Why is China so supportive of NK?

Marcus Noland

By Kang Hyun-kyung

Staff reporter

Why is it so difficult for China to join the South Korea-led initiative to bring North Korea to the U.N. Security Council and to force the North to take responsibility for its provocative act?

In a nutshell, North Korea is useful for China and therefore the latter wants to keep the former intact, just the way it is, observed Marcus Noland, deputy director of the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

In an interview Friday for the Peterson Perspective series on the rising tensions on the Korean Peninsula, Noland said Beijing doesn't share Washington's interest on the Korean Peninsula in that the former likes to have a divided Korea.

"China can basically have North Korea do things such as cooperate in nuclear weapons programs with Pakistan and then maintain possible deniability," the North Korea watcher said.

"North Korean bellicosity can go too far and create a backlash for China. That's what we see now (in the wake of the sinking of the naval vessel which killed 46 sailors)."

Pakistan and India are nuclear rivals, and India and China are in a rivalry, too.

India tried to bolster ties with the U.S. "to hedge against potential hostilities" with rising power China.

Brajesh Mishra, a former national security advisor for India, was quoted as saying in an interview with the Wall Street Journal that "China is trying to become a number one and that this is the seed of conflict between China, India and the United States."

Given the power relations, North Korea's nuclear cooperation with Pakistan poses a common threat to India and the United States, and this probably serves China's interest.

The Obama administration gave top priority to the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons.

Noland's analysis came at a time when Seoul has been courting China, the North's closest ally, to vote for the campaign to bring the North to justice at the international level after a multinational investigation team charged it with torpedoing the vessel.

China's latest reaction over the maritime disaster was that it "will decide its position on the incident in an objective and fair manner, while reviewing the reports of an international investigation and the reactions from other countries."

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao made the announcement of the updated China's position on the sinking of the warship Cheonan during talks with President Lee Myung-bak on Friday.

Foreign policy experts here said the recent stance of China hints at a subtle change from its previous staunch defense of North Korea.

But they said it will be hasty to conclude that this indicates that China will take South Korea's side if the South refers the maritime disaster case to the UNSC.

With respect to North Korea's motive, Noland analyzed that its next leader Kim Jong-un, the third son of incumbent leader Kim Jong-il, probably tried to prove himself by allowing his deputies to commit the provocation.

"The younger Kim doesn't have any military credentials. He doesn't have any nationalistic credentials. And to use a kind of gangster language, this could have been a way for Kim Jong-un to make his bones," Noland said.

"His father blew up an airliner, (and) he is now sinking a ship."

North Korean agents blew up KAL 858 in 1987, which took the lives of 115 people on board.

Noland went on to say that the provocative act is a way of establishing that the younger Kim is a real man and he is being credited as a young general for planning and executing the action.
hkang@koreatimes.co.kr