Is there any chance that China could absorb NK? Possibly as an autonomous zone or client state?
I don’t think so. For one, the Koreans north and south realize that absorption into china means the utter destruction of their self-identity. For another, the Chinese don’t want the mess that North Korea is — also, getting a radical communist state would only be a problem for the chinese oligarchy. they would prefer to have this stick to wag at the west — that they control but pretend to not control