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Approval of the agreement by Panama is a pretty sure bet. A sharp outcry from the country's militant left is expected over the retention of U.S. bases in the zone, but then much of the Panamanian left (as well as the right) is in exile. But many Panamanians, perhaps unrealistically, look to the treaty to cure many of their national ills—including a zero growth rate. Says Nicolas Ardito Barletta, Minister of Planning and Economic Policy: "This will create a perfect situation for a lasting boom."
The fate of the treaty in the U.S. is less certain. Commitment to a U.S.-controlled canal is deeply embedded in popular sentiment and skillfully exploited by such conservative Republican Senators as Strom Thurmond of South Carolina and Jesse Helms of North Carolina. Helms flaunts a recent poll of 1,011 adult Americans by the Opinion Research Corporation, showing 78% for keeping the canal, only 14% willing to cede it to Panama. Yet the survey does not specify the conditions under which the U.S. might relinquish the canal.
A rough nose count indicates at least 50 Senators for the treaty, 20 unalterably opposed (a minimum of 34 will be needed to block the treaty). Proponents are encouraged by the defection of Barry Goldwater and S.I. Hayakawa. Since Barry switched, he says that Ronald Reagan has not spoken to him. Explains Goldwater, resignedly: "I would have said that we should fight for the canal if necessary. But the Viet Nam years have taught me that we wouldn't. So we might as well hand it over." During his California senatorial campaign, Hayakawa quipped: "We stole it fair and square." He now insists that he was only being waggish. He thinks the agreement is fair and square.
To try to convince others, Bunker and Linowitz have spent hundreds of hours on Capitol Hill briefing Senators and conducting seminars to explain the "justice and timeliness" of the treaty. Linowitz even had lunch with Reagan. "I don't think I persuaded him," admits the diplomat, "and I'm sure he didn't persuade me." The opposition to the pact, says Linowitz, "is not only one of emotionalism; it is one of great ignorance on the part of the American people." The treaty, he feels, "will indeed preserve those interests which are important to us."
Carter wasted no time coming to the support of the agreement. He got on the phone from Plains to more than a dozen congressional leaders to ask for help in winning approval of the pact. He put his top troubleshooter, Hamilton Jordan, in charge of steering the treaty through Congress—the toughest assignment Jordan has been given since getting Carter elected. A White House task force under Jordan fired off wires to all 534 members of Congress, urging them to approach the treaty with open minds. White House emissaries were planning to ask for help from Gerald Ford, Nelson Rockefeller and Henry Kissinger. Says a senior White House adviser: "A major job of lobbying and education must be done immediately —fireside chats, the works, or we're going to lose on the Hill."
The lobbyists and educators will have to field a number of thorny questions about the canal and its future: