China is not a country like any other. The president can not control the red generals or their families. Each of them has an army and owns the production facilities in their districts. If they want to sell missiles or oil or uranium than the fact that the president of China has promised they won’t means nothing. The oil is being sold by allies of the old Chinese regime, which was much closer to the North than the present regime. It’s an internal matter.
Now, what could be done? Fire a torpedo filled with flash powder into the ships as a warning. Get on the radio and tell them they will be fired on. Or, better still, get the present regime to patrol the areas where the oil will be offloaded onto North Korean ships. Or, board and seize the North Korean ships. Every action carries its own risks of escalation. Of the list here, I think getting the Chinese Navy to do the work is the best. However, that may be a huge risk of open conflict between the various Chinese cliques.
Good point. There is also a sometimes mindboggling level of corruption in China, not to mention a mindset of what I guess I would call “disregard for consequences” among many Chinese, NOT driven by desperation or ignorance, that equals the worst that can be found anywhere else in the world.
I would add to your list “covert Chinese action resulting in sudden & unexplained (publicly) disappearance of certain shipping companies’ owners.”
If there is solid evidence that these oil shipments are occurring in the manner you and I suspect they are, the next Trump tweet perhaps should be “Big loss of face if Chinese government cannot control rogue oil shipments to N. Korea.”
Parallel article w/ spy sat photos here:
https://news.sky.com/story/president-trump-disappointed-in-china-after-north-korea-oil-deal-11187645
The article says the S. Koreans claim 30 such “instances” since October — this is no small scale operation.
I would think our surveillance people could determine forthwith if petro of some sort was being transferred...