【2010.11.30 The Economist】Wikileaks embarrasses North Korea: A glimpse into the

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http://www.economist.com/blogs/asiaview/2010/11/wikileaks_embarrasses_north_korea



Nov 30th 2010, 18:11 by D.T. | SEOUL

IF THE Chinese had been hoping that Hillary Clinton and Kim Jong Il might find some common ground, their mutual hatred of WikiLeaks is perhaps not the first place they would have looked. Among the seemingly endless stream of small revelations this week, we have tantalising bits of evidence to the effect that Beijing is at last tiring of its old ally, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea—a “spoiled child”, in the rather more honest words of one Chinese civil servant.

Most surprising are the details of a meeting between China’s delegation to the six-party talks and South Korea’s vice foreign minister, Chun Yung-woo. They suggest that among the younger generation of Chinese officials there is a growing desire to relinquish support for North Korea. One official apparently stated that all of Korea “should be unified under ROK [South Korean] control”.



The overall impression given by these leaked documents is that of a China torn between past loyalties and present realities. While Xi Jinping, Hu Jintao’s heir-apparent, recently praised his country’s involvement in the Korean War as “great and just”, there are many around him who would seem to place a much higher value on maintaining healthy relationships with those important trading partners farther afield: South Korea, Japan and America.



If these intercepted cables are accurate, they provide a certain amount of vindication to the continued South Korean and American policy of keeping up pressure on the mandarins of Pyongyang by, for instance, refusing them a return to the six-party talks. If Kim Jong Il and his princeling son had been calculating the force and timing of their recent military aggressions with an assumption that Beijing regards them as being eternally useful, they may now have a rethink coming.



Not all of the WikiLeaks trove is so useful, however. It would not require great investigative skill to out the North Korean leader as “a flabby old chap”, to use the words attributed to Singapore’s former prime minister, Lee Kuan Yew. That counts as gossip, perhaps—but it says something too, about some of the most inscrutable relationships in East Asia.



(Photo credit: AFP)

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doublehelix wrote:
Nov 30th 2010 10:01 GMT

The veracity of the leaked documents is still somewhat questionable, but why is the Obama administration just now starting to crack down? Why not months ago when leaked documents identified hundreds of informants in Afghanistan and exposed them to mortal danger? Are they just slow or incompetent (a totally reasonable explanation), or is there something more sinister at work?

Excerpt:

Federal authorities are investigating whether WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange violated criminal laws in the group’s release of government documents, including possible charges under the Espionage Act, sources familiar with the inquiry said Monday.

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said the Justice Department and Pentagon are conducting “an active, ongoing criminal investigation.” Others familiar with the probe said the FBI is examining everyone who came into possession of the documents, including those who gave the materials to WikiLeaks and also the organization itself.

In highly sensitive discussions in February this year, the-then South Korean vice-foreign minister, Chun Yung-woo, told a US ambassador, Kathleen Stephens, that younger generation Chinese Communist party leaders no longer regarded North Korea as a useful or reliable ally and would not risk renewed armed conflict on the peninsula, according to a secret cable to Washington…

“The two officials, Chun said, were ready to ‘face the new reality’ that the DPRK [North Korea] now had little value to China as a buffer state – a view that, since North Korea’s first nuclear test in 2006, had reportedly gained traction among senior PRC [People's Republic of China] leaders. Chun argued that in the event of a North Korean collapse, China would clearly ‘not welcome’ any US military presence north of the DMZ [demilitarised zone]. Again citing his conversations with [the officials], Chun said the PRC would be comfortable with a reunified Korea controlled by Seoul and anchored to the US in a ‘benign alliance’ – as long as Korea was not hostile towards China. Tremendous trade and labour-export opportunities for Chinese companies, Chun said, would also help ‘salve’ PRC concerns about a reunified Korea.

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John2003 wrote:
Nov 30th 2010 10:51 GMT

The leaked cable seems to me is a not so discrets warning to North Korea from US and South Korea that China is getting tired of supporting them. Whether the conversation was real or just a staged performance with wishful thinking on South Korean part, might push the North Korea back to negotiation table. In international diplomacy, nobody will trust each other. It is unreal to assume that China welcome South Korea to take over the North. With their infamous nationalistic approach to international affair, China cannot be sure that Korea would one day be hostile towards them. On top of that, there is no guarantee that US would not move their troops north regardless what Korean thinks. This is going one of the most bizarre revelation of one wishful thinking of a hawkish Korean official. It sounds more like a make-up story to me.

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John2003 wrote:
Nov 30th 2010 10:58 GMT

Following are some of the dispute between China and South Korea:

1. According to some Korean academics, a large part of North East China used to be part of a Korean Dynasty. SK officially still lays claims on those Chines territory as theirs.

2. The world famous dragon boat race is claimed by South Korea as their heritage and a lot of Chinese traditions were copied from Korea according to Korean government.

The list goes on and on.

Think about what would happen after the two Korea re-united and become a world power.

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BlahBiccah wrote:
Nov 30th 2010 11:06 GMT

The cable is perfectly consistent with China's approach to North Korea up until now. The CCP's preference has always been, in this order:

1) Have North Korea develop in a similar vein to China
2) Stability, with North Korea as a buffer to South Korea and the Americans
3) A united Korea that's friendly to China
4) Instability on the peninsula

They've tried numerous times to get NK to modernize, but the Dear Leader wouldn't have it because any development would result in people being smart enough to see through his cult of personality. Nuclear tests, missile launches, and aggression in the last few years has shown NK to be an unstable ally that China can't control. So they've opted for choice 3.

Although, really, I would think that reunification would be much easier had the US and SK rejoined 6 party talks and waited it out for Kim Jong-il to die and the political system to collapse. Instead, all this saber-rattling on both sides unnecessarily increases the chance of confrontation on the peninsula.

I also think that people overestimates China's influence on North Korea. They probably have as much control on NK's actions as the US has over Israel's. In fact, the similarities are pretty glaring.

China also wouldn't rush in to defend NK against US aggression at this point. Any confrontation on the peninsula is lose-lose as SK is one of China's largest trading partners (much more valuable than NK) and the last thing the Chinese want is to have to deal with 300k starving refugees.

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ewakorn wrote:
Nov 30th 2010 11:35 GMT

The reunification of Korea will be not much different from the reunification of Vietnam.

A reunified Vietnam is more hostile to China. A reunified Korea may also be hostile to China; however, it seems more likely they will be even more hostile to Japan since the rivalry between the latter is more recent and deep-wounded.

U.S. troops may most likely depart from the Korean peninsula if the North and South have been reunified.

Why? Plain simple.

U.S. forces have been stationing in South Korea under the UN mandate as the aftermath of the Korean War. If the Korean War formally ends, i.e. reunification, then the UN mandate will be revoked by UN Security Council which China is a permanent member.

Anyway, close allies like China and Vietnam, which were both orthodox Communist countries in 1979, fought a bloody war at everybody's surprise. I don't see a reformed China cannot abandon a feudal dynasty like North Korea which only once had been ally decades ago.

Moreover, when China was at odds with former USSR in '60s and '70s, Kim I had tilted towards USSR and betrayed China. I don't see why China must still keep this disloyal ally.

Of course, if Kim II & III can learn from China's economic reform and adopts an open door policy, then that is China's best option. However, every time when Kim I & II came back from their tours in China where they had been shown China's showpiece like Shanghai and Shenzhen, right away they purged all pro-reform officials and bragged on the invincibility of their stupid "Juche" policy at home.

Kim Dynasty is hopeless. The least worst option is an engineered regime change or reunification by the South.

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