The Nicaraguan Canal?

The Nicaraguan government has just approved a contract for HK Nicaragua Canal Development Investment Co. Ltd to build a canal between the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea. The Hong Kong-based investment company says it would take up to 11 years to compete and cost more than $40 billion.

The canal proposal received astonishingly quick approval from the leftist-controlled National Assembly dominated by President Daniel Ortega’s Sandinistra Front. Curiously, no route has been chosen, the investment company has no experience with huge construction projects, and environmentalists and shipping experts are skeptical.

No matter which route is chosen, it’s expected to be about 130 miles through jungles, lakes and supposedly protected lands, although it will probably take advantage of (35-mile-wide) Lake Nicaragua and/or the Rio San Juan. Panama’s Canal is about 42 miles long.

Nicaragua was, of course, originally slated to be the site of the first canal between the Pacific and the Caribbean. But then U.S. senators began meddling, and essentially created the country of Panama out of a corner of Colombia so they could build the canal they wanted to support their constituents’ business interests.

If Nicaragua could create a profitable canal — a gigantic ‘if’ — it could dramatically recast the geopolitics of the area as well as give the Chinese a major strategic stronghold in Central America.