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One thing we need to keep in mind while China is responding to the current crisis is that an event like N. Korean nuclear test affects power struggle inside Chinese leadership. China no longer has monolithic leader like Deng Xiao-ping or Mao Zedong who towers over everybody else. It is ruled by collective leadership made up of multiple factions, in which Hu Jintao has a little more power than other Politburo members. Everytime something like this happens, some factions are on the offensive, and others are put on the defensive.

Exactly. "China" is not the same as "North Korea", in that there's not one guy at the top looking down at the chessboard, and moving pieces at whim. China top leadership has become a lot more like the U.S. Congress, where everyone has a chess piece, and must work together to get things done. As the situation changes, the pieces will alter their tactics from offensive to defensive. Some situations will force moves that the players don't want, but they'll generally come to a consensus on how to get around problems.

The current Chinese system is an arcane and inflexible way to govern, but it's far less arbitrary than the days of the revolutionary leaders.

Some of y'all might actually want to do a bit of looking into the who and what of NK puppet mastering.

The NK was created by the USSR.
The USSR equipped, trained, organized the NK forces and lead them in the Korean War.
The NK system is based on an exaggerated Stalinist system.
The NK has never had any love for either China or Maoism.
The NK was a wholly owned subsidiary of the USSR up until the "fall of the wall".

Now, some may want to keep following along that rosy path that says because "communism was defeated" in the old USSR that Russia is now all civilized but that's pure, unadulterated, unprocessed manure.

Russia is as dangerous today as it has ever been. They may not have access to all the nukes they would never have used anyway, nor the deep ranks of tanks and artillery they couldn't supply well enough to have fielded in force anyway, but they are still waging war against "the west" by the very same proxies they've always used.

Ever wonder why this NK issue is so freekin similar to the "Cuban crisis"?

Same play-book is being used, so why shouldn't it be so similar in appearance and motivation?