Look beyond N Korea’s threats
US should not give legitimacy to Pyongyang’s nuclear blackmail
Unlike animals and humans, a rogue nation can only go astray as far as its sponsors allow it to. This is especially true for North Korea. China has provided it the economic and political cover for almost all of the latter’s destabilising actions. This has been true for the past few weeks of confrontation between Washington and Pyongyang.
China may have supported the United Nations sanctions against North Korea but it did little to stop the flow of essential supplies that could have applied pressure on the rogue regime. The latest crisis seems to have begun to wind down. There have been reports of back channel diplomatic activity. But what seems to be the fundamental North Korean motive of forcing the US to accept it as a de facto nuclear state and thus capable of nuclear blackmail against the US and the world may yet prove a step too far for both sides to take.
Indians should experience a sense of deja vu while considering North Korea’s manipulation of geopolitics through rogue action. Pakistan has done similar actions in its march towards international nuclear acceptance. Islamabad has a long history of persuading Washington to help it financially and militarily by arguing that the fallout would be a destabilised Pakistan filled with loose nukes and jihadis. And its ultimate patron was also China. Insofar as a difficult Pakistan serves to geopolitically limit India, the real beneficiary has been China.
A parallel tale can be made of China’s use of North Korea. Pyongyang does not aim its missiles at Beijing. And its seemingly irrational belligerence helps keep Northeast Asia from becoming a US lake but also holds back Japan’s strategic vision and keeps South Korea from a larger Asian role. More than anything else, this is why the Trump administration should resist any temptation to confer a nuclear legitimacy , no matter on how tentative, to Kim Jong-un’s deadly toys. That may mean further nuclear crises in the region, but this should be treated as a further form of management and one less harmful than accepting a status quo of blackmail.