Let's Manifest Destiny

EXPANSION: PRESIDENT CHAMPIONS CONQUERING 'NEW STATES', CANAL

- Washington

Manifest Destiny" is back, with Donald Trump as its champion. In the 19th century, the phrase was used to invoke the divine justification for the US to expand its territory westward all the way to the Pacific - in bloody campaigns that saw the conquering of Mexican and Native American lands.

Trump's second term as president, not even two weeks old, is already mixing religious fervor, nationalism and territorial expansion.

The Republican has vowed to acquire Greenland - and declined to rule out the use of military force to do so. And he's targeted the Panama Canal, insisting on taking back the key waterway.

Canada, meanwhile, would be better off as America's 51st state, according to Trump.

Though key to Trump's aggressive foreign policy, threats of territorial expansion have rattled Washington's modern diplomatic relationships.