Interesante. Solo quiero agregar esta anecdota: En un concurso de
television aqui en USA le preguntaron a un estudiante de
High School donde quedaba el Canal de Panama? Contesto:"Entre Nueva
York y Chicago"!
El Reverendo
> Date: Tue, 2 Mar 1999 15:40:00 -0600
> Reply-to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> From: "FORERO, JAIME E. (JSC-CA)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: "'macondo'" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Subject: FW: Who Needs The Panama Canal?
> Me mandaron esto sobre el Canal de Panama. A ver que les parece.
>
>
> ________________________________________________________________
> Jaime Forero
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> 281-244-8779
> NASA VITT
> Siempre adelante !!
>
> > ----------
> > From: Mahan[SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> > Sent: Monday, March 01, 1999 8:16 PM
> > To: Mahan, Fred & Cheryl
> > Subject: Who Needs The Panama Canal?
> >
> > Who Needs the Panama Canal?
> > WorldTribune.com
> > Robert Morton
> > March 1, 1999
> >
> > In 1976, Ronald Reagan mobilized his conservative base and almost defeated
> > Gerald Ford for the Republican presidential nomination by campaigning to
> > retain U.S. sovereignty over the Panama Canal. Ford won the nomination,
> > lost
> > the White House and on Sept. 7, 1977, Jimmy Carter signed a treaty with
> > Gen.
> > Omar Torrijos surrendering the canal to Panama on Dec. 31 of this year.
> >
> > The United States gained the goodwill of a leftist dictator and lost a
> > prime
> > geopolitical asset - one built and maintained with tens of billions of
> > taxpayers' money in a nation with no army or navy. Polls show most
> > Panamanians support continued American military presence. The
> > installations
> > fortify the economy, the native bureaucrats' competence at managing the
> > canal is suspect, and the local police are no match for the
> > narco-terrorists
> > operating with impunity in neighboring Colombia where schoolchildren are
> > taught that Panama is really Colombia. But does anyone really care about
> > the
> > Panama Canal?
> >
> > No one, it would seem, except Communist China's Military Industrial
> > Complex,
> > otherwise know as the People's Liberation Army (PLA). If the United States
> > does not consider the canal a strategic asset, the surviving communist
> > superpower apparently does. In a deal reported by this newspaper on March
> > 19, 1997, the Clintonesque government of Panama in effect sold the Chinese
> > rights to two prime, American-built port facilities which flank the canal
> > zone both to the east and the west. The 50-year contract awarded Balboa,
> > on
> > the Pacific side, and Cristobal, on the Atlantic side, to a giant Hong
> > Kong
> > shipping firm, Hutchison Whampoa, Ltd. By any analysis this company,
> > headed
> > by Li Kashing is an interesting operation:
> >
> > * Hutchison has worked closely with the China Ocean Shipping Co. (COSCO)
> > on
> > shipping deals in Asia even before Hong Kong reverted to Beijing's control
> > in 1997. COSCO, you may remember, is the PLA-controlled company that
> > almost
> > succeeded in gaining control of the abandoned naval station at Long Beach
> > California.
> >
> > * Li Kashing has served on the board of directors of China International
> > Trust and Investment Corp., a PLA-affiliated giant run by Wang Jun whose
> > name may ring a bell.
> >
> > Yes, the very same Wang Jun enjoyed coffee at the White House in exchange
> > for a modest donation to the Clinton-Gore 1996 slush fund.
> >
> > As Adm. Thomas H. Moorer, USN (Ret.) testified before the Senate Foreign
> > Relations Committee on June 16, 1998, "My specific concern is that this
> > company is controlled by the Communist Chinese. And they have virtually
> > accomplished, without a single shot being fired, a stronghold on the
> > Panama
> > Canal, something which took our country so many years to accomplish." Not
> > to
> > worry, the spin goes. This is 1999. The Soviet Union is dead, Russia is
> > bankrupt, the really big ships can't fit in the canal anyway, and we could
> > always seize control in wartime. As the clock ticks down to Dec. 31, 1999,
> > there is no anxiety like that engendered by the Y2K computer crisis. Just
> > how important is the Panama Canal? Speaking on his car phone after a busy
> > post-impeachment day at the office, U.S. Rep. Bob Barr, R-Ga., was
> > emphatic.
> >
> > "I think the geopolitical significance of the Panama Canal in 1999 is the
> > same as it has been for the past 85 years - critical." The new Chinese
> > presence there only adds to its significance, he said. Mr. Barr who was a
> > schoolboy in Panama and served in the CIA, traveled to Panama last January
> > with Lt. Gen. Gordon Sumner, (U.S. Army, Ret.) a former chairman of the
> > Inter-American Defense Board. At the June 16 hearing, Mr. Barr testified
> > on
> > the importance of a continuing U.S. presence to offset the narco-terrorist
> > threat in a region for which Panama serves as a transportation and
> > geographic nexus. He laments the lack of interest in the issue by the U.S.
> > congress and especially by the White House. "We don't have any strategic
> > thinking," says Gen. Sumner. "There is no long-term vision. Whatever you
> > think of Henry Kissinger, he had a strategic vision."
> >
> > The Chinese certainly have "strategic vision," according to former Soviet
> > GRU officer, Col. Stanislav Lunev. "The Chinese intention to develop
> > ocean-going capabilities for its navy is well-known," he wrote in an
> > article
> > for Insight magazine in November 1977. "This is the reason that Chinese
> > entrepreneurs are actively in the market for abandoned port facilities in
> > strategic locations." "They take a long view of history," says Mr. Barr
> > who
> > noted that the Chinese have also been quietly increasing their presence in
> > Cuba.
> >
> > Shortly after President Clinton announced the departure of the U.S.
> > military
> > from Panama, the Bank of China extended a 15-year, $120 million loan to
> > Panama at a 3 percent interest rate. Nice. This was during the 1996 U.S.
> > presidential campaign, incidentally, when boatloads of Chinese money were
> > also making their way into the coffers of the Democratic Party. And the
> > DNC
> > chairman that year was Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd who along with Jimmy
> > Carter's National Security Advisor, Robert Pastor, supports the turnover
> > as
> > passionately now as they did in 1977.
> >
> > So when several American companies including Bechtel International
> > tendered
> > bids in the neighborhood of $2 million for leases on the strategic ports
> > at
> > Balboa and Cristobal, Panamanian President Ernesto "Toro" Balladares
> > secretly changed the rules of the bidding process and accepted Hutchison
> > Whampoa offer for $22.2 million a year.
> >
> > Well, if the White House was for sale, why not the Panama Canal? The fine
> > print in the China-Panama deal should outrage any competent commander in
> > chief. Panama's Law No. 5 was a secret provision, passed by the
> > legislative
> > assembly on Jan. 16, 1997 that may have violated both the 1977 Panama
> > Canal
> > treaties and the Panamanian constitution. Among other things Law No. 5
> > provided Hutchison Whampoa:
> >
> > * "First option" to take over the U.S. Rodman naval station;
> >
> > *"Rights" to operate piloting and tug boat services for the canal and
> > private roads near the two ports;
> >
> > * Authority in the words of Adm. Moorer's testimony "to deny ships access
> > to
> > the ports and entrances of the canal if they are deemed to be interfering
> > with Hutchison's business - in direct violation of the 1977 Panama Canal
> > Treaty which guarantees expeditious passage for the United States Navy."
> >
> > "What the hell are we doing?" asks former Reagan administration official
> > Martin Anderson, now at the Hoover Institution. Good question. Another
> > good
> > question is "what are the Chinese doing?" But that is none of our
> > business,
> > Janet Reno has ruled.
> >
> >
> > Robert Morton is managing editor of the National Weekly Edition of The
> > Washington Times in which this column was first published in the March 1-8
> > edition. He is also a media fellow at the Hoover Institution. Robert
> > Morton
> > can be reached at [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> >
> >
>
