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{
    "localId": "486500486",
    "label": "Report, Central Intelligence Agency, Panama, Situation Report 26",
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    "id": "486500486",
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    "contentType": "document",
    "title": "Report, Central Intelligence Agency, Panama, Situation Report 26",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/486500486",
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        "President's Secretary's Files (Truman Administration)",
        "Intelligence Files"
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    "productionDates": [
        {
            "logicalDate": "1948-03-01",
            "month": 3,
            "year": 1948
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{
    "seq": 26,
    "pageIndex": 0,
    "type": "photo",
    "url": "https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/truman/hst-psf/602196/875510/875510-01-026.tif",
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    "ocrText": "SECRET\nSECTION III\nFOREIGN AFFAIRS\nPanama's foreign policy is based on a compromise between its wish to retain its\nposition as a quasi protectorate of the US and its desire to assert for itself unlimited\nnational sovereignty.\nUnder the Treaty of 1903, the US guaranteed Panama's independence: Article 136\nof the original Panama Constitution conceded to the US a legal right to \"intervene\nin any part of the Republic of Panama to re-establish peace and constitute order in the\nevent of there being a disturbance.\" Inasmuch as none of the other American Repub-\nlics has granted any such right to the US, this clause in Panama's Constitution clearly\ncreated a special situation, which has lent itself to description by anti-US elements in\nterms of tutelage and about which even pro-US Panamanians have-without for\na\nmoment denying the urgency of the US interest on the Isthmus-shown increasing\nsensitiveness in recent years. This contrasts sharply (the constitutional provision\nentirely apart) with Panamanian attitudes through the earlier years of the Republic,\nwhen the special position of the US tended to be taken for granted. Thus when, in\n1909, the US asserted that it was entitled to prevent Panama from getting into a contro-\nversy with another government that might render imperative US intervention on\nPanama's behalf, Panama offered no objection; and on occasion the Panamanian Gov-\nernment has itself invoked the constitutional provision cited in order to permit US\nintervention in its domestic affairs (on one such occasion the President of Panama\norally requested intervention). Moreover, US intervention, in the absence of such\nauthorizations or requests, has been accepted without any question of, for example, an\nappeal to other powers.\nA shift in attitude became perceptible around 1933; and, increasingly through sub-\nsequent years, Panama has taken steps that appear to have been motivated in large\npart by a desire to draw attention-inside Panama, in the US, and over Latin America\nas a whole-to its equality of status with the US. As an active member of the Pan\nAmerican Union and the United Nations, as a power represented by diplomatic and\nconsular establishments throughout the world, and as an ardent partner in the Good\nNeighbor Policy and hemisphere cooperation, it today, at first glance, appears to possess\nall the external paraphernalia of full sovereignty, and might on this showing fairly be\nexpected to adjourn its fears concerning the possibility that it will be considered a US\nprotectorate. For the Panamanians, however, the nub of the question is, on the one\nhand, the US' supposed right of intervention and, on the other hand, their own complete\nunwillingness (US attitude entirely to one side) to sever the bonds of interest which\n(as they themselves know) make it impossible for the US to remain indifferent to events\nwithin Panama. The major objective of Panamanian foreign policy is, in this back-\nground, that of retaining the political and economic benefits that accrue from the fact\nof US reliance upon the Panama Canal for its defense and its commerce, while weaken-\nIII-1\nSECRET"
}