US confusion on Pyongyang
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson recently wrapped up a five-day tour of East Asia, his first official visit to the region, but a sense of ambiguity and insecurity still lingers. Several contentious trade and security issues were on the discussion table, but dealing with belligerent North Korea still seems like a pill US foreign policymakers find hard to swallow.
Mr Tillerson, the former chief executive of the energy giant ExxonMobil, made contrasting remarks on the US approach to handling North Korea during the second and third legs of his tour. In South Korea, he remarked ominously that Washington’s “strategic patience” policy with the regime was over and pre-emptive military action was “on the table” given that the threat from the North’s weapons had reached an alarming level.
But he seemed to soften his stance in China, a longtime ally of the pariah regime in Pyongyang. He struck a more positive chord, saying the US and China were determined “to work together to convince the North Korean government to choose a better path and a different future for its people”.
While it may be understandable that he chose to make two different statements because the Chinese and South Korean governments have different approaches toward their neighbour, such inconsistency reflects a lack of clarity in US foreign policy on tackling Pyongyang’s missile development and nuclear warhead programme. Many questions remain, but one that sends shivers down the spine is what kind of war would result if the US were to retaliate against Pyongyang’s defiance through weaponry.
It didn’t help when US President Donald Trump resorted to Twitter to smear China while Mr Tillerson was in Beijing, saying “China has done little to help” rein in misbehaving North Korea. Although Mr Tillerson did not respond to a query about his boss’s inflammatory tweet, this suggests a muddled approach to diplomacy and could fuel greater mistrust between the US and China.
Not long after the dust from Mr Tillerson’s trip had settled, the pariah regime tested the waters with another missile launch. Though South Korean defence officials said the launch was a failure, I would say the timing signals North Korea’s insistence on further developing its capability, defying imposed international sanctions and the annual “Foal Eagle” military drills between South Korea and the US.
Whether Mr Trump and Mr Tillerson like it or not, the US clearly needs to engage actively with China and hope Chinese authorities would persuade Kim Jong-un and his compatriots to disavow their nuclear proliferation ambitions. However, Washington under Republican control has not demonstrated a sincere attempt to befriend Beijing so far, a serious misstep that could have significant repercussions on Mr Trump’s vow to “make America great again”.
Even Mr Trump’s labelling of China as a “currency manipulator” or threatening to slap a 45% tariff on Chinese steel imports cannot rattle Beijing as thoroughly as Washington’s decision to deploy the THAAD (Terminal High-Altitude Area Defence) anti-missile system in South Korea, seen as an attempt to defend South Korea and Japan from possible North Korean attacks.
While the US has insisted that THAAD deployment has nothing to do with China, Beijing thinks otherwise as the move could threaten its security status quo and possibly derail its territorial ambitions in the South China Sea.
Tensions between China and South Korea have now moved up a notch, with Beijing lashing out against high-profile Korean firms in entertainment, consumer goods, travel and online trade, with Lotte suffering heavy losses as a result.
While China, South Korea and the US are all irked by North Korea’s growing impudence, Beijing seems to be the most comfortable as the North’s political dynasty has not been destablised. China might even have the upper hand over the US when it comes to North Korea as Mr Tillerson’s tour has not produced anything concrete in dealing with the warmonger regime.
Whether it is going to be constructive dialogue or a more drastic course of action, the Trump administration should develop a clear-cut policy toward North Korea to avoid repeated failures of efforts to defuse tensions on the Korean Peninsula experienced by past American governments.
It is definitely not child’s play as relations with Japan, South Korea and China have to be taken into consideration, but the longer the North Korea issue remains in limbo, the less leverage the US has in its tit-for-tat strategy.