Chinese influence along the Panama Canal receives a Check Mate.

The United States military has teamed with Panamanian police to conduct a series of new exercises aimed at protecting the Panama Canal, amid tensions over alleged Chinese influence along the prized trade route. To kick off the drills, three US Army helicopters arrived in Panama on Sunday – two UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters and a CH-47 Chinook – landing at the Panama-Pacific Airport, formerly the US Howard base.

Michael Palacios, sub commissioner of Panama’s National Aeronaval Service – known as SENAN – said the exercises would prepare Panama’s forces, as well as countries in the region, against any threats to the security and defense of the canal. The US soldiers have conducted similar exercises in Panama a month ago, under a bilateral agreement that allows Washington to use Panamanian air and naval bases for training without establishing its own bases.

The agreement sparked protests in the Central American country, and came amid pressure from US President Donald Trump, who threatened to reclaim the canal. He has repeatedly claimed that China has too much influence over the canal, which handles about 40% of US container traffic and 5% of world trade.

In April, Trump called for the free transit of American commercial and military ships through the inter-oceanic route, claiming the canal would “not exist” without the US. But Panamanian President Jose Raul Mulino said the toll fees are regulated by the Panama Canal Authority, an autonomous governing body overseeing the trade route.

US presence in Panama remains a sensitive issue, as it evokes a time when Washington had an enclave of military bases in the country before the canal was handed over to Panamanians on the last day of 1999. SENAN officials said the US maneuvers will last until Friday and will respect “national sovereignty”, while Palacios reiterated that the exercise has been held for 23 years.

The agreement prohibits the United States to build its own permanent bases on the isthmus, a move that would be deeply unpopular with Panamanians and legally fraught, but it gives the United States broad sway to deploy an unspecified number of personnel to bases, some of which Washington built when it occupied the canal zone decades ago.

However, a longer-term rotational force — such as the one the United States maintains in Darwin, Australia — could prove politically toxic for Panama’s center-right leader Jose Raul Mulino, who was on Thursday in Peru, where he revealed that the United States had asked to have its own bases.

Mulino said he had told visiting Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth that US bases, allowed under an earlier draft, would be “unacceptable”. Furthermore, he has warned Hegseth: “Do you want to create a mess, what we’ve put in place here would set the country on fire?”

In the watered-down “Memorandum of Understanding,” signed by Hegseth and Panama’s security chief Frank Abrego Wednesday, Panama won its own concessions. The United States recognised Panama’s sovereignty — not a given following Trump’s refusal to rule out an invasion — and Panama will retain control over any installations.

Panama will also have to agree to any deployments. But given Trump’s willingness to rip up or rewrite trade deals, treaties and agreements, that might offer little comfort to worried Panamanians.

“What is happening over here is a setback to national sovereignty”, Panamanian trade union leader Saul Mendez told Reporters. “What the Panamanian government has done is an act of treason. They are traitors and must be tried”.

Panama has a long and difficult relationship with the United States. They have close cultural and economic ties, despite the decades-long US occupation of the canal zone and US invasion 35 years ago to overthrow dictator Manuel Noriega. That invasion had killed more than 500 Panamanians and razed parts of the capital.

But, Donald Trump’s vow to take back the canal, and his claim of Chinese influence have prompted mass demonstrations. By law, Panama operates the canal, giving access to all nations. But the US president has zeroed in on the role of a Hong Kong company that has operated ports at either end of the canal linking the Atlantic and Pacific oceans for decades.

Under pressure from the White House, Panama has accused the Panama Ports Company of failing to meet its contractual obligations and pushed for the firm to pull out of the country. The ports’ parent company CK Hutchison announced last month a deal to offload 43 ports in 23 countries — including its two on the Panama Canal — to a consortium led by US asset manager BlackRock for $19 billion in cash. A furious Beijing has since announced an antitrust review of the deal.

Team Maverick