WI French Panama Canal

The French made a first big attempt at building a canal in Panama in the 1880's

It didn't work because Lesseps insisted on doing a "flat" canal like in Suez rather than one with locks, which would have better suited the terrain.
To be fair, he was no engineer and had been told in Suez that a lockless canal couldn't work and yet it did.

This had major consequences as France abandoned the project to the US and it also had major repercussions in France as there was a massive scandal around the financing of it, which ended as little more than a Ponzi scheme.

Now, what if it did work? The actual engineers on the project were advocating for locks.
Let's say Lesseps gets sick, he wasn't very young anymore and another man like Eiffel takes the lead (he was already on the project), and they manage to build it, what would the consequences be?


And yes, yellow fever, but that didn't stop the French conquering Indochina and if it shows progress I'm sure you can get as many warm bodies as needed
 
I'm not sure if Lesseps leaves if the project would do any better. Without his famous personality helping the funding, would money keep coming? Even if you go in with locks intended the project is HUGE and the French lacked the steam shovels that America would use to such great effect later. Between that and yellow fever...I'm not sure there is a French victory here.
 
I'm not sure if Lesseps leaves if the project would do any better. Without his famous personality helping the funding, would money keep coming? Even if you go in with locks intended the project is HUGE and the French lacked the steam shovels that America would use to such great effect later. Between that and yellow fever...I'm not sure there is a French victory here.
Eiffel was quite popular as I recall. Plus, even if he's sick, you can have Lesseps as a figurehead?
 
Would the US seize it as part of the Monroe doctrine? It could be a starting point for renewed European influence in SA.
 
Would the US seize it as part of the Monroe doctrine? It could be a starting point for renewed European influence in SA.
Don't think they'd risk it, no? It's twenty years after the ACW, not sure about the state of the US army...
It'd be interesting to see what the Brits do
 
Another issue is the health of the workers that played a major role as well and nearly stopped the US as well.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
French need to figure out how to deal with Malaria for this to work. Really, the USA success is within a few years of figuring out how to handle Malaria, so you have to move this technology up. Beside the impact of the French having the canal, we now see a French colonial structure that knows how to fight Malaria, and this is huge for France's colonies in Africa.

Also tend to think the canal makes the USA tend to see France as a threat. It would make the USA think about the alliance structure in Europe. For example, if the USA covets the canal, then Germany as an ally in a potential war for the canal is tempting. It likely means the USA builds a big navy sooner. It means the USA ship design is much different since we don't have all those PanaMax issue.
 
Don't think they'd risk it, no? It's twenty years after the ACW, not sure about the state of the US army...

1881


Army 25,842

Navy 10,101

Coast Guard 1,902

total 37,845


And the Navy?
the less said, the better. two years before the new Steel ABCDs would be authorized. Iron ships were laid up, and the 'Great Rebuild' of USS Puritan, where the 1864 Ship's Bell was lifted up and a new ship built underneath, was not yet complete.

The most modern ship in service was USS Trenton, an 1877 wooden hulled screw frigate, still armed with Dahlgren Muzzle loaders, but had been 'updated' with rifled 8" liners. It was a laughing stock to even South American Navies.
But hey, it had electrical lighting, so was 'modern'
098601106.jpg

It was a mercy getting wrecked at Samoa in 1889.
 
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I was going to start a thread sort of on the same topic, but then saw this. i was reading about the Nicaragua canal project and that the US were interested in building it in competition to the panama canal. if the french were successful it would have been a much greater incentive financially and security reasons for the US to have control of their own canal across central america.
 
The disease problem was in part malaria, but the major issue was yellow fever. Malaria could be treated with quinine, and while debilitating was not often fatal. Yellow fever on the other hand was quite deadly and untreatable. The discovery of the mosquito vector of yellow fever by the USA (working with the Cuban physician Carlos Finley) and the success of the subsequent anti-mosquito efforts by the USA during the occupation (all of this in the wake of the Spanish-American War) that allowed the Panama Canal to be built. Coupled with the knowledge was the carte blanche that Gorgas had as senior medical officer for Panama to devise and ENFORCE the appropriate sanitary measures to limit yellow fever. The French effort some 20+ years earlier had failed because the work force kept dying, which was independent of the choice of route.
 
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