Man, China’s changed the name of their capital to #Beijing?
I felt all hip because Canada’s PM looks good with his shirt off, but our capital is just boring old Ottawa. Maybe we can get it changed to 0π4w4 or something.
He’s also the only one in the picture who isn’t smiling, oddly.
Well, it’s also in China’s interest to not have a war on their border. If they can push for talks between NK and the US, and help to even out the regime in NK, all the better for them.
Bonus points!
Anyone who thinks that NK is ever going to be China’s puppet is dreaming. There’s obviously influence, but control? No.
Think more like the U.S. and Canada. The U.S. has no credible way to threaten to destroy Canada, although it can make life unpleasant. Canada will tend to cleave to the U.S. position, but has lots of potential to take paths that heavily annoy the U.S…
But if someone threatens to attack Canada, the US will get involved forthwith. Other nations know that as well.
So Canada has no need for its own nuclear weapons program.
Kim Jong Un’s nuclear program has no purpose other than threatening South Korea and Western Japan if his regime is threatened from the outside. Chinese nuclear protection does the same thing.
More importantly it puts a good deal of the decision making process out of the hands of the least reliable parties. NK won’t attack anyone without China’s go-ahead. Which means never. China have extensive trade with South Korea, Japan and the US.
Canada is a member of NATO (founding member).
An attack on any NATO member is an attack on NATO as a whole.
Again, what makes you say that? It’s pretty clear it started the nuclear program without China’s consent. And it certainly started the last war without China’s consent.
China needs NK as a defensive buffer, and while I’m certain it would prefer that NK got rid of its nukes and generally played nicer (but not too nice), it’s not the one calling the shots.
As I said, NK is no-one’s puppet, and honestly, even if China formally declared NK under its nuclear umbrella, I’d be very surprised if NK gave up its nukes, as being able to nuke, say, LA, means that it can engage in the lower level mischief (a few hundred dead here or there) without any serious repercussion (is an air strike in retaliation really worth a few million dead in LA?)
Of course, where NK is concerned, any prediction is fraught. Personally, I’d go with public security declaration with China perhaps a (secret) billion dollars a year to Kim’s private Swiss bank account in exchange for giving up the nukes. The increased world safety would be cheap at the price.
Because China has committed itself to defending NK openly and pretty much is the only country which keeps its economy afloat.
Sure China would rather not have NK with nukes. But they can live with that, provided it doesn’t mess up trade in the region.
As for means “lower level mischief”. NK has been doing that for decades. Including blowing up airliners, shelling SK territory, naval engagements, and abducting people. This new agreement with China doesn’t change that situation at all. Its not a few million dead in LA which is the realistic danger. Its a few million dead in Seoul, through means far lower tech than missiles and nukes.
Agreed - China feels that it needs NK. It can’t afford to have it fall or be conquered. Which means NK is the one holding the cards. (It can’t even squeeze NK too hard or it might fall.)
And that means NK has the freedom to do what it likes as long as the consequences to China aren’t worth more than losing NK. This would include, potentially, military aggression towards SK.
Do I think it likely? No.
But do I think it possible? Yes. Especially something like a “limited strike on the evil SK’ers” that kills 100K, but not millions.
Do I think China would use nukes to keep the US from retaliating (say, serious airstrikes) in the face of such aggression? No.
Do I think NK would use nukes to keep the US from retaliating in the face of such aggression? Absolutely.
The US is never going to sacrifice a few million of its own citizens for the sake of defending SK, especially if the aggression is already over.
And it’s that knowledge that will have me very surprised if NK gives up its nukes barring Kim being richly rewarded. He may never intend to invade SK - but the value of having that option available is worth a lot.
(And yes, I know, defense treaties, etc. We all know that it will never come down to publicly “reneging”. But we both know the US response towards an NK with nukes would be totally different to one without nukes, China’s protection notwithstanding.)
Actually they can squeeze pretty hard. They have been squeezed by their allies before. The last famine was largely due to prior support from Russia drying up. Even their ability to cause mayhem with a nuclear program is rather limited by how much their allies allow. NK barely has the resources to keep its nuclear reactor at Youngbyon functional. An NK Chernobyl is a more credible danger than a nuclear weapons strike by them.
Aggression towards SK has never really ceased. But there is only so much even China will put up with. China values Seoul as well. NK can’t risk going to all out war with anybody. Their military is too far behind to do more than senseless damage for its own sake. Ruining the markets China considers valuable. The threat of war suits them more than actual conflict.
There is no such thing as a limited strike against SK as large as you say, which won’t trigger massive retaliation. At best, for the last 60 years it has been “limited strike” killing a dozen people or downing airliners.
The possibility of war is a lot more remote than you think. A war will end the NK regime. They know it. The threat of war however brings nice blackmail $$$ to them from neighbors.
NK will not give up its nukes short of a complete change of government. They, and close proximity to Seoul assure he will not end up like Quadafi or Saddam Hussein. At this point the payoffs although sound like a crappy course of action are really the sanest course. A NK falling apart would be a greater threat than the current autocratic dynasty. We have had bad luck with regime changes as of late.
The Chinese auto industry is seeking to supplant Toyota as the lead producer of “Technicals” in developing world conflicts.
For an explanation as to why this is significant, one need only look at the war where an armored professional military was beaten by a bunch of guys in pickup trucks
Is this true? If so, it would change the calculus quite a bit and make the possibility of NK accepting a “buy-out” (suitably structured to not look like a buy-out) much higher.
Here’s hoping.
Framing that as a war story strikes me as more than a bit Sinophobic [1].
The story is that the developing Chinese automotive industry is increasing market share at the expense of the Japanese. The possibility that a tiny percentage of those vehicles may end up with guns mounted on them is an incidental detail. Selling a few civilian trucks to the military is a routine thing for all manufacturers, using military iconography in marketing is also not unusual.
Does it make any difference to those conflicts if the trucks have Great Wall badges instead of Toyota? In what way are Chinese sales in this market any different or worse than Japanese sales? Do these sales cause any significant shift in the global balance of power?
The ramping up of media demonisation of China (among others) over recent times is alarming. It’s manufacturing consent for war.
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[1] To be clear: I’m talking about the journalists/publishers, not you.
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