Caribbean Sea Region in the Year 2000

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by RN7

But it is not a target that you can effectively destroy with one nuclear weapon

You don't need to destroy the whole thing to render it essentially useless. It's long and narrow, you damage one part and the whole thing shuts down.
As for fallout, if a single small warhead was used close to one end, and the wind was blowing in the right direction, it would almost all have fallen into the sea.

Seriously, nuking the canal without lasting damage to nearby locations isn't at all impossible. Only takes two minutes of thinking to come up with possible answers.

There are just sooooo many more reasons why it would be nuked than why it wouldn't, and canon certainly isn't broken in any way by doing so.

[Legbreaker]

It's also worth looking at the worlds other great canal - Suez. Look at how easily it was blocked in 1956 by the Egyptians scuttling several dozen cargo ships, how long it took to clear, and the disruption to trade it caused. Unlike the Soviets re Panama, they were right there onsite and had almost uncontested control of at least one bank.
Nuking the Panama canal (which could have entailed just sailing an old ship into it and setting off the bomb it carried), is the easiest way the Soviets could strangle trade and military transport for about half the planet. Even if the channel wasn't completely blocked, having a radioactive wreck there would, and I've said earlier, prevent virtually any civilian shipping passing. Naval vessels may will still get through though, if they buttoned up and decontaminated once past the "hot zone".

[WallShadow]

One garden spot not mentioned was Jamaica.
It's got a lot of natural resources including bauxite, coffee, sugar, produce, animal husbandry (jerked pork or chicken, anyone?), fishing, and now, probably, drugs growing in the less-than-patrolled areas.

And a little detail about Puerto Rico? Arecibo radio observatory. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arecibo_Observatory

And what about the regular tourist spots that had a big hospitality industry? What would happen to folks who were stranded by the panics and TDM? Cruise ships, while fuel hogs, are also stockpiles of materials and machinery and equipment. Folks with nautical experience, security personnel, or contacts all over the region.
For example, my wife and I encountered some ex-cruise ship employees who retired on Roatan, Honduras. I would suppose the tropical life may have lured many to settle down away from "civilization". And many tourist locales have a big support base for boating, scuba diving, sport fishing, so spare parts, equipment, and machine shops would be likely.

[Legbreaker]

Can anyone honestly think anyone would be going on a cruise in the midst of WWIII?
Personally I think most of the cruise ships would be pressed into service as troop transports and hospital ships as occurred in WWI and WWII.
Not to say there wouldn't be some tourism, but certainly not as much as pre December 1996.

[Mahatatain]

Thanks for all the ideas and suggestions. Blocking the Panama canal has now been added to the timeline I'm developing (I prefer to use my own, non canon one) and a war between Colombia and Venezuela is something that I'm considering. Jamaica and Puerto Rico were already two countries/islands that I was thinking about, probably as part of an alliance against Cuban forces.

With Cuba I'm considering having them starting to exert their influence in the region in about 1999 or 2000, having failed to support the Soviets when the war started. That way I can set them up as the major military opposition in the campaign so that the theme isn't just fighting pirates.