The Panama Canal is essential to global trade, but a recent drought has left large numbers of ships waiting to pass along it. The first attempt to build a canal across the Isthmus of Panama was a wreck. A French company spent eight years and $287 million trying to create a waterway, but ultimately failed due to challenges like disease and financial issues.
At the time it was built, the canal was an engineering marvel, relying on a series of locks that lift ships – and their thousands of pounds – to cross from one ocean to the other. The U.S. officially handed over control of the Panama Canal to Panama, in accordance with the Torrijos-Carter Treaties. The Panama Canal opened 100 years ago, on August 15, 1914, stretching 77 kilometers long and connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans at Panama.
China has planned a huge project within the framework of its Belt and Road initiative to curb US influence in Latin America through the Panama Canal. With the tightening ties between China and Panama, the latter needs to consider its partnership with the United States. Donald Trump might not know it, but the United States didn't build the Panama Canal. Workers did.