Panama and Allied Countries Simulate Air and Sea Assaults to Protect the Canal: It is Panamax 2026.
Nearly 45 units from Panama, the United States, Argentina, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic participated this Sunday in air and sea assault simulations as part of the multinational exercise. Military personnel from 21 countries are testing their ability to operate together and respond to threats that could affect the security of the Canal.
PANAMAX 2026 is a multinational military exercise led by Panama and sponsored by the U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM), running from August 3 to August 14, 2026. It brings together over 1,700 personnel from 21 nations to simulate air, land, sea, and cyber assaults to protect the Panama Canal and ensure regional stability.
Key Aspects of Panamax 2026
- Participants: Elite troops and defense personnel from 21 countries, including the U.S., Panama, Colombia, Ecuador, Argentina, Peru, Brazil, and European nations like the Netherlands.
- Task Forces: Simultaneous naval patrol and interdiction operations are split between a Pacific Task Force and a Caribbean Task Force.
- Operations: Rehearsals include simulated vessel boarding, search and seizure (VBSS) against hostile actors, counter-terrorism raids, drone defense (C-UAS), and jungle/beach assaults.
- Significance: This marks a major return to large-scale, live field-training exercises physically hosted in Panama after years of primarily command-post or tabletop simulations.
As part of the multinational exercise Panamax 2026, simultaneous air and maritime assault simulations have been conducted. This is part of the maneuvers designed to strengthen the response capacity to potential threats against the security of the Panama Canal. Commissioner Luis Rodríguez, of the National Aeronaval Service (Senan), explained that the air exercise simulated the recovery of a confined space occupied by the BML, a fictitious adversary used in the various Panamax scenarios.
