CHANGE: Chinese-Backed Canal Gets Underway in Nicaragua.

Chinese investors broke ground on the Nicaragua Canal this week. The hasty opening fulfills chief investor Wang Jing’s promise that construction would start by the close of this year, even though the project’s core problems have not yet been resolved. . . .

China has a long-term goal to increase its soft power in Latin America and the Caribbean, but that’s not all bad from the American point of view. As we’ve said before, Chinese foreign investment will help a region where governments are sometimes shaky and poverty and crime rates still high; a healthier Latin America, both economically and politically, is very much in our interest. Nicaragua is the second-poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere: the more investment here, the better.

Well, possibly.