World-China Forum

It is China that holds the key to North Korea

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il is taking advantage of Beijing’s desire for stability on the Korean peninsula by engaging in provocative actions that could permanently alter the north-east Asian security situation. Mr Kim’s moves are calculated – they are designed to help secure a dynastic succession and North Korea’s status as a nuclear weapons power. Fearful of a flood of refugees should Mr Kim’s regime implode, China has responded cautiously. Beijing apparently still believes that its national interests are best served by a weak North Korean regime that is dependent on China.

The new nuclear and missile tests are just part of a series of provocative moves by Pyongyang this spring, but even by North Korean standards Mr Kim’s actions since April are outrageous. Yet China’s response has been very restrained. It argues that the best option for stability in North Korea is a smooth transition of power. It therefore is hesitant about supporting sanctions that really bite, such as cutting the supply of oil and coal, which would cripple the dysfunctional North Korean economy. True, such measures could destabilise the regime. But tough, targeted sanctions may get North Korea back to the negotiating table if done with a clear offer of resuming the principles of reciprocal action embedded in the February 2007 agreement. North Korea is not Iran. It does not have oil and gas to sell to get around sanctions. If left unchecked, surely Pyongyang will try to define a new reality that allows it to maintain nuclear weapons. Which is more destabilising: instability in succession or North Korea seeking to redefine the nuclear status of the Korean peninsula? That is the real question of instability before China.

Why is China so careful? It is partly the product of its historically strained relations with Mr Kim and worries that it may be embarrassed if it presses him without success. But Beijing also appears to have decided that the best chance of stability in North Korea lies in another hereditary transfer of power. By muting criticism of Pyongyang’s actions the Chinese are sending any contenders for power a strong message that China supports the current power arrangements. (Dennis Wilder, Financial Times)

India casting a wary eye on China's role in Pakistan

Washington's focus on Pakistan and economic dependence on China are forcing India to reassess its own place in South Asia, reviving long-standing fears of strategic encirclement by its giant northern neighbor. Analysts say Indian suspicions about China, suppressed during the boom years by burgeoning trade ties, have been stoked by Chinese involvement in Pakistan and a sense that Beijing has replaced India as the favored friend of the U.S. in the region.

“There is a very strong feeling that China is India's threat number one,” said Subhash Kapila at the South Asia Analysis Group, an Indian think-tank. Under former President George W. Bush, the United States forged close ties with India — in part seeing it as a counterweight to growing Chinese power — culminating in a deal effectively recognizing its nuclear-armed status. India and China also made efforts to mend relations soured by a border war in 1962, while their growing clout in the world economy earned them the nickname “Chindia.”

But with the financial crisis highlighting U.S. dependence on Beijing to bankroll its debt, India is fretting that while it acquired a friendship, China bought the U.S. economy. “During the Bush era, U.S. policy was seeking to build India as a counterweight to China,” Brahma Chellaney, from India's Centre for Policy Research, said at a conference in London. “As this was going on the Chinese and U.S. economic ties were getting thicker and thicker,” he said. “'Chimerica' is more meaningful than 'Chindia.'” (Myra MacDonald, China Post/Reuters)

Sustaining American Leadership with Military Power

Contrary to what many politicians and talking heads tell Americans, a false choice exists between what are often referred to as hard and soft power. A country's military resources (its hard power) and the diplomatic tools it uses to persuade others without resorting to coercion (its soft power) operate most efficiently in tandem.

As Teddy Roosevelt famously observed, a nation must "speak softly" with diplomacy while also wielding a "big stick." Just as no country can be expected to provide security and pursue its interests solely through the use of military power, no country can expect to be taken seriously during high-stakes negotiations without the potential threat of military force to back up its word. The two approaches are not separate tools but mutually reinforcing mechanisms.

The consequences of hard-power atrophy will be a direct deterioration of America's diplomatic clout. This is already on display in the western Pacific Ocean, where America's ability to hedge against the growing ambitions of a rising China is being called into question by some of our key Asian allies. Recently, Australia released a defense White Paper that is concerned primarily with the potential decline of U.S. military primacy and the implications that this decline would have for Australian security and stability in the Asia-Pacific. These developments are anything but reassuring.

The ability of the United States to reassure friends, deter competitors, coerce belligerent states, and defeat enemies does not rest on the strength of our political leaders' commitment to diplomacy; it rests on the foundation of a powerful military. Only by retaining a "big stick" can the United States succeed in advancing its diplomatic priorities. Only by building a full-spectrum military force can America reassure its many friends and allies and count on their future support. (Kim Holmes, Heritage Foundation)

Why isolate a global pariah even further?

On the question of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, better known as (a) North Korea, (b) notorious charter member of former U.S. President George W. Bush's "axis of evil" and (c) pain-in-the-neck threat to world peace and stability, here are a few humble observations in light of the fact that, basically, no one really knows what to do about North Korea, including China.

You would think that China, the originator of the six-party talks (aimed at North Korean nuclear disarmament and begun in 2003) would be embarrassed by the latest morose turn of events. But China, Pyongyang's longtime ally, is not totally hapless. All along, it has said the North Korea is such an enfant terrible that even China cannot really control it. And Beijing's greatest fear is not the missiles but the potentially massive migrant population if North Korea collapses. China prefers the company of secure, sealed, unthreatening buffer states. Given its common border with North Korea, it is much opposed to instability, whatever the nature of that regime.

Calls from the West to isolate it further are like asking to further isolate the planet Pluto from Uranus. What's the point? Besides, isolation as a policy doesn't work, if what you want is regime amelioration or even change. If it is outright regime change you prefer, consider trying something different. Consider aggressive, near-reckless engagement. What is there to lose? Better to execute an approach favored by the bold campaigner Barack Obama — not the waffling President Obama — and run circles around the North Koreans with an embarrassment of recognition and riches: Drop the embargo, establish a U.S. Embassy in Pyongyang (we have no official representation there now), fatten the regime up with aid, accumulate leverage, change the behavior, establish regional peace. Try to be subtle, indirect and smart for once. (Tom PLate, Japan Times)

Kim Jong-il is a headache, but not a nightmare

North Korea is a big problem. With nuclear weapons it would become an even bigger one. But, unlike Iran, it does not keep me awake at night. Iran wants to be the major power in the Gulf. Its neighbours, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, see it is a direct threat to their safety and security. Iran's threats to annihilate Israel, combined with its aspirations for nuclear weapons, could be a precursor to a major war with massive casualties throughout the Middle East.

North Korea is in a different league. It cannot be the new regional power in the Far East. The very thought is ludicrous. It is desperately poor; its economy is puny compared to South Korea's, and both China and Japan tower over it. A nuclear-armed North Korea would be dangerous but, because of its poverty and relative insignificance, it would be a different kind of danger.

North Korea and its dictator, Kim Jong-il, are like the disturbed individual with a gun and several hostages who has been cornered in a house by the police. The damage he could do is serious but is limited to those closest to him. He could be killed by the police, at any time, but that might endanger the hostages and there could be other repercussions. The challenge is to manage the incident and try to conclude it without casualties and without damaging side effects.

Economic sanctions and the threat of a total blockade could destroy what is left of the North Korean economy and threaten the survival of the regime without too much difficulty. The consequences, however, could be highly destabilising for the whole region. (Malcolm Rifkind, Telegraph)

The North Korea Conundrum

Realistically, North Korea's belligerence looks like a problem that can’t be solved. Instead, we’re going to have to try to manage it -- minimizing the harm North Korea can do while acknowledging that a lasting solution is unlikely to emerge until there’s a change of leadership in Pyongyang.  More aggressive strategies, like urging sharply punitive economic measures from China, seem likely to do more harm than good. The reason is that the complete failure of the North Korean state would pose too many difficult questions in terms of how to cope with the ensuing flows of refugees. Then there's the reality that South Korea's economy would likely sink if it had to take responsibility for the North. The military options against North Korea also don't look remotely appealing. For one thing, you can't bomb the engineering knowledge North Korea has obtained. More fundamentally, the problem with military action against North Korea remains the fact that Seoul is within artillery range of North Korean forces. A war, in other words, could lead to one of the world's largest cities being effectively destroyed.

That's not to say there's nothing we can do about the North Korea problem. Diplomacy must be continued.-----As for the North Korean endgame, it's not clear what we can do. Ultimately, the United States -- along with South Korea, China, and Japan -- needs to start thinking more seriously about the possibility of a North Korean collapse. Pyongyang's political and economic systems are unsustainable, and the country's aggressive behavior is alienating all potential friends and making things worse. Meanwhile, one reason it's so difficult to respond effectively to North Korean provocations is that its enemies are almost as afraid of its collapse as its leaders are. As of now, nobody's prepared for what would happen when the waiting ends, making the situation even harder to manage, let alone solve. The fact that there are no good answers to either the North's nukes or its potential collapse tends to encourage people to just focus attention on other things. But ignoring the problem doesn't make it go away, and delaying efforts to think about it makes things worse. (Matthew Yglesias, American Prospect)

North Korea Poses No Real Threat to the World

Q: Do you think North Korea poses a real threat or is it just a political game that they are playing?

A: I am a little different from some observers, because I think the threat is very small. North Korea lacks the industrial capacity to build large numbers of long-ranged missiles. They will not be able to build so many weapons as to become a strategic factor in the region. But I have to acknowledge that they do pose a threat to South Korea both through short-range missiles, and the possibility of using the nuclear weapons in the South, even though there are just a few, or artillery from the North to the South. That would be the end of the North regime if they were to attack the South, but they still have that capacity. Moreover, they may force the Japanese to reconsider their very modest defense program. The Japanese have the capacity to move to a nuclear weapon, I do not think they will, but they certainly can. Certainly, politically Japan will debate whether or not move to a nuclear weapon in the short term because of this development in North Korea. And they do feel threatened by the North Korean short-ranged missiles and nuclear weapon. But as I said, North Korea is an industrial midget and not really in a position to pose a large-scale threat to the neighborhood. (Douglas H. Paal, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace)

Time for China to exercise leadership to reign in North Korea

There is no military option here. Diplomacy — backed by stiff sanctions — is the only hope for walking North Korea back from the brink. And for now, China — not Washington — is the prime player.

It is time for China (host of the six-party talks scuttled by Pyongyang) to exercise the leadership it has long shirked. As the North’s main oil and food supplier, it has more leverage than any other country. We understand that China is worried that too much pressure could topple the government, pouring refugees over the border.

Beijing should be able to calibrate that pressure. If not, North Korea will end up with a nuclear arsenal that could pose an even greater threat to China and the whole region. Already some in Japan and South Korea are arguing for their own weapons.(Editorial, New York Times)

Beijing weighs its options on North Korea

Looking at China's positions on the North Korean nuclear issue over the years, one can summarize that they consistently emphasize three core elements: denuclearization, peninsular peace and stability, and resolution through diplomacy and dialogue. Beijing views North Korea's nuclear program as a symptom, not a cause, of insecurity and instability in the region. Any action that further aggravates the situation will not help solve but can only escalate nuclear tension. This is why the Chinese government has called on all parties involved to "respond in a calm and appropriate manner and persist in solving the problems through consultations and dialogue".

Clearly, the issue is not whether China has the leverage and the willingness to use it against North Korea; it is the calculation of what impacts on what specific goals such pressure would generate. China has over the past six years selectively used such pressure to good effect without completely losing influence, however limited it may be. Beijing has already concluded, as have many others, that the key to solving this problem remains direct dialogue between Pyongyang and Washington.

China views stability on the Korean Peninsula as essential for its near to mid-term strategic objectives, continued economic development, domestic stability and international standing, as each requires a peaceful regional security environment. For this reason alone, it can be expected that Beijing will endorse condemnation of North Korea's behavior and limited but not severe sanctions that could seriously undermine its interests. But getting to that point depends on how skillful the Chinese diplomacy is in the corridors of the United Nations Security Council.(Jing-dong Yuan, Asia Times)

World powerless to stop North Korea

North Korea shook the world - literally - in the early hours of May 25, carrying out its second nuclear test, at a site in the northeast of the country. Significantly, the latest detonation was much more powerful than its first nuclear test, carried out on October 9, 2006, which was widely believed to have fizzled. The Russian military and the South's Defense Ministry estimated Monday's blast to have yielded 20 kilotons, or roughly the same as the American atomic bomb that destroyed the Japanese city of Nagasaki at the end of World War II in 1945.

Rhetoric aside, the US and its allies have no realistic means with which to punish North Korea. The bigger question is whether North Korea's nuclear test will lead to growing calls for South Korea and Japan to develop their own nuclear weapons. Ultimately, a nuclear South Korea and Japan could transform the geostrategic landscape of East Asia, and possibly the world. It could hasten the end of US hegemony in Asia, since the two would become less dependent on the US to guarantee their security.

Meanwhile, China would at the very least be uncomfortable with a nuclear South Korea, which might encourage Taiwan to develop nuclear weapons for fear of being left behind in the nuclear race. China would be especially concerned about a nuclear Japan, since Tokyo is Beijing's most formidable geopolitical rival in East Asia and a potential check on its self-proclaimed peaceful rise. (Santaro Rey, Asia Times)