05-07-2017, 09:41 PM
*** 8-May-17 World View -- Ancient tensions flare between China and North Korea
This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
****
**** Ancient tensions flare between China and North Korea
****
![[Image: g160911b.jpg]](http://Media.GenerationalDynamics.com/ww2010/g160911b.jpg)
North Korea's child dictator Kim Jong-un (KCNA/AFP)
As two ancient civilizations and neighbors, China and Korea have had
many disagreements over the centuries, and tensions and wars have been
the norm. However, during the last century, they've been united by
their common enmity to Japan before World War II, and to the United
States after World War II.
Now as both countries go deeper into a generational Crisis era, like
most countries today, they're both becoming increasingly nationalistic
and xenophobic. They both frequently continue to express their hatred
of Japan and the United States, but increasingly this nationalism is
causing them to turn on each other.
China has numerous concerns about North Korea, including these:
Tensions between the two countries have been growing almost
continually since 2006, when DPRK (North Korea, the "Democratic
People's Republic of Korea") conducted its first nuclear bomb test.
At that time, Chinese state media said that "China resolutely opposes
DPRK's nuclear test," and quoted China's Foreign Ministry as saying:
> [indent]<QUOTE>"The DPRK ignored universal opposition of the
> international community and flagrantly conducted the nuclear test
> on Oct. 9. The Chinese government is resolutely opposed to
> it."<END QUOTE>[/indent]
China's Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing talked over telephone with
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and they agreed that North
Korea's nuclear tests must be firmly opposed. The United Nations
Security Council held an emergency session to opposed the DPRK nuclear
test.
Since then, countries around the world have strongly and vehemently
opposed North Korea's nuclear program. This has included China, which
has applied economic sanctions to North Korea, most recently
restricting coal imports from North Korea.
North Korea's leaders say that they fear an invasion by the United
States, and they're known to believe that the only protection they
have against such an invasion is the development of nuclear weapons.
They believe that the West would not have invaded either Libya or Iraq
if these countries hadn't given up their nuclear weapons development.
On Wednesday, North Korean state media KCNA published a scathing
attack on China:
> [indent]<QUOTE>"A string of absurd and reckless remarks are now heard
> from big neighboring countries, perhaps frightened at the
> U.S. blackmail and war racket, every day only to render the acute
> situation of the Korean peninsula more strained.
>
> The People's Daily and the Global Times, widely known as media
> speaking for the official stand of the Chinese party and
> government, have recently carried commentaries asserting that the
> DPRK's access to nukes poses a threat to the national interests of
> China. They shifted the blame for the deteriorated relations
> between the DPRK and China onto the DPRK and raised lame excuses
> for the base acts of dancing to the tune of the U.S.
>
> Those commentaries claimed that the DPRK poses a threat to "the
> security in the northeastern region of China" by conducting
> nuclear tests less than 100 km away from its border with
> China. They even talked rubbish that the DPRK strains the
> situation in Northeast Asia and "offers the U.S. excuses for
> deploying more strategic assets" in the region.
>
> Not content with such paradox, the commentaries asserted that to
> remain averse to the DPRK's access to nukes is to preserve
> interests common to the U.S. and China, calling for slapping
> harsher sanctions against the DPRK in order to avert a war which
> would bring danger to China. ...
>
> This is just a wanton violation of the independent and legitimate
> rights, dignity and supreme interests of the DPRK and,
> furthermore, constitutes an undisguised threat to an honest-minded
> neighboring country which has a long history and tradition of
> friendship. ...
>
> Some theorists of China are spouting a load of nonsense that the
> DPRK's access to nukes strains the situation in Northeast Asia and
> offers the U.S. an excuse for beefing up its strategic assets in
> the region. But the U.S. had activated its strategy for dominating
> Asia-Pacific long before the DPRK had access to nukes, and its
> primary target is just China.
>
> China should acknowledge in an honest manner that the DPRK has
> just contributed to protecting peace and security of China,
> foiling the U.S. scheme for aggression by waging a hard fight in
> the frontline of the showdown with the U.S. for more than seven
> decades, and thank the DPRK for it. ...
>
> One must clearly understand that the DPRK's line of access to
> nukes for the existence and development of the country can neither
> be changed nor shaken and that the DPRK will never beg for the
> maintenance of friendship with China, risking its nuclear program
> which is as precious as its own life, no matter how valuable the
> friendship is. ...
>
> China had better ponder over the grave consequences to be entailed
> by its reckless act of chopping down the pillar of the DPRK-China
> relations."<END QUOTE>[/indent]
China's state media responded directly:
> [indent]<QUOTE>"The KCNA opinion piece contains no new substantive
> information, except mentioning the names of China, People's Daily,
> and Global Times and expressing a stronger disgruntling. It did
> not mention China's support for the United Nations sanctions
> against North Korea. Nor did it state Pyongyang's next step to
> take. Overall, the editorial is nothing more than a
> hyper-aggressive piece completely filled with nationalistic
> passion.
>
> Pyongyang obviously is grappling with some form of irrational
> logic over its nuclear program. ...
>
> Beijing needs to make China’s standing and position very clear to
> Pyongyang, either on an official or grassroots level. It needs to
> address with Pyongyang its concerns and bottom line. It should
> also make Pyongyang aware that it will react in unprecedented
> fashion if Pyongyang conducts another nuclear test. Beijing should
> not hesitate in delivering this message, and there is certainly no
> need to debate this issue back and forth with
> Pyongyang."<END QUOTE>[/indent]
Probably the most important sentence is: "[Beijing] should also make
Pyongyang aware that it will react in unprecedented fashion if
Pyongyang conducts another nuclear test."
So we have the following situation:
The Diplomat and Xinhua (9-Oct-2006) and Rodong Sinmun (North Korea) and Global Times (Beijing) and Times of India
Related Articles
****
**** China's relations deteriorate with both South and North Korea
****
China's relations with North Korea have been deteriorating steadily
with North Korea for over a decade, but China's relations with
South Korea have crashed almost overnight.
Just two years ago, there was a "brand new honeymoon" in relations
between China and South Korea. President Park Geun-hye visited
Beijing on September 3, 2015, during the commemoration of the 70th
anniversary of the victory of the Chinese People’s War of Resistance
against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War. Park
was treated like visiting royalty, and even had a private lunch
with China's president Xi Jinping.
Then, in July 2016, Park announced her decision to deploy the THAAD
(Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) system on South Korean soil.
This was specifically a reaction to ballistic missile and nuclear
threats from North Korea, but it infuriated China because THAAD's
powerful radar could also give early warning to the United States of a
pre-emptive missile attack by China on the United States.
On February 28 of this year, news broke that the Lotte Group, a South
Korean multinational conglomerate, had agreed to a land swap that
would allow THAAD to be deployed on a piece of land previously owned
by the company. This enraged the Chinese, who furiously started
imposing economic sanctions on South Korea, particularly targeting
Lotte Department Stores in China and South Korea with a boycott.
So now China is imposing economic boycotts on both North and South
Korea, for different but related reasons. There's another irony to
the situation: Even though China has an economic boycott on South
Korean products, China is increasing its imports of petroleum products
from South Korea, with an increase of 2.6% over the previous year.
The reason is because there's a supply shortage of energy products in
China, exacerbated by the fact that China is no longer importing coal
from North Korea.
These issues are all very recent, but there are also deeply historical
issues separating China and Korea. Since 2003, China has been
developing a "Northeastern History Project" with the intention of
proving that regions that have historically been recognized as
belonging to Korea's history and culture, on China's northeastern
border with Korea, are really all Chinese. In other words, just as
China is confiscating regions historically belonging to Vietnam,
Brunei and the Philippines in the South China Sea, China is also
planning to confiscate regions historically belonging to Korea.
So there may be ephemeral ups and downs in the relations between
China and each of the two Koreas, but these two civilizations have
been around for millennia, and the norm is very tense relations,
usually leading to war.
Deng Xiaoping, China's leader in the 1980s, said, "Observe calmly;
secure our position; cope with affairs calmly; hide our capacities and
bide our time; be good at maintaining a low profile; and never claim
leadership."
This has been China's strategy to implement the "China dream." As
I've been describing for years, China has been using a "salami-slicing
strategy" of using military force to annex one portion after another
of regions of the South China Sea historically belonging to Vietnam,
Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan and the Philippines. By doing so
gradually, China's hopes to prevent any counter-action. At the same
time, China has been vastly building up its military, on land, in
space and on the sea, but then pretending that they're a tiny power
compared to the United States. In this way, they follow Deng's
advice, hoping to surprise the world with their military strength in
the same way that Adolf Hitler surprised Britain.
Unfortunately, China keeps getting bitten by mosquitoes that send it
off-course. China was enormously humiliated by the dramatic 2016
ruling by the United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) at
The Hague declaring China's claims and activities in the South China
Sea to be illegal. This hasn't stopped China, of course, but
it's exposed to the world the danger in allowing China's
salami-slicing strategy to continue.
Another mosquito is North Korea, which has put China's entire foreign
policy into a tailspin. Instead of being able to blame all the
world's problems on the United States, while it continues its vast
military buildup in obscurity, China has to cope with the fact that
North Korea is more a danger to China than it is to the United States.
Even worse, the North Korean situation is directly responsible for the
THAAD deployment in South Korea, which could never have occurred
otherwise.
The fact is that China making enemies of one country after another.
China has a few allies, such as Cambodia, Pakistan, Myanmar, and
others, but China is surrounded by historic enemies, including Japan,
Korea, Philippines, Vietnam, India, Russia, and many others. When
China finally decides that it's time to declare war on the United
States, they will not be fighting the United States alone. The Diplomat and Yonhap News (Seoul) and SinoNK (3-Mar-2012) and The Atlantic (15-Apr-2013) and Council on Foreign Relations
Related Articles
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, North Korea, South Korea,
DPRK, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, KCNA,
Li Zhaoxing, Condoleezza Rice, Libya, Iraq, Yalu River,
Park Geun-hye, Xi Jinping, Northeastern History Project,
Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, THAAD, Lotte Group,
War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War,
Deng Xiaoping, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Philippines,
United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration, PCA
Permanent web link to this article
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal
John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe
This morning's key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com
- Ancient tensions flare between China and North Korea
- China's relations deteriorate with both South and North Korea
****
**** Ancient tensions flare between China and North Korea
****
North Korea's child dictator Kim Jong-un (KCNA/AFP)
As two ancient civilizations and neighbors, China and Korea have had
many disagreements over the centuries, and tensions and wars have been
the norm. However, during the last century, they've been united by
their common enmity to Japan before World War II, and to the United
States after World War II.
Now as both countries go deeper into a generational Crisis era, like
most countries today, they're both becoming increasingly nationalistic
and xenophobic. They both frequently continue to express their hatred
of Japan and the United States, but increasingly this nationalism is
causing them to turn on each other.
China has numerous concerns about North Korea, including these:
- A nuclear explosion or nuclear accident near China's border,
similar to the accident at Ukraine's Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in
1986, could send massive amounts of radiation into China's
northeast.
- A collapse in North Korea's government could send hundreds of
thousands of North Korean refugees across the Yalu River border
with China into northeast China.
- Even a conventional war between North and South Korea would
put at risk over a million Chinese living in South Korea, including
over 100,000 living Seoul, as well as thousands more living
in North Korea.
Tensions between the two countries have been growing almost
continually since 2006, when DPRK (North Korea, the "Democratic
People's Republic of Korea") conducted its first nuclear bomb test.
At that time, Chinese state media said that "China resolutely opposes
DPRK's nuclear test," and quoted China's Foreign Ministry as saying:
> [indent]<QUOTE>"The DPRK ignored universal opposition of the
> international community and flagrantly conducted the nuclear test
> on Oct. 9. The Chinese government is resolutely opposed to
> it."<END QUOTE>[/indent]
China's Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing talked over telephone with
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and they agreed that North
Korea's nuclear tests must be firmly opposed. The United Nations
Security Council held an emergency session to opposed the DPRK nuclear
test.
Since then, countries around the world have strongly and vehemently
opposed North Korea's nuclear program. This has included China, which
has applied economic sanctions to North Korea, most recently
restricting coal imports from North Korea.
North Korea's leaders say that they fear an invasion by the United
States, and they're known to believe that the only protection they
have against such an invasion is the development of nuclear weapons.
They believe that the West would not have invaded either Libya or Iraq
if these countries hadn't given up their nuclear weapons development.
On Wednesday, North Korean state media KCNA published a scathing
attack on China:
> [indent]<QUOTE>"A string of absurd and reckless remarks are now heard
> from big neighboring countries, perhaps frightened at the
> U.S. blackmail and war racket, every day only to render the acute
> situation of the Korean peninsula more strained.
>
> The People's Daily and the Global Times, widely known as media
> speaking for the official stand of the Chinese party and
> government, have recently carried commentaries asserting that the
> DPRK's access to nukes poses a threat to the national interests of
> China. They shifted the blame for the deteriorated relations
> between the DPRK and China onto the DPRK and raised lame excuses
> for the base acts of dancing to the tune of the U.S.
>
> Those commentaries claimed that the DPRK poses a threat to "the
> security in the northeastern region of China" by conducting
> nuclear tests less than 100 km away from its border with
> China. They even talked rubbish that the DPRK strains the
> situation in Northeast Asia and "offers the U.S. excuses for
> deploying more strategic assets" in the region.
>
> Not content with such paradox, the commentaries asserted that to
> remain averse to the DPRK's access to nukes is to preserve
> interests common to the U.S. and China, calling for slapping
> harsher sanctions against the DPRK in order to avert a war which
> would bring danger to China. ...
>
> This is just a wanton violation of the independent and legitimate
> rights, dignity and supreme interests of the DPRK and,
> furthermore, constitutes an undisguised threat to an honest-minded
> neighboring country which has a long history and tradition of
> friendship. ...
>
> Some theorists of China are spouting a load of nonsense that the
> DPRK's access to nukes strains the situation in Northeast Asia and
> offers the U.S. an excuse for beefing up its strategic assets in
> the region. But the U.S. had activated its strategy for dominating
> Asia-Pacific long before the DPRK had access to nukes, and its
> primary target is just China.
>
> China should acknowledge in an honest manner that the DPRK has
> just contributed to protecting peace and security of China,
> foiling the U.S. scheme for aggression by waging a hard fight in
> the frontline of the showdown with the U.S. for more than seven
> decades, and thank the DPRK for it. ...
>
> One must clearly understand that the DPRK's line of access to
> nukes for the existence and development of the country can neither
> be changed nor shaken and that the DPRK will never beg for the
> maintenance of friendship with China, risking its nuclear program
> which is as precious as its own life, no matter how valuable the
> friendship is. ...
>
> China had better ponder over the grave consequences to be entailed
> by its reckless act of chopping down the pillar of the DPRK-China
> relations."<END QUOTE>[/indent]
China's state media responded directly:
> [indent]<QUOTE>"The KCNA opinion piece contains no new substantive
> information, except mentioning the names of China, People's Daily,
> and Global Times and expressing a stronger disgruntling. It did
> not mention China's support for the United Nations sanctions
> against North Korea. Nor did it state Pyongyang's next step to
> take. Overall, the editorial is nothing more than a
> hyper-aggressive piece completely filled with nationalistic
> passion.
>
> Pyongyang obviously is grappling with some form of irrational
> logic over its nuclear program. ...
>
> Beijing needs to make China’s standing and position very clear to
> Pyongyang, either on an official or grassroots level. It needs to
> address with Pyongyang its concerns and bottom line. It should
> also make Pyongyang aware that it will react in unprecedented
> fashion if Pyongyang conducts another nuclear test. Beijing should
> not hesitate in delivering this message, and there is certainly no
> need to debate this issue back and forth with
> Pyongyang."<END QUOTE>[/indent]
Probably the most important sentence is: "[Beijing] should also make
Pyongyang aware that it will react in unprecedented fashion if
Pyongyang conducts another nuclear test."
So we have the following situation:
- North Korea considers its nuclear development program an
existential requirement for its survival.
- China says that it will "react in unprecedented fashion" in case
of another nuclear test, whatever that means.
- President Donald Trump says that the US will stop North Korea if
China doesn't, whatever that means.
- If nothing is done, then North Korea will have the ability within
two or three years to deliver a nuclear bomb to South Korea, China,
Japan or the United States.
The Diplomat and Xinhua (9-Oct-2006) and Rodong Sinmun (North Korea) and Global Times (Beijing) and Times of India
Related Articles
- North Korean missile strikes sea close to Japan, threatening radar base (04-Aug-2016)
- China-North Korea tensions high after nuclear test (09-Jan-2016)
- U.N. promises 'response' to North Korea firing midrange missiles (30-Mar-2014)
****
**** China's relations deteriorate with both South and North Korea
****
China's relations with North Korea have been deteriorating steadily
with North Korea for over a decade, but China's relations with
South Korea have crashed almost overnight.
Just two years ago, there was a "brand new honeymoon" in relations
between China and South Korea. President Park Geun-hye visited
Beijing on September 3, 2015, during the commemoration of the 70th
anniversary of the victory of the Chinese People’s War of Resistance
against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War. Park
was treated like visiting royalty, and even had a private lunch
with China's president Xi Jinping.
Then, in July 2016, Park announced her decision to deploy the THAAD
(Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) system on South Korean soil.
This was specifically a reaction to ballistic missile and nuclear
threats from North Korea, but it infuriated China because THAAD's
powerful radar could also give early warning to the United States of a
pre-emptive missile attack by China on the United States.
On February 28 of this year, news broke that the Lotte Group, a South
Korean multinational conglomerate, had agreed to a land swap that
would allow THAAD to be deployed on a piece of land previously owned
by the company. This enraged the Chinese, who furiously started
imposing economic sanctions on South Korea, particularly targeting
Lotte Department Stores in China and South Korea with a boycott.
So now China is imposing economic boycotts on both North and South
Korea, for different but related reasons. There's another irony to
the situation: Even though China has an economic boycott on South
Korean products, China is increasing its imports of petroleum products
from South Korea, with an increase of 2.6% over the previous year.
The reason is because there's a supply shortage of energy products in
China, exacerbated by the fact that China is no longer importing coal
from North Korea.
These issues are all very recent, but there are also deeply historical
issues separating China and Korea. Since 2003, China has been
developing a "Northeastern History Project" with the intention of
proving that regions that have historically been recognized as
belonging to Korea's history and culture, on China's northeastern
border with Korea, are really all Chinese. In other words, just as
China is confiscating regions historically belonging to Vietnam,
Brunei and the Philippines in the South China Sea, China is also
planning to confiscate regions historically belonging to Korea.
So there may be ephemeral ups and downs in the relations between
China and each of the two Koreas, but these two civilizations have
been around for millennia, and the norm is very tense relations,
usually leading to war.
Deng Xiaoping, China's leader in the 1980s, said, "Observe calmly;
secure our position; cope with affairs calmly; hide our capacities and
bide our time; be good at maintaining a low profile; and never claim
leadership."
This has been China's strategy to implement the "China dream." As
I've been describing for years, China has been using a "salami-slicing
strategy" of using military force to annex one portion after another
of regions of the South China Sea historically belonging to Vietnam,
Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan and the Philippines. By doing so
gradually, China's hopes to prevent any counter-action. At the same
time, China has been vastly building up its military, on land, in
space and on the sea, but then pretending that they're a tiny power
compared to the United States. In this way, they follow Deng's
advice, hoping to surprise the world with their military strength in
the same way that Adolf Hitler surprised Britain.
Unfortunately, China keeps getting bitten by mosquitoes that send it
off-course. China was enormously humiliated by the dramatic 2016
ruling by the United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) at
The Hague declaring China's claims and activities in the South China
Sea to be illegal. This hasn't stopped China, of course, but
it's exposed to the world the danger in allowing China's
salami-slicing strategy to continue.
Another mosquito is North Korea, which has put China's entire foreign
policy into a tailspin. Instead of being able to blame all the
world's problems on the United States, while it continues its vast
military buildup in obscurity, China has to cope with the fact that
North Korea is more a danger to China than it is to the United States.
Even worse, the North Korean situation is directly responsible for the
THAAD deployment in South Korea, which could never have occurred
otherwise.
The fact is that China making enemies of one country after another.
China has a few allies, such as Cambodia, Pakistan, Myanmar, and
others, but China is surrounded by historic enemies, including Japan,
Korea, Philippines, Vietnam, India, Russia, and many others. When
China finally decides that it's time to declare war on the United
States, they will not be fighting the United States alone. The Diplomat and Yonhap News (Seoul) and SinoNK (3-Mar-2012) and The Atlantic (15-Apr-2013) and Council on Foreign Relations
Related Articles
- China, Russia, Syria: The 'Salami Slicing Strategy' (19-Feb-2015)
- China's military strength and poor civilian control alarm neighbors (24-Nov-2014)
- Vietnam, Philippines unite to confront China in South China Sea (26-Mar-2014)
KEYS: Generational Dynamics, China, North Korea, South Korea,
DPRK, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, KCNA,
Li Zhaoxing, Condoleezza Rice, Libya, Iraq, Yalu River,
Park Geun-hye, Xi Jinping, Northeastern History Project,
Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, THAAD, Lotte Group,
War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War,
Deng Xiaoping, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Philippines,
United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration, PCA
Permanent web link to this article
Receive daily World View columns by e-mail
Contribute to Generational Dynamics via PayPal
John J. Xenakis
100 Memorial Drive Apt 8-13A
Cambridge, MA 02142
Phone: 617-864-0010
E-mail: john@GenerationalDynamics.com
Web site: http://www.GenerationalDynamics.com
Forum: http://www.gdxforum.com/forum
Subscribe to World View: http://generationaldynamics.com/subscribe
