Some of the South wants unification. It would be very costly.
The South couldn’t. It’s arguable that we couldn’t / wouldn’t.
IMO, having China depose the Kims & absorb NK as something between a colony and a new province is *the best *possible route out of the current situation.
We all lose the global danger of the Kim regime. The Chinese, for all their faults, are pretty thoroughly status quo once you get past the bluster. And SK isn’t hobbled by the tremendous weight of rebuilding NK. China can carry that load; SK can’t.
SK carrying NK is like West Germany carrying East Germany times about 100. And the Wessi’s found that much, much heavier than they expected. SK absolutely would collapse under the weight.
The only really tricky part is keeping the world calm while China does the deed. Some serious secret diplomacy where we agree not to interfere and China agrees to stop at the current NK/SK DMZ and everybody on our side is on alert, but not hair trigger alert, is the way to go. Some Chinese ordnance may stray over the border, but if everybody on our side is aware of the plan we ought to be able to prevent overreaction. And their side also needs to be ready to accept an unauthorized pinprick or two without going ape-shit.
Yeah, but NK is probably crazy enough to just shell Seoul for the hell of it. Not much else they could do with that dug in arty I don’t think. China would be done with them before they could move it/put it to use as defense against them.
You’re probably right. In effect it’s a suicide pact or akin to MAD. The NK regime will ensure that deposing it costs the world more than the benefits.
See also Israel’s so-called Samson option. Samson Option - Wikipedia . Nobody knows if it’s real, but …
You guys are making the assumption that China wants NK. One of the reason China is propping up North Korea is the fact they don’t want to deal with an influx of refugees if the North Korea govt. collapse. I don’t think they would want to absorb North Korea whole sale.
Besides NK pose no risk to China, why would China attack anyways? To make the world safer? Has Chinese foreign policy ever gone that direction without there benefits to China. There’s no pros here, only con.
Just wool gathering I think. Anyway, you’re probably right. And NK makes a nice buffer between it and those nasty US controled South Koreans.
That is why China got involved in the Korean War in the first place. In fact, neither North or South Korea was invited to the meeting to hash out the treaty to suspend the war, just China and US.
Anyways, the problem with North Korean is that no one wants to deal with it. South Korea govt. does not want reunification, b/c it would destroy them economically and they know it. If NK govt. fails, there’s going to an influx of refugee that no one wants to deal with, China or South Korea. There’s a lot of people in power who prefer the status quo, Kim making scary threats and then no real actions.
Having to deal with a dysfunctional neighbor when they are trying to industrialize is a problem. Plus SK is a big trading partner with China, technically they are the 4th largest at about 250 billion a year in trade (the US is 1 with over 500 billion a year in trade with China). FWIW, Japan is 3 with 300 billion. Plus other regional powers like Taiwan and Hong Kong add another 600 billion.
So NK is constantly threatening war against Japan & SK, which make up 550 billion a year in trade with China, and their threats could cause problems withTaiwan and Hong Kong, another 600 billion a year in trade.
That alone seems like an issue China may worry about. China-NK trade is only about 6 billion a year. China does 40x more business with SK than NK. Chinas biggest trading partners are enemies of NK (US, Japan, SK).
Plus NK has a lot of rare earth metals. I don’t know if China ‘needs’ them but they were trying to corner the market a few years ago for rare earth metals so they could become a world leader in renewable energy and communications/IT manufacturing.
Plus as others have said, it is a pool of low cost labor.
Plus there is a risk that if China doesn’t get involved, NK may eventually fall and end up under the control of Seoul. Then China has a US/SK ally as a neighbor whereas if they overthrow the regime it remains friendly to China.
Actually I made no such assumption. I said it’d be the best way out. Best for us & the world. And as **Wesley **points out, probably better for China for them to take over than to have us, SK, or the UN (hah) take over NK.
I don’t see China doing this for any world-improving altruistic reasons. Nor do I see them doing it out of a clear blue sky. But if it appeared the Kims were toppling, China might well conclude that a semi-controlled implosion falling their way is better for them than a semi-controlled or uncontrolled implosion falling towards SK & their evil US allies.
My point is that in that scenario, we might be well ahead to play chess & let the Chinese take NK, versus just thinking like an MMA contestant or Fox News talking head and bringing all our offense to bear before we’ve thought the scenario through.
Only if the Kim dynasty topples. But I think China will do a lot more to prop up the current govt. as it stands. Although the ideal situation from China’s POV is to have a puppet govt. under Chinese control. Frankly in that situation, I can still see the NK govt. giving out empty threats, only the world will be more certain that they won’t act on it. Just b/c U.S., Japan, and China are huge trading allies, doesn’t mean they don’t have competing interests. China will threaten Japan, U.S. using the N.K. mouth piece, whenever their foreign policy conflict with China’s.
For N.K. people, would thing get better or worst? Cheap labor tend to shade over to into slave labor. China doesn’t like people to look too closely at the govt. either. China has it’s own source of intellectuals, they don’t need North Koreans. Especially since most of them are so behind anyways, they will need to be re-educated. Would they bother to spend the money built up the infrastructure in N.K. or bring in their own people in order to loot the country better?
Agreed. A China-friendly well-controlled puppet in NK is their (the Chinese’) ideal situation. What they lack today is the well-controlled part.
If the Chinese do eventually engineer that, via whatever vile skullduggery is necessary, it’ll be a good day for the rest of us. And for most NK residents.
To be sure Beijing will not pay to convert NK into Guangdong - version 2. But simply hooking NK into the Chinese economy will start them moving forwards, much as is happening (slowly) in the Chinese hinterlands today.
And the worst of the NK prison-state will be replaced by the much more benign (really!) Chinese prison-state.
All without destroying SK or shedding US blood & treasure. Sounds like a winner all around to me.
If China were launch an all-out invasion of North Korea, though, it seems like North Korea’s nuclear arsenal may come into play. If a nuclear deterrent isn’t meant to be used when one’s regime is about to be completely overrun by an invading enemy army, then when?
Sure, China would nuke North Korea if the latter ever nuked China, but by then the damage is already done.
‘Bomb’ NK with information. It’s already happening, naturally. NK tries to stop it, but it can’t be done as the world gets smaller. Let NK determine it’s own fate.
While the Kims are tyrants (nicest word I can come up with), if they have two brain cells to rub together, perhaps they could bring NK into a state where people can eat every day. And join the modern world.
Of course the Kim dynasty will take credit for it. Fine. Whatever. Let the history books show what happened.
Let’s face it, if your next door neighbor was starving, and threatened you all the time, wouldn’t you want to change that?
I’d be very surprised if NK has the tech and ability to put a nuke on an ICBM. Perhaps they could transport one by ship though…
The problem here is if the head of the snake gets cut off, it just grows two more.
And the very sad thing is that the majority of the NK’s think they are living in paradise compared to well, everyone else. Information is the first key.
At least in other countries with ‘overloards’ the population has a clue that they are getting truly and completely fucked. Not so in NK. That’s gonna change in a few years.
Small world. It will be interesting to see what happens. Just hope the Kim’s don’t take many with them.
The ruling elite in North Korea cannot change the mode of governance. If they were to do that, then the entire population would realize the horrors they’ve visited on said population and that those horrors had no basis other than the overlords (not “overloards”) to enslave the population. And there would be an incredible reckoning for that. Of course, there will be quite the migration to get out of North Korea, too. China, of course, doesn’t care about “buffer states” between itself and South Korea as the PRC’s government and the CPC know that SK will not attack either NK or China. What China cares about is not having a huge influx of refugees, economic or otherwise, coming into China.
What would you propose?
Information about the rest of the world is coming. No way to stop it.
Kim Jong un may want to ride this to the end. I don’t think he’s totally stupid though. Just the worlds biggest asshole. Like his father. And father before him. Kim II Sung followed Stalin, and we all know how that turned out. And that seems to be turning to shit again, but I digress.
I agree that China worries about refugees from NK.
So. A hypothetical, If Kim Jong Un wanted to be a good leader, and bring NK up out of the darkness. What should he do? The people of NK are catching on.
My idea, to do this slowly and avoid war and help the North Korean people.
He must rid the society of the idea of Songbun. A classification of people based on their ancestry or who they associate with. Or their grandfather supposedly associated with.
Get rid of Juche. Ha. This is Grand Dads great idea. And eh, well Ok. In a nutshell, “Only depend on yourself” “Self reliance”. Doesn’t work very well in a communist government when at lest in NK, they limit the size of your vegetable garden.
Juche, is a good idea. To depend on yourself for self reliance, but when you are restricted to even grow your own food is an Orwellian joke. Allow real Juche to thrive.
Get rid of block wardens, informers and spys so people can learn and talk with out the fear of going to a labor camp.
That’s a small start. Probably too much, and Kim Jong un could even keep his hookers and blow, but ya gotta start somewhere.
There was a thread about this similar topic last year.
Not an ICBM, or even an IRBM, but certainly short range missiles at least. That’s the problem. I’ll bet they not only have a couple of their crude nukes atop SRBMs targeted on Seoul ready to launch 24/7, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Un himself has a ‘deadhand’ device strapped to his chest, and if his heart stops beating the order to launch automatically gets sent*!*
