AH Challenge: Give the USA has Bitter Territorial Dispute

The world has tons of territorial disputes that work up both sides of the conflict.

Falklands - UK/Argentina
Kurils - Russia/Japan
Senkakus - China/Japan
Gibraltar - UK/Spain
etc.

Is there any way the USA can have a dispute of this magnitude? There are some disputes with Canada but nothing too serious. I'm talking about a diplomatic relations ruining dispute.

(I don't know if this is pre-1900 or post-1900, but the dispute should last to the present so I put it here.)
 

sharlin

Banned
The war with Spain in the late 1800's. That was a territorial dispute. The war with the Phillipines etc again late 1800's. That was empire building.
 
Up to the start of the Great War, the USA continued to be in direct conflict with the Republic of Mexico, as in the late 19th century it had annexed parts originally belonging to this Hispanic state. New Mexico, Texas and parst of today's California all had been anexed by US Colonist shortly after the American Civil War. Mexico was not at all happy with that.
 
Khruschev publicly demands that the US hand back Guantanamo Bay to Cuba during the missile crisis. The crisis is defused before that happens, but Guantanamo Bay is now played up, especially by right-wing Republicans, a a symbol of American freedom against communist aggression, etc. Meanwhile, the Castros play up their dispute over "Yankee occupation of Cuban soil", etc. This continues even after the end of the Cold War.
 
Wouldn't Guantanamo Bay count? In my eyes a lease carries a lot less weight then, say, Spain outrightly giving Gibraltar to the British and then crying when they don't get it back or Argentina demanding the Falklands despite never actually owning them for one single day.

If Guantanamo doesn't count because the U.S. doesn't really claim to own it, I believe there are several islands in the Caribbean that the U.S. and another nation claims.

A simple POD would be to either have the U.S. get bossy in keeping those islands or for some sort of larger dispute to emerge between the U.S. and either Nicaragua or Columbia.

Another option would be the for Teddy Roosevelt to go full imperialist and just take over Panama, either directly by conquest or by a treaty with the Panamanian rebels instead of propping up the rebels and then taking land for the Canal.
 
One of the dictators of Haiti decides to start a pissing match over Navassa Island to distract from domestic problems

Columbia, Honduras, Jamaica or Nicaragua decide to do the same thing about Bajo Nuevo, Quita Sueno or Rosalind bank

If you want Anglo American enmity have the status of Flanagan island not get clarified

Problem with anything more than a diplomatic pissing match is that after WWII the US is too powerful for anyone to escalate
 
Mexico keeps California and are eventually kicked out, with the mExicans laying claim to the state.


Or the six Mexican irredentists complain loudly enough that the Mexican government decides to use its "claim" to the areas taken in 1848 as a negotiating tool/means of shutting up an annoying political choir.
 
If the USA decided to keep the Panama Canal Territory I could see that being a continuing source of friction with Panama and other South American countries

Best Regards
Grey Wolf
 
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