Officials say the US military’s southern headquarters, which explores multiple options, from cooperation with Panama to military action.
The Pentagon is reportedly exploring military options for the Panama Canal to ensure that the US has continued access to strategically important waterways in line with demands from the White House.
Reuters News Agency said Thursday that a US official who spoke on condition of anonymity called the new Trump administration’s interim national security guidance called U.S. troops to consider military options to protect access to the Panama Canal.
In response to reports of possible US military action, the Panama government said it remains “hard” in defending sovereignty in news that US President Donald Trump is considering options aimed at “recovering” the strategic canal.
“In regards to these statements, I have nothing more to say than to Panama’s continued obsession with protecting its territory, canals and sovereignty,” Panama Foreign Minister Javier Martinez Chacha told reporters Thursday.
“Let’s make that clear, the canal belongs to the Panama people and will continue to be,” he added.
Tensions between the US and Panama are swirling once again about Trump’s repeated threat of “recovering” the Panama Canal.
News about the US military program was reported by NBC earlier this week, citing an internal memo from the Trump administration and comments from unnamed US authorities.
Officials told the network that the US military’s Southern Command would consider several options, including working with the Panama army and taking the canal with force. They also said that the US invasion of Panama is still unlikely to be present.
However, the memo asked the Pentagon “providing reliable military options to ensure fair and free US military and commercial access to the Panama Canal.”
The Panama Canal is extremely valuable as it passes through Panama’s narrow isthmus that connect North and South America, connecting the Pacific Ocean to the Caribbean and Atlantic Oceans.
The waterway, more than 100 years ago, has been in the global spotlight since Trump took office in January.
In a speech to the US Congress last week, the US president said that his administration “is planning to reclaim the Panama Canal and has already begun it.”
Despite his frequent remarks about the canal, Trump has yet to publicly speak out about how the canal will be taken away and whether the US military will be involved. The United States acquired the right to build and operate canals in the early 20th century. In a treaty signed in 1979 while President Jimmy Carter was in charge of the United States agreed to hand over control of the canal to Panama at the end of 1999.
However, the United States and Panama are bound by treaties to protect the canal from any threat to its neutrality, and are permitted to take unilateral action to do so.
As Trump previously claimed, China secretly controlled the waterways, control of the canal was also the point of the conflict between Washington and Beijing.
Both Panama and China have denied foreign interference.
Until recently, two of the canal’s four major ports were majority owned by Hong Kong-based conglomerate CK Hutchison Holdings.
After weeks of scrutiny, the conglomerate sold most of its global port business across 23 countries for $22.8 billion to a consortium of investors led by US company BlackRock.
The sale may be placating Trump for now, but it appears that the company is currently at the intersection of China’s Communist Party.
This week, Providen Hong Kong newspaper Ta Kung Pao announced a company that “spinless, seeks profits, pass profits” that calls the BlackRock deal a “betrayal” by Chinese and CK Hutchison.
The newspaper commentary was later uploaded to websites of representative offices in China in Hong Kong and Macau, indicating implicit approval of the content.