When Donald Trump announced his intention to “take back” the Panama Canal from China, I had to chuckle. My old friend Linc, who had died in 2005, was having the last laugh after all.

As editor of the Daily Inter Lake newspaper in Kalispell, Montana, for 18 years, I got to meet hundreds of people whom I would never have come across otherwise when they came to visit me at my office. One of the most memorable was an octogenarian named Linc France.

Linc (short for Lincoln) was an American original. For decades he had run Linc’s Automotive in Columbia Falls. His 2005 obituary noted that “He could fix anything. If he didn’t have the tool, he could make one.” Despite ending his formal education in the 8th grade to help support his family, Linc was knowledgeable about many topics and was also civic minded, having served on the Columbia Falls City Council and volunteered for various charities such as Meals on Wheels.

When Linc came to visit me in his blue jeans and flannels with a trucker cap above his piercing eyes, I would sit back in my chair and prepare to be both amused and challenged. Generally, he would be dropping off a hand-written letter to the editor, and he would ask me to give it a once-over. Most of the time, the letter was about the Panama Canal.

President Jimmy Carter had signed the canal over to the nation of Panama for the contractual obligation of a single dollar back in 1977, and Panama took full control on Dec. 31, 1999, but by then most Americans weren’t interested. It certainly wasn’t high on my radar, but Linc insisted on educating me and my readers, so he sent a steady barrage of letters warning of the national security risk of surrendering what he called the “eighth wonder of the world.”

On Feb. 28, 2003, Linc wrote a letter we titled “Canal could be sign of worse to come.” It was indeed prophetic:

I still wonder how many “taxpaying American citizens” have looked towards the Panama Canal lately. Maybe most everybody is too busy making a living or having too many types of entertainment to even think about Li Ka-shing, who has control of the Pacific-to-Atlantic bypass that was built with American sweat and blood.

(Letters quoted are available at Newspaperarchive.com)

I had never heard of Li before Linc started writing his letters, but I used the still-young Internet to research and found that Linc was right to be worried. The Hong Kong oligarch was using his companies such as Hutchison Whampoa and CK Hutchison to obtain ports at both ends of the canal and to gain effective control. A few months after Panama officially took over the canal on Dec. 31, 1999, the Washington Times wrote this:

Chinese businessman Li Ka-shing was planning to take over operation of the Panama Canal before the pullout last year of the United States, according to a declassified Pentagon intelligence report.

The Army intelligence report contradicts statements by President Clinton and Panamanian government officials that the Atlantic and Pacific port facilities leased in Panama by Mr. Li and his Hong Kong-based Hutchison Whampoa Ltd. will have no role in Panama Canal operations.

And it was well known that Li’s global corporate holdings were closely controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, as most such companies are in China. Evidence that such control continues until this day came to light in the past few months after President Trump declared his intention to reclaim the canal for the United States.

In an effort to capitalize on the urgency of the situation, the Li family agreed on March 4 to sell controlling interest in the Panama Canal ports to a global consortium led by BlackRock Inc. for $22.8 billion. Beyond the Panama implications, the deal would have turned over control of 43 ports in total in 23 countries, a huge win for the United States.

But within weeks, the deal was put on hold by the Chinese government. According to the Wall Street Journal, “Chinese leader Xi Jinping is angry about [the] plan to sell Panama Canal ports to a U.S.-led group, in part because the company didn’t seek Beijing’s approval in advance.” That is tantamount to confirmation that the Trump administration is right in its assessment that China’s interest in the canal goes well beyond the financial.

And for that matter, it also confirms the worst fears of Linc France, the retired auto mechanic from Columbia Falls, Montana, who was paying attention decades before almost anyone else. As he finished up in the letter quoted above:

I just can’t help [but] read or see the handwriting on the wall. It makes me feel sick at what the Red Chinese have gotten away with in the Panama Canal… As we all know, the Red Chinese have taken over the Panama Canal without even firing a shot. When the U.S.A. pulled out and gave it back to Panama, the Red Chinese just moved in, no questions asked.

That is, until Donald Trump moved back into the White House on Jan. 20, 2025. I can’t help seeing Linc France coming back to my office at the Inter Lake with a big grin on his face and a red MAGA hat on his head. “It’s about time,” he’d say. “Somebody finally got the message.”