Panama Canal

• From the writings of Admiral Afred Mahan, President Theodore Roosevelt was convinced that a canal connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans was pivotal to the United States military capabilities.

• The most narrow land separating the two was in the Latin American nation of Colombia in a region called Panama. The U.S. offered Colombia 10 million. Colombia insisted on 25 million.

DECISION: You are Roosevelt. What do you do? Pay the 25 million? Give up the plan? Declare war on Colombia?

Click here to see what Roosevelt did