1968; in the past seven years Panama has had six civilian presidents, whose comings and (usually sudden) goings were dictated by the military. That pattern is almost certain to be repeated in the presidential elections scheduled for May, 1989, whether Noriega or someone else commands the Defense Forces. The sanctions that the United States imposed as part of its campaign to squeeze out Noriega have damaged domestic banks and inspired some foreign banks to relocate; the damage to the Panamanian economy will be much harder to repair than it was to inflict. And, as long as American narcotics consumption remains high, the money from that trade will be a corrupting influence in Panama.

Instead of striking some desperate deal to ease Noriega out by Wednesday, when President Reagan is scheduled to leave for the superpower summit in Moscow, the Administration ought to be thinking about its long-term interests in Panama. Awful as Noriega is, what is truly disturbing is the prospect that, unless the nation’s political system is transformed, someone like him will be calling the shots when Panama takes control of the Panama Canal in 1999. Getting rid of Noriega for seven months won’t cure that problem.

Dismissing the indictments against him might have been an acceptable--if distasteful--option back when the quid pro quo demanded by the United States was his pledge to leave Panama permanently. But, since the United States has retreated from its original demand, we see no reason to drop the charges against him; there’s nothing to be gained, no prospect of real change in Panamanian politics, and much to be lost, notably respect for this country’s drug laws. What the Administration is peddling is a bad bargain.