China's strategy in Korean peninsula

schlieffen said:

I think that was actually the prevailing mood in China during the Xi-Park honeymoon between 2013-15 -- let’s prepare for the inevitable eventuality of a unified peninsula under Seoul. However, the THAAD episode has amply demonstrated that China does not have real leverage over S.Korea except the economic one, and the United States kept its semi-client state in very tight control. No deal to remove U.S. military from Korean soil can be brokered until U.S. military was removed from Korean soil, hence the circular reasoning. Just like Soviet forces in Germany, only Washington could chose to leave/give up Korea -- that decision is not for Koreans to make.


With Beijing losing its influence in Pyongyang, bankruptcy of the Seoul option really left China with no viable strategy in the peninsula, except to procrastinate the inevitable outburst as long as possible.

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THAAD was in part a result of China not being able to deliver more on NK. Assuming that it's also not a sign that we are quickly approaching an endgame with the NK situation, it won't necessarily have long term implications for the China-SK relationship. The decision over the US military in SK actually rests with SK. The US military is only allowed there under SK's consent, but the US will continue to have that consent so long as NK is a danger.

China is for sure bereft of a viable strategy that won't incur major penalties given their diminished influence on NK, but that can be said of pretty much everyone locked in this tussle now, except NK and maybe Japan.

latenlazy said:

But what does the calculus look like if China can get SK to agree to remove US bases in exchange for reunification (not to say that SK wants reunification for certain).

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I think the key issue with any such deal is a total lack of a way to assure Beijing that Seoul would keep its word afterwards.

Democracies simply do not keep their word. One election cycle/CIA coup later and the new regime will happily rip up all the promises and agreements made by the previous administration.

China has been stung so far too many times to be able to trust even the most 'cast iron' assurances any democracy could give it.

schlieffen said:

I think that was actually the prevailing mood in China during the Xi-Park honeymoon between 2013-15 -- let’s prepare for the inevitable eventuality of a unified peninsula under Seoul. However, the THAAD episode has amply demonstrated that China does not have real leverage over S.Korea except the economic one, and the United States kept its semi-client state in very tight control. No deal to remove U.S. military from Korean soil can be brokered until U.S. military was removed from Korean soil, hence the circular reasoning. Just like Soviet forces in Germany, only Washington could chose to leave/give up Korea -- that decision is not for Koreans to make.


With Beijing losing its influence in Pyongyang, bankruptcy of the Seoul option really left China with no viable strategy in the peninsula, except to procrastinate the inevitable outburst as long as possible.

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I doubt that is the mood of Chinese, but rather South Koreans or their "proxies" in China.

Remember that South Koreans are the number 1 in terms of foreign residents, students and business people living in China. They are excellent in grasping and utilizing mandarins in media and internet. In short, they are influential. One would not be able to see who is speaking by simply reading their posts.

Take the shutdown of cjdby BBS as an example again, I mentioned "lead the pace" was suggested by fyjs members, who is the leader? There is another fyjs member suggested "south Korean water army"/南朝鲜水军.

I have a childhood friend who married a Chinese Korean woman whose family members lives in SK. I also had been introduced to a Chinese Korean girl by a friend of mine. That two Chinese (Han) speak much more favorably towards SK, but I have not heard anything like that from my other friends who has no relation to NK or SK or Korean in general.

I can only speak for myself or my friends, but the fact that Korean being very involved and influential in China may be misleading to the perception of what the majority of Chinese think.

plawolf said:

China has been stung so far too many times to be able to trust even the most 'cast iron' assurances any democracy could give it.

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Its natural that china doesnt trust the US. But i dont think the US (or anybody else) cares about that. Nations care first and utmost for their own interests (specially big powers), and right now it is in the interests of the US to stop NK´s nuclear program.

Regarding the NK nuclear program, china for the last 23 years have just keep kicking the can down the road. They are the reason that NK continues to exist, yet dont want (or cant, doesnt matter) to keep NK in check. One day, NK will have nuclear capable ICBMS´s and then what?

China wants (needs) to keep NK´s regime, and at the same time needs to have good relations with the US. The problem is that it seems that the US will no longer play along with that.



Regarding china´s troops in the NK border, what do you make of this video? It appears to shown a chinese military convoy on a road. Have anybody else saw this?

Orthan said:

Its natural that china doesnt trust the US. But i dont think the US (or anybody else) cares about that. Nations care first and utmost for their own interests (specially big powers), and right now it is in the interests of the US to stop NK´s nuclear program.

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True, and my understanding of wolf's comment was just pointing out that truth from China's perspective which I agree with totally.

Regarding the NK nuclear program, china for the last 23 years have just keep kicking the can down the road. They are the reason that NK continues to exist, yet dont want (or cant, doesnt matter) to keep NK in check. One day, NK will have nuclear capable ICBMS´s and then what?

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This is the US perspective. On the contrary, China does not see that way.

Since 2016, Chinese FM has repeatedly stating that the root causes of the Korean crisis are TWO things, NOT One. It is US/SK provocation to NK and NK's stunt (maybe oversized) reaction.

NK has nuke or not is much less Chinese concern (although China don't want any nukes at her boarder) than to US, Japan and SK. Don't make US headache a Chinese one especially when China sees the root cause of the whole crisis is US occupation of Korean peninsular.

The latest statement from the Chinese PM last weeks repeated that stand again, as he proposed (and be ignored of course) the "two parallel" solution.

China wants (needs) to keep NK´s regime, and at the same time needs to have good relations with the US. The problem is that it seems that the US will no longer play along with that.

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Now everyone is stuck to a place that they can not maneuver. It is true as you said that US will no longer play along, but neither is China willing to let US to move to the Yalu river. Don't tell me US will withdraw after removing Kim, nor would SK move in instead of US will make any difference.

Chinese bottom line is "she does not care if US will or will not play along", because Korean peninsular is one of China's core interest, just like "no Soviet missile on Cuba" is US core interest. China was willing to take a huge cost in 1950s, so will she in 2017.

Regarding china´s troops in the NK border, what do you make of this video? It appears to shown a chinese military convoy on a road. Have anybody else saw this?

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Regarding the scene in the video, there is nothing revealing. I can not get any date, location, license plate number of the convoy, not even the blue sticker on the right side of the windshield of the filming car.

The only thing can be obtained is about the driver and the passengers and their conversation. They spoke Mandarin with very strong accent and used words, that tells that they are not Chinese from mainland China.

The revealing fact is that the main voice said "干韩国" when asked what the military convoy was doing. "干韩国" literally means "fuck S. Korea", but more accurately mean "beat or attack (S.) Korea". DONT take offensive, it is what the guy said.

Two takes, "干" is rather a south dialect, in the north, it is "肏" used instead. "干" also means "beat" in south, but "揍" or "抽" are more commonly used in north especially northeast China (Manchuria) where this convoy was supposed to be spotted. This supported my suspicion that the people in the video are from very south, likely outside China.

The second, "韩国"/"Hanguk" means South Korea in China, while "朝鲜"/"Choson, Joseon" is used to refer to North Korea. Chinese speakers in countries aligned with west call both "韩国" "Hanguk" (seeing SK as legitimate). This once again proves that the people in the car were not Chinese.

This reminds me again why the shutdown of BBS, and very recent "spy catching campaign".
Apparently, China suspect spies from specific countries very recently doing very specific things in very specific places. Otherwise, it would be a very rare coincidence.

Orthan said:

Its natural that china doesnt trust the US. But i dont think the US (or anybody else) cares about that. Nations care first and utmost for their own interests (specially big powers), and right now it is in the interests of the US to stop NK´s nuclear program.

Regarding the NK nuclear program, china for the last 23 years have just keep kicking the can down the road. They are the reason that NK continues to exist, yet dont want (or cant, doesnt matter) to keep NK in check. One day, NK will have nuclear capable ICBMS´s and then what?

China wants (needs) to keep NK´s regime, and at the same time needs to have good relations with the US. The problem is that it seems that the US will no longer play along with that.



Regarding china´s troops in the NK border, what do you make of this video? It appears to shown a chinese military convoy on a road. Have anybody else saw this?

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

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If it weren't also China's interests to keep NK from acquiring nuclear capabilities then China and NK would be on better terms. The problem here is the US presumes China has more influence than it does. When China isn't able to deliver, rather than alter its understanding of China's influence, it blames China for stalling. Furthermore, you're conflating denuclearization and regime change. Because the US leans so strongly on regime change as an option, it compromises its own diplomatic credibility on denuclearization, since NK's primary motivation for developing a nuke is to deter the US and it's proxies. When China collaborates with a US that keeps signaling it wants regime change to disarm an NK which feels threatened, it diminishes China's influence on NK further. As NK regime change is also against China's interests, the US's demand for pressure at costs that will be borne on China's back and its own makes cooperation with China harder. You're not going to get help if you demand the person helping you to harm themselves. This is how you breed mistrust.

plawolf said:

I think the key issue with any such deal is a total lack of a way to assure Beijing that Seoul would keep its word afterwards.

Democracies simply do not keep their word. One election cycle/CIA coup later and the new regime will happily rip up all the promises and agreements made by the previous administration.

China has been stung so far too many times to be able to trust even the most 'cast iron' assurances any democracy could give it.

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If that were the case the US (or any other democracy) wouldn't be able to sustain so many security parternships and alliances, which has clearly not been the case.

latenlazy said:

If it weren't also China's interests to keep NK from acquiring nuclear capabilities then China and NK would be on better terms. The problem here is the US presumes China has more influence than it does. When China isn't able to deliver, rather than alter its understanding of China's influence, it blames China for stalling. Furthermore, you're conflating denuclearization and regime change. Because the US leans so strongly on regime change as an option, it compromises its own diplomatic credibility on denuclearization, since NK's primary motivation for developing a nuke is to deter the US and it's proxies. When China collaborates with a US that keeps signaling it wants regime change to disarm an NK which feels threatened, it diminishes China's influence on NK further. As NK regime change is also against China's interests, the US's demand for pressure at costs that will be borne on China's back and its own makes cooperation with China harder. You're not going to get help if you demand the person helping you to harm themselves. This is how you breed mistrust.


If that were the case the US (or any other democracy) wouldn't be able to sustain so many security parternships and alliances, which has clearly not been the case.

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Totally agree with the first paragraph.

But I want to remind the difference between your examples in the second paragraph and China. Those parterners and allies are either under US security ganrantee (totally in cases of Japan and SK, and partially in case of Europe), while China is percieved as a rival at the best, the next enemy at the worst. The trust and mistrust are on totally different scale, not comparable. It is NOT democracy that sustained thoese trust (with the examples), because any side of the political spectrum in thoese democracies are on the same side with US on security aspect. But democracy in any of these countries (including SK) is a fundation for a possible policy flip-flop regarding China.

taxiya said:

It is US/SK provocation to NK and NK's stunt (maybe oversized) reaction.(...) Don't make US headache a Chinese one especially when China sees the root cause of the whole crisis is US occupation of Korean peninsular.

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Tell me about the US/SK "provocations" that werent in response to NK´s actions. Oh sure, the US would ignore its (and its allies) security interests and not create problems for china just because china doesnt agree with that.

taxiya said:

but neither is China willing to let US to move to the Yalu river (...) China was willing to take a huge cost in 1950s, so will she in 2017.

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Dont be so sure about that. China isnt the same as 1950´s china, totally different. China depends on US europe and japan to exports and know-how. Thats why china is not siding with NK, instead keeping neutral. They may intervene, but not to make war to US/SK, instead to stop US/SK from advancing further after they had advanced north. But then NK would be a divided nation, with only chinese troops keeping in the "border" south, and no longer working as "buffer state". Then whats the point of intervening south if they will end up staring up at US/SK troops anyway? better to get an excuse (for internal consumption) to not aiding NK. It will be painful, but I think that china can live with that, specially if NK causes a lot of SK civilian casualties.

latenlazy said:

This is how you breed mistrust.

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I dont think that the US wants china´s or NK´s trust. The US wants the NK nuclear program to end, thats it. Each nation defends its own interests first.

delete

taxiya said:

Totally agree with the first paragraph.

But I want to remind the difference between your examples in the second paragraph and China. Those parterners and allies are either under US security ganrantee (totally in cases of Japan and SK, and partially in case of Europe), while China is percieved as a rival at the best, the next enemy at the worst. The trust and mistrust are on totally different scale, not comparable. It is NOT democracy that sustained thoese trust (with the examples), because any side of the political spectrum in thoese democracies are on the same side with US on security aspect. But democracy in any of these countries (including SK) is a fundation for a possible policy flip-flop regarding China.

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My point in the second paragraph is being a democracy is not what makes disagreements inherently unreliable. Authoritarian regimes, like democratic ones, can renege and backpedal on deals with some consistency. Interests dictate how reliable a deal is, not regime type.