Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

China's Korea policy 'in tatters,' as both North and South defy sanctions
Yahoo! News ^ | April 17, 2017

Posted on 04/18/2017 6:46:32 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster

China's Korea policy 'in tatters,' as both North and South defy sanctions

More than half a century ago, hundreds of thousands of Chinese soldiers died in the Korean War, fighting on the side of their Communist allies against the American-backed South.

Yet today, China finds itself in the uncomfortable position of falling out with both the Communist North and capitalist South of this troublesome peninsula, imposing sanctions on both countries but getting no satisfaction from either.

Yesterday, South Korea announced it would press ahead with the "swift deployment" of an American missile defense system despite relentless and vociferous Chinese opposition.

In February, China said it was cutting off coal imports from North Korea in accordance with sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council in a bid to convince the country to abandon its nuclear and missile programme. On Sunday, North Korea ignored China's pleadings not to raise regional tensions by conducting another missile test, albeit one that failed.

China has also imposed unofficial and unilateral sanctions against South Korea to persuade it not to deploy the missile defense system, experts say. On Monday, as Vice President Pence warned North Korea not to test U.S. resolve, South Korea’s acting president, Hwang Kyo-ahn, vowed to rapidly deploy that system, known as Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD).

(Excerpt) Read more at yahoo.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Front Page News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: china; nkorea; skorea
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-40 last
To: RinaseaofDs

USSR at the peak of its power couldn’t even control Cuba.


21 posted on 04/18/2017 9:33:59 AM PDT by LS ("Castles Made of Sand, Fall in the Sea . . . Eventually" (Hendrix))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 20 | View Replies]

To: Mariner
"It would be a short but exciting life for the NORK military should they decide to take us on."

You are correct. No matter how many people under arms the NORKs boast they have it is all meaningless. With us and South Korea's superior technology, plus the South Koreans have quite a large military force as well, the NORKs could not win a conventional war against us.

The problem is not one of military might, but one of geography. The capital Seoul is approximately 35 miles from the DMZ, within the limits of conventional artillery. It was devastated during the Korean War. The last time I was in Seoul was the 90s and at that time it was a city of 10 million people, I imagine it is more now. Can you imagine the loss of life that could possibly happen with the NORKS launching even conventional arms against South Korea?
22 posted on 04/18/2017 9:57:45 AM PDT by Old Teufel Hunden
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 18 | View Replies]

To: LS

You are partially making my point.

NK has literally nothing to lose. If they launch successfully, is that enough to strike back at China?

If Kim says he’s going to launch, do we simply take him at his word and strike first?

If we do, is that enough for China to strike back against us?


23 posted on 04/18/2017 9:58:13 AM PDT by RinaseaofDs (Truth, in a time of universal deceit, is courage)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 21 | View Replies]

To: RinaseaofDs

No. Big diff between a loose cannon and a nuke strike in your region. China won’t put up with that.

NORKS can’t hurt us yet.if we shoot down every test he can retaliate vs SK or China, but either would be suicidal.


24 posted on 04/18/2017 10:00:55 AM PDT by LS ("Castles Made of Sand, Fall in the Sea . . . Eventually" (Hendrix))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 23 | View Replies]

To: Mariner
"within the limits of conventional artillery"

Sorry, meant to say conventional missiles, not artillery.
25 posted on 04/18/2017 10:05:58 AM PDT by Old Teufel Hunden
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 18 | View Replies]

To: LS

Say you are right, and they can’t hurt us, and we are sure of it, but we shoot down their tests. They retaliate against SK.

Costs the US little, though the world is going to say we should have seen this coming. If half of the 63,000 artillery pieces on the DMZ work, the damage to SK is going to be substantial, though not permanent.

If they retaliate on the Chinese, that’s another matter. Nobody is going to cry much, given the Chinese gave them the weapons in the first place.

All of this hinges on the belief NK doesn’t have a nuke, and cannot deliver it. We better be right about this.


26 posted on 04/18/2017 10:10:29 AM PDT by RinaseaofDs (Truth, in a time of universal deceit, is courage)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 24 | View Replies]

To: Old Teufel Hunden

For artillery to be effective against Seoul they have to bunch it up at the DMZ. And most of that would still be out of range. Only the MRLS has the range to damage Seoul in a significant way.

Additionally, with immediate air supremacy, the US could drop thousands of cluster bombs from B-52s and B-1Bs in short order.

Artillery and rockets and armor are no match for the CBU-100 family of weapons. No match whatsoever.

Completely neutralized in a few hours.


27 posted on 04/18/2017 10:14:00 AM PDT by Mariner (War Criminal #18)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: RinaseaofDs

If the NORKS believed China did not have their back there would not continue with the missile and nuke testing. If we launch a conventional attack imo china would not get involved unless we penetrated their border or if the NORKS used nukes or other WMDs. Hopefully not against our fleet as I suspect we would lose most of it and things could escalate further. This has similarities to 1950. We have minimal Intel. We are in Asia where we have been worned to stay out of land wars. We need for China to step up and take this state out. I wonder the cost for this politically and economically verses the military cost and danger.


28 posted on 04/18/2017 10:17:44 AM PDT by Mouton (There is a new sheriff in town.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 23 | View Replies]

To: RinaseaofDs

. . . and people forget that it wasn’t that long ago (late 1980’s) that China was threatening to nuke Los Angeles and other cities on the west coast - now all of a sudden China is a good bud?


29 posted on 04/18/2017 10:18:20 AM PDT by atc23 (The Confederacy was the single greatest conservative resistance to federal authority ever)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: Mouton

That is the crux of my fear. Kim can’t be completely stupid. The reason why SK has deployed a missile defense system is because they don’t trust the Chinese to defend their national interests.

In the Gulf War, a SCUD impacted Israel at one point, and we persuaded the Israeli’s not to retaliate, or enter the conflict. Israel stood down. They bought into the notion the US would defend their interests in that case.

Kim persists because he’s being emboldened to continue increasing the pressure.

Kim’s not persuaded by China, and neither is SK, yet we should be willing to leave the security of the US mainland and Hawaii to the Chinese being effective with NK?

Again, assuming NK 1) doesn’t have a nuke, and 2) can’t deliver it.

If the assumptions are correct, then China can act in our interests I guess. SK clearly doesn’t believe these assumptions are correct. Their intelligence services have an existential stake in being right about NK.

Haven’t heard anything about Japan deploying their missile defense system yet.


30 posted on 04/18/2017 10:27:10 AM PDT by RinaseaofDs (Truth, in a time of universal deceit, is courage)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 28 | View Replies]

To: Jimmy The Snake
How can you complain about Missile Defense system? I look at it more like a Bullet Proof Vest.

The argument is you can make a first strike and then defend against a retaliatory response. Guess it sort of makes sense in an insane sort of way, because Reagan offered to create the defense and share it with the rest of the world.

31 posted on 04/18/2017 10:34:42 AM PDT by itsahoot (As long as there is money to be divided, there will be division.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: atc23

Economically, so much has changed for China. They really do need us in terms of keeping their bicycle economy afloat. They still have 29 ghost cities, where the entire city has been built, and nobody is living there.

They are a creditor of ours, but they have been selling off US debt for a while.

Xi is a different cat. China should be a world power, but they have 1.2 billion people to employ. They can’t print enough money to keep all those people fed and happy, which is why quite a few are trying to leave before it blows up.

Russia is holding a pair of 2’s economically as well. Balance sheet is a mess, and they are essentially a petrostate in a market where fracking has put many of their customers in a place where they can engage in something called tapered integration, where you continue to buy from your supplier until you no longer need them.

France has started fracking, for instance. So has Germany.

2008 did no favors. All of it was sparked by taking the Community Reinvestment Act to an obscene extreme. The CRA literally puts a gun to banks heads and makes them provide bad loans to diverse people and companies with little chance of paying it back. The audits are unbelievable, and very detailed. If a bank fails, not only are they fined, the news leaks and hits the bank’s goodwill. Not kidding.

2008 was such an avoidable affliction, and not much has been written or filmed about the effect of the meltdown on the rest of the world’s economy. It was bad here, it was so much worse everywhere else.

Then we had the temerity of suing Deutche Bank to the point of potentially closing their doors.

The rest of the world has a legitimate beef with the US. It explains some of the Obama apology tour, the immigration, and the rolling over that happened in the last eight years. I wouldn’t have done that. I would have crucified Warren Buffett and others in the public square instead, but that’s me.


32 posted on 04/18/2017 10:41:54 AM PDT by RinaseaofDs (Truth, in a time of universal deceit, is courage)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 29 | View Replies]

To: TigerLikesRooster

They also have no standing to tell S. Korea not to defend itself if Fat Boy lobs a missile their way.


33 posted on 04/18/2017 11:00:04 AM PDT by prairiebreeze (Don't be afraid to see what you see. -- Ronald Reagan)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Sasparilla
China can’t say this is not what they wanted

It's exactly what they have always wanted. Without China's support North Korea would quickly collapse and this gives China veto power over everything of consequence done there. They use that control to advance China's interests.

But things are changing - North Korea is on the verge of having a workable nuke/missile system that not only threatens S.Korea, Japan and us, it threatens China. And they don't like that. But they haven't figured out what to do about it yet. Right now it looks like they are leaning towards having us pay them to allow us to solve the lil Kim problem for them.
34 posted on 04/18/2017 11:05:18 AM PDT by Garth Tater (What's mine is mine.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies]

To: RinaseaofDs

There are a million scenarios a day we “better be right about.” This is no different than assuming the Pakis have a stable government, or that the Indians don’t go all burning bohdi on us.


35 posted on 04/18/2017 11:07:24 AM PDT by LS ("Castles Made of Sand, Fall in the Sea . . . Eventually" (Hendrix))
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: itsahoot
Reagan had to offer the Soviets Star Wars. Otherwise they would have launched a first strike to prevent their ICBMs from becoming irrelevant.
36 posted on 04/18/2017 12:16:21 PM PDT by justa-hairyape (The user name is sarcastic. Although at times it may not appear that way.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 31 | View Replies]

To: Jimmy The Snake
How can you complain about Missile Defense system?

China is really afraid we will use the THAAD system to stop them from attacking Japan, if they choose to do so some day as a diversion from their internal economic problems. They don't like to lose any tactical options - even unrealistic ones.

37 posted on 04/18/2017 12:22:22 PM PDT by Mr. Jeeves ([CTRL]-[GALT]-[DELETE])
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: TigerLikesRooster

One worry is the nature of the NK deep defense fortifications only 35 miles from Seoul. It would be a nightmare to assault conventionally. The heavy artillery is thoroughly dug in. It the NKs began firing on Seoul then it would take tactical nukes to silence the guns. And when that happens it’s anyone’s guess what follows.


38 posted on 04/18/2017 12:45:46 PM PDT by Seruzawa (I keel you V1orga feelthy.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Garth Tater

...Right now it looks like they are leaning towards having us pay them to allow us to solve the lil Kim problem for them....

Like sending cousin Guido over to break his kneecaps?


39 posted on 04/18/2017 4:12:41 PM PDT by Sasparilla ( I'm Not tired of Winning)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 34 | View Replies]

To: Old Teufel Hunden

“The last time I was in Seoul was the 90s and at that time it was a city of 10 million people, I imagine it is more now.”

The metropolitan Seoul area is just under 26 million people. If the NORKS started shelling the area they’d potentially kill millions before they could be stopped even if stopping them only took 20 or 30 minutes.

Imagine if they used chemical weapons. The Norks have at least 10,000 artillery tubes trained on Seoul not to mention (I think) short ranged Scud type missiles.

The Norks can’t really win a major war but they could kill a lot of people.


40 posted on 04/18/2017 5:29:43 PM PDT by Fai Mao (I still want to see The PIAPS in prison)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-40 last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson