WPL02103 – The Panama Canal: A Complicated Political Backstory

The Panama Canal was one of the greatest engineering accomplishments of all time. From a political perspective, building the canal was either a bold diplomatic stroke or a crude display of arrogance by America.  The first part of this presentation will focus on how the United States was able to build and then maintain this canal in another country. The second part of this presentation will focus on how the United States turned over the canal to Panama and why this unleashed one of the most contentious foreign policy debates in American history.