Socialist Party Australia - Bourgeois analysis of North Korea talks

Greg Sheridan of the Australian newspaper (30th August 2003) analyses the failed six country talks on North Korea. He clearly outlines the cynicism of China's approach to their 'comrades' in Pyongyang,

Howard hand in hand with China's iron glove Australian Angle
August 30, 2003
JOHN Howard was exceptionally complimentary of Chinese diplomacy towards North Korea when he was in Beijing earlier this month.

The Chinese, he said, were playing a "constructive and positive" role on North Korea.
Not only that, Australia and China had virtually identical aims on North Korea, seeking a peaceful outcome in which North Korea had no nuclear weapons.
Everyone knew then that China had strongarmed Pyongyang into agreeing to six-nation talks, held this week in Beijing.
But Howard had a much deeper confidence about Beijing's long-term position.
Australian intelligence had obtained a record of the conversations between China's Vice-Foreign Minister, Dai Bingguo, and his North Korean counterpart, Kang Sok Ju, and the North Korean President, Kim Jong-il.
This highly prized intelligence showed that the Chinese were serious in pushing the North Koreans not only to have six-nation talks but to do a deal giving up its nuclear weapons program.
China has a bad record of proliferating nuclear weapons technology itself to states such as Pakistan, Iran and North Korea. But recently it has come to realise that proliferation threatens its own interests.
This could represent a vital maturing of China as a status quo power, one which has invested in the international order and will work to keep it going.
In the past, China has had an ideological commitment to North Korea. China lost a million men during the Korean War.
A North Korea that was a nuisance to the US was no bad thing, it thought. It was happy to have a buffer state between it and the US ally, South Korea, and all the US troops South Korea hosts.
But the high-stakes crisis North Korea is now provoking is altogether different. It could result in a war between North Korea and the US, which would see vast floods of refugees into China and a huge US military presence on China's borders.
And it could result in China's mortal strategic competitor, Japan, radically changing its military posture.
But most of all, China seems deeply concerned that its relationship with the US not be blown off course. The new Chinese President, Hu Jintao, who Howard met for the first time on his recent visit and who will visit Australia later this year, is moving effectively to consolidate his power.
China faces many daunting domestic problems. Its $US500 billion ($778 billion) trade surplus with the US is a critical engine of its high economic growth and it doesn't want that endangered.
Therefore, for the first time since the end of the Korean War, Beijing might have come to the view that it would be prepared to countenance the disappearance of the North Korean regime, and the eventual unification of the Korean peninsula, rather than risk large-scale instability or a fundamental rupture in its relations with Washington.
This is a profoundly significant change from China's historical position. In the past, it didn't want a crisis in North Korea but it showed little real displeasure at North Korea's nuclear ambitions.
If it were still operating under its old mindset, Beijing may have encouraged North Korea to hold talks but not put it under any pressure to ultimately come to a deal that involved scrapping its nukes.
Dai Bingguo's visit to Pyongyang in July was a critical step, although there have been a great deal of other secret and semi-secret meetings and envoys. Chinese diplomacy towards North Korea has been exceptionally active in recent months.
In Pyongyang, Dai Bingguo saw his counterpart, Kang Sok Ju, for more than one session of talks that went for several hours. Kang Sok Ju is notionally only a Vice-Foreign Minister but he is regarded as the most important figure in North Korean foreign policy after Kim Jong-il, more powerful than the actual Foreign Minister, and certainly more powerful than the other Vice-Foreign Minister, Kim Yong Il, who led the talks in Beijing.
Dai Bingguo also saw the North Korean President, Kim Jong-il, and hand-delivered a letter to him from China's president, Hu Jintao.
Earlier this year, Beijing cut off for several days a vital oil pipeline into North Korea in a move analysts believe was de signed to put pressure on Pyongyang.
The proof that Beijing really does want a non-nuclear Korean peninsula is vital for two reasons. It vastly increases the chances of a deal being done in which North Korea gives up its nukes, allows an intrusive inspections verification regime and gets aid and recognition in exchange.
But perhaps even more importantly it demonstrates how highly Beijing values its US relationship. Since September 11, 2001, the US has greatly increased its military presence in central Asia. Beijing has responded calmly whereas once it would have regarded such US deployments as provocative.
The new Chinese outlook, which has evolved rather than come about abruptly, is the best possible news Australia could have. Howard was very well advised to go to Beijing to bed down his relationship with the new Chinese leadership.
And he was right to praise China's contribution on North Korea.