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In the continuing exchange of recriminations about the failed coup against Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega, the Bush Administration last week loudly accused Congress of trying to micromanage intelligence matters. At the same time, however, a National Security Council review indicates that if anyone was micromanaging, it was the President, who picked up some unhealthy habits during his year as President Ford's CIA director.

As chief spymaster, Bush learned to compartmentalize information, drawing on many sources but sharing little of what he knew or how he was leaning. As President, he continues the practice; much undigested and conflicting intelligence from Panama was "stovepiped" straight to the Chief Executive and his top aides, bypassing lower-level experts who would normally sort it out. Some Bush aides now admit privately that this practice confused the U.S. response to the Panamanian coup. The compartmentalization of information, says one senior Administration official, is "a destructive trait in any President. The information the President has is not shared with enough people to allow him to head off bad ideas."

Despite these conclusions, the Administration is using the furor over Panama to seek more leeway to assist a coup that, while not intended to kill Noriega or another foreign leader, might wind up doing just that. At the same time, Bush last week assured the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence that he would give it "timely notice" of covert actions, at least within a matter of days (in contrast to the ten months that Ronald Reagan once took).

Before Bush flew to Central America to join regional leaders in Costa Rica on Friday, new details emerged about covert U.S. plans aimed at overthrowing Noriega in July and October 1988. These plans, the Administration noted, were blocked by some of the same Senators who last month criticized Bush as timid. Members of the Senate intelligence committee, both Democratic and Republican, defend their caution. One congressional source described the October plan as an ill-defined "hodgepodge." Committee spokesman James Currie added that conducting any high-risk covert operation just before a presidential election could unduly and unpredictably influence the election if the operation became public. Said Currie: "No matter what side you're on, you probably don't want to let a U.S. election turn on that kind of crap shoot, especially if there's no reason it has to be done right then."