The Dear Leader has indicated that North Korea will re-enter the Six Power Talks following a chat with Wen Jiabao, the Chinese PM, who also delivered a personal letter from the Chinese president, Hu Jintao. The new Chinese demarche is critical as only the Peoples Republic can put credible pressure on the Hermit Kingdom of the North.
Ever since 6 October 1949 when the Peoples Republic extended diplomatic and fraternal relations to North Korea, it has been the primary supporter of the Hermit Kingdom. Without Chinese assistance the North Korean state would have ceased to exist back in the Fall of 1950. Subsequently, the Chinese have assured that the North Koreans have been fed, given military and economic development aid, and generally been protected against the worst effects of their rambunctious behavior.
When the Hermit Kingdom detonated its second nuclear test shot, it went over the line as far as Beijing was concerned. The Chinese government is (perhaps unrealistically) concerned that a nuclear armed North Korea would trigger an arms race in the region. There is little doubt that both South Korea and Japan could produce nuclear weapons in very short order, and this is an eventuality which Beijing wants to avoid at almost any cost.
At the same time Beijing has been concerned that pushing the Hermits too hard or too fast would result in a destabilization of the country. Any fracturing of the regime in Pyongyang would result in a flood of refugees across the Yalu and Tuman rivers. A flow of refugees would have an echo effect on the stability in northeast China, which has already experienced internal unrest as the aging rust belt industries of the area have been closed.
Apparently, Beijing has concluded that Kim Jong-il is in sufficient command of the situation and further that the succession "crisis" has been averted or sufficiently postponed that it can now put the screws to Dear Leader. As a result, the Chinese leadership has taken advantage of the sixtieth anniversary of the diplomatic relations and fraternal friendship to "suggest" that Pyongyang should return to the Six Power Talks.
If the Hermits follow through on the initial indications and come back to the multi-lateral talks, not only will this be a complete reversal of previous policy, but, more importantly from the perspective of Beijing, it will be a major diplomatic coup for their team. China has more to gain from bringing the long running in fits and starts Six Power talks to a successful conclusion than merely the avoidance of a nuclear arms race in their backyard.
In case no one has noticed, China is in the midst of a major multi-year effort to become a significant international actor not only in economic affairs but in global politics. The Six Power talks have been a prime component of this campaign, so the ultimate success of the talks is a matter of global importance to Beijing. If the talks resume and come to a conclusion agreeable to the US, then China will have established itself as the ultimate regional power and have a good shot at rivaling the US and eclipsing Russia globally.
With a goal of this magnitude in play, the Beijing government has decided it is worth the slight risk of the Hermit Kingdom being either intransigent or tottering toward the abyss of internal rupture. At the very least, the resumption of the Six Power Talks will place the US and the (new) Japanese government in Beijing's debt.
More, a successful resolution of the North Korean nuclear question will make Beijing's light of leadership all the more attractive to the (new) Japanese government in its quest to chart a course more independent of the US. The same light will beckon to the South Koreans, giving their present and future governments an alternative to the US.
While not constituting a shift in the seismic plates of Pacific Rim relations, the Chinese role in a (still hypothetical of course) success in the Six Power Talks will add leverage to the goal of Beijing of reabsorbing Taiwan into the homeland. As the center of diplomatic gravity shifts closer to Beijing and further from Washington, the opposition to the reclamation of Taiwan is automatically attenuated--significantly.
A Chinese guided success in the Six Power Talks will also put Washington somewhat in Beijing's debt with ramifications of importance to other looming problems. Like Iran. The success of the Six Power Talks--or merely their resumption--will assure that Beijing has a greater freedom of action with respect to Iran. That it can ignore calls for enhanced sanctions with impunity--an even greater impunity than currently exists.
The Obama administration and its State Department would be well advised to view the new Chinese efforts with a careful eye--even a jaundiced one. The Boys In Beijing are not running a global eleemosynary institution. Beijing is pursuing self-defined national and strategic interests with a view to enhancing its global authority while necessarily reducing that of the US.
The same degree of skepticism should be employed by the Deep Thinkers of the Obama crew with respect to the impact of the scuttling of the land-based Central European ABM system. To no great surprise the move has been hailed in Moscow. Not only has PM Putin greeted it as a "brave move;" Dmitry Medvedev has promised that American concerns will be listened to "more closely."
WOW! How shocking! So what?
At the same time the Obama reversal has lowered the credibility of the US as the ultimate guarantor of national self-determination and independence of countries uncomfortably close to the Russian frontier. In the estimate of realpolickers in Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungry, the Ukraine, Georgia and the Baltic States, the center of diplomatic gravity shifted overnight from the far reaches of the Atlantic Ocean to the walls of the Kremlin. The apparent capitulation of the Obama administration to long standing Russian demands hints (or more) at a lack of political will in Washington and a willingness to sacrifice the countries of Central Europe to the political and historical paranoia of the Russians.
Regardless of the intrinsic merits of the Obama administration's decision (and there are many including a rejection of the insultingly high-handed way in which the Bush/Cheney bunch rammed the ABM policy down the Kremlin's throat), the action was taken without any immediately evident quid pro quo. The absence of a "quo" from Moscow in return for the Obama "quid" in and of itself gives the appearance of surrender, of weakening political will, of a withdrawal from Central Europe.
Quid pro quo is the basic reserve currency of diplomacy. Mood music and honeyed words from Putin, Medvedev, and Company do not constitute a quid pro quo. Perhaps one will be forthcoming. Perhaps Moscow will reverse its course and join in the (proposed) next round of sanctions against Iran following the failure of the upcoming talks in Turkey. Perhaps whales will sprout wings and fly.
The Russians were the first to jump in bed with Ahmedinejad. They have consistently opposed sanctions as an unworkable approach--and continued to do so immediately after the Obama concession on the ABM matter. Moscow wants increased rights in the Caspian. It believes that the road to peace in the North Caucasus runs through Tehran. And, Iran is a good customer for Russia's major industrial exports--arms and nuclear reactors.
In short, what would Russia gain--and lose--if it were to listen more "closely" to US "concerns" regarding Iran? The quick answer is it would gain nothing and lose much.
The Obama administration gave a tasty morsel to the Russian Bear with the cancelling of the ABM project. Now the Bear is smiling. Who wouldn't after a free lunch?
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