I interacted with a meme about the Panama Canal and I just cannot believe how many people suddenly CANNOT BELIEVE that Jimmy Carter left that thing on the table and walked away. I would love to hop back 6 months and find out how much any of these people cared about the Panama Canal. To the best of my knowledge Trump didn't care about it that long ago.
I did dig up something that was interesting to me. Certainly not any kind of secret, but just what I didn't know. The canal wasn't our idea. A French company started building a canal on the dangly top part of Colombia, got 40% done, and then went bankrupt and quit. When the US decided to get involved we almost started fresh in Nicaragua, but decided to try Colombia. We made up a treaty and passed it, but Colombia didn't pass it because they didn't like our 10-year renewable leases in perpetuity. Some people on the dangly top bit of Colombia contacted our government to see if we would still want to build it if they broke away as their own country. We sent military force down there to keep an eye on things and the dangly bit did break away and named itself Panama and then we bought the French equipment, got a 99 year lease, and finished where they started.
It's not a very good look.
I did dig up something that was interesting to me. Certainly not any kind of secret, but just what I didn't know. The canal wasn't our idea. A French company started building a canal on the dangly top part of Colombia, got 40% done, and then went bankrupt and quit. When the US decided to get involved we almost started fresh in Nicaragua, but decided to try Colombia. We made up a treaty and passed it, but Colombia didn't pass it because they didn't like our 10-year renewable leases in perpetuity. Some people on the dangly top bit of Colombia contacted our government to see if we would still want to build it if they broke away as their own country. We sent military force down there to keep an eye on things and the dangly bit did break away and named itself Panama and then we bought the French equipment, got a 99 year lease, and finished where they started.
It's not a very good look.
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