The situation in the Panama Canal is worse than we thought. Not only does a Chinese company control container ports at each end of the waterway, but a Chinese construction battalion is slowly building a bridge right across the middle.
How slowly? Well, the bridge won’t be completed until 2027 and Sen. Ted Cruz thinks he knows why.
As Cruz, who is chairman of the Commerce Committee, noted at a hearing this week, “the partially-completed bridge gives China the ability to block the canal without warning…This situation poses acute risks to US national security.”
What kind of risks?
Imagine that China announces a blockade of Taiwan and that we want to surge forces from the Atlantic into the Pacific to counter it.
A US aircraft carrier is midway through the canal, passing under China’s bridge when, without warning, the unfinished bridge collapses, crushing the ship.
China pretends it’s an accident, offering its condolences to the families of the thousands of US sailors who lost their lives. Unable to break the blockade on its own, the island of Taiwan capitulates two months later, and the largest chip-manufacturing factory in the world falls into China’s hands.
The last administration turned a blind eye to these kinds of national security risks.
Joe Biden was literally asleep on a Delaware beach for much of his presidency. Or perhaps he really was, as many believe, the Manchurian Candidate all along.
Whatever the case may be, China has had four long years to run riot over the world.
While Biden slept, China crushed the Democracy Movement in Hong Kong and locked up its leading dissident, Jimmy Lai.
It nibbled away at the territory of neighboring states like Bhutan and India, built a naval base in Cambodia, and encouraged North Korea’s Kim Jong-un to continue his campaign of missile intimidation.
Just last week Little Rocket Man, as Trump labeled him, fired off another round of cruise missiles. --->READ MORE HERE
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| PHOTO: Jacquelyn Martin |
Secretary of State Marco Rubio says President Donald Trump’s desire to acquire Greenland and retake control of the Panama Canal is driven by legitimate national security interests stemming from growing concerns about Chinese activity in the Arctic and in Latin America
Secretary of State Marco Rubio says President Donald Trump’s desire to acquire Greenland and retake control of the Panama Canal is driven by legitimate national security interests stemming from growing concerns about Chinese activity and influence in the Arctic and in Latin America.
Ahead of a trip to Central America that will start in Panama this weekend, Rubio said Thursday that he could not predict if Trump would succeed in buying Greenland from Denmark or restoring American authority over the Panama Canal while he is office. But he said the attention that Trump will give to both would have an impact.
“What I think you can rest assured of is that four years from now, our interest in the Arctic will be more secure; our interest in the Panama Canal will be more secure,” Rubio said in an interview with SiriusXM host Megyn Kelly.
Rubio will arrive in Panama on Saturday on his first official foreign trip as America's top diplomat, signaling the importance that both he and Trump place on securing the canal. Although immigration will be a major topic of conversation in Panama and at his other stops, Rubio said the canal issue is a priority.
Chinese investments in ports and other infrastructure and facilities at both the Pacific and Caribbean ends of the canal are a cause for major concern, leaving Panama and the critical shipping route vulnerable to China, he said.
“They’re all over Panama,” Rubio said of Chinese companies that many experts believe are beholden to the government in Beijing and would carry out orders to cut off or limit traffic to the canal in the event of a conflict with Taiwan or an unrelated breakdown in relations with the U.S.
“If the government in China in a conflict tells them to shut down the Panama Canal, they will have to,” he said. “I have zero doubt that they have contingency planning to do so that is a direct threat.” --->READ MORE HEREFollow link below to a relevant story:
+++++The US is right to be concerned about China’s influence over the Panama Canal+++++
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