ct. The French preferred the Panama route, but could not negotiate acceptable arrangements with the Colombian government.
The French finally reached a canal accord with the Colombians, and commenced work on the project in 1880. For the French private company to complete the canal, however, it was necessary to obtain financing guarantees from the French government. The U.S. government, which did not want a French canal in Central America, successfully blocked French governmental financial guarantees, by claiming that such action would violate the American Monroe Doctrine (Meditz & Hanratty, 1989). As a consequence, the French canal building effort failed, which provided the Americans with an opportunity to gain control of the project.
Unfortunately, however, the Americans could not negotiate satisfactory arrangements with the Colombian government to allow an American takeover of the canal project. The sticking point was an American demand for a 100 year lease on a 10 kilometer wide strip across the Isthmus of Panama.
In response to the failure to gain Colombian governmental assent for American control over the canal project, a revolutionary junta was formed in Panama. The junta was headed by the president of the American-owned Panama Railroad Company, Jose Augustin Arango. The American government immediately announced support for the junta, and warned Colombia against armed action to subdue the revolution in their own country (Meditz & Hanratty, 1989).
In November 1903, the junta "with the protection of United States naval forces, carried out a successful uprising against the Colombian government" (Meditz & Hanratty, 1989, p. 23). In 1846, the U.S. and Colombia negotiated a treaty which permitted the U.S. to intervene militarily in the Isthmus of Panama in the event of disorder. In 1903, in the wake of American fomented disorder, the U.S. government invoked this treaty to prevent "a Colombian force from moving ac...