From Publishers Weekly
In this well-researched, scholarly study, Major traces the roots of Washington's Panama Canal policy deep into the 19th century, with emphasis on the rivalry between the U.S. and Britain over the proposed isthmian waterway. The author, who teaches history at the University of Hull in England, describes how the U.S. gained treaty rights to build, maintain and fortify the canal and explains how the canal affected Panamanian politics and economics. Built between 1904 and 1914, the canal performed a dual role as a thoroughfare for maritime commerce and a conduit for seapower. Major argues that the canal more than justified itself in both categories throughout WW II but lost its strategic and economic importance in the postwar years. In a later section of the study he charts the U.S. government's decision to transfer canal authority to Panama via treaties signed in 1977 during the Carter administration. Those treaties stipulated that in 1979 the Canal Zone, created three quarters of a century earlier, would cease to exist.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
From Library Journal
British scholar Major has examined a wealth of U.S. government documents bearing on American involvement in Panama and the Canal Zone, from Theodore Roosevelt to Jimmy Carter. Unlike such previous scholars as David McCullough, who have concentrated on how the United States acquired the rights in 1903 to build an isthmian canal, Major focuses on the subsequent history of the Canal Zone. His concern is how the United States administered the zone, governed its people, and intervened in Panamanian politics for more than seven decades. Despite its considerable achievement, Major's work will not supplant Walter LaFeber's The Panama Canal: The Crisis in Historical Perspective (1978; LJ 10/15/89. rev. ed.), which should also be consulted. Recommended for academic libraries.
- Thomas H. Appleton Jr., Kentucky Historical Soc., FrankfortCopyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
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