Panama and the U.S. signed a new security pact on the canal, boosting defense ties as tensions with China over Latin American influence continue to rise.

If China’s alleged influence over the canal wasn’t halted, Trump threatened to “take back” the iconic waterway that the US returned to Panama in 2000, employing military force if needed.

For over 40 years, Capt. Efraín Hallax, 73, has been steering vessels through the canal, and he has seen it all, from a dictator’s fall to the rise of U.S. interest in retaking the waterway.