A history of the Panama Canal -- and why Trump can't take it back on his own [View all]

PANAMA CITY (AP) — Teddy Roosevelt once declared the Panama Canal “one of the feats to which the people of this republic will look back with the highest pride.” More than a century later, Donald Trump is threatening to take back the waterway for the same republic.

The president-elect is decrying increased fees Panama has imposed to use the waterway linking the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. He says if things don’t change after he takes office next month, “We will demand that the Panama Canal be returned to the United States of America, in full, quickly and without question.”

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Why doesn’t the US control the canal anymore?

The waterway opened in 1914, but almost immediately some Panamanians began questioning the validity of U.S. control, leading to what became known in the country as the “generational struggle” to take it over.

The U.S. abrogated its right to intervene in Panama in the 1930s. By the 1970s, with its administrative costs sharply increasing, Washington spent years negotiating with Panama to cede control of the waterway.

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https://apnews.com/article/trump-panama-canal-roosevelt-treaties-1999-handover-8db28fd0249377a3f102cbb0a81e9356