Noriega was useful to U.S. counterintelligence. As head of G-2, Panama's military intelligence command, Noriega was the second most powerful man in Panama. In 1975 G-2 agents rounded up businessmen critical of Torrijos' dictatorial populist style, confiscated their property, and sent them into exile in Ecuador. Torrijos once said of him, "This is my gangster."
Torrijos died in 1981 in a mysterious plane crash. In the ensuing two-year contest for power between civilian politicians and ambitious military officers, Noriega emerged triumphant. In late 1983, following his promotion to general and commander of the National Guard, the guard was combined with the navy and air force into the Panama Defense Forces (which also included the national police). The following year Noriega's choice for president, Nicolás Ardito Barletta, won a narrow victory over Arnulfo Arias. But there was widespread fraud in the election. Barletta tried manfully to grapple with the country's growing economic woes, he failed, and Noriega forced him out. (Panama had received no windfall from the canal treaties Torrijos had negotiated with President Jimmy Carter.)
The reason had less to do with Barletta's economic policies than his alleged threat to investigate the brutal slaying of Hugo Spadafora, who had publicly accused Noriega of being a drug trafficker.
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