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Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

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Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#11

Post by Spooky23 »

ams6110 wrote: post #4

> It was in 1956 that Beijing realized it had to go easy on Pyongyang, despite Kim’s maddening obstinacy, because the alternative was to surrender the country to the Soviet influence. Well there is no Soviet influence anymore, so how does that have relevance today? > Like Mao in 1956, Xi is tired of North Korea, but he is keen to emphasize that China won’t crack the whip on anyone’s behalf. So they would prefer the U…

The Korea situation bogs down other potential powers like Japan and South Korea. That makes it easier to dominate the region.

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#12

Post by komali2 »

Endama wrote: post #3

As a Korean American, this conflict has always been so strange to me. My family members fought in this war, my grandfather ran from his village, in the middle of the night, to join the US-led Korean Army so that he wouldn't be conscripted by NK as they moved south. My mom's father joined as an intelligence officer and later continued on to work in the middle east for the US gov. That left his wife (my grandmother) to…

Hah, I wonder if you're my coworker, we just had this argument during lunch today (about whether NK missiles are a threat to us in Mountain View).

>What I hear from my native-born Korean friends is a lot of nonchalance. The NK threat is all bluster, no action. Nothing is ever going to happen.

I remember this from my time living in Japan and Taiwan - everyone was convinced NK was not a threat because it hadn't been... in their lifetimes.

I see it here in the States too - "The USA is immune to revolution / constitutional crisis / splitting into a confederacy / totalitarianism." Intelligent people can read history books and know these things happened in the past, but these things can then seem like "the stuff that happens in history book." They're not real, that's not real life stuff.

I heard it from a close family friend about heart attacks, and then he had one, and then it became real. For him. And his family. But they remain unreal to the other morbidly obese people I know. Car crashes, heat stroke, being sued to bankruptcy, etc. Anything even slightly outside the norm, we're generally incapable of internalizing and planning for. It's just too "unreal."

I don't know how to solve this, I just observe it and do my best to adopt a mindset for myself that nothing is too "unreal" to happen, especially if it has happened before or to other people.

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#13

Post by [deleted] »

ams6110 wrote: post #4

> It was in 1956 that Beijing realized it had to go easy on Pyongyang, despite Kim’s maddening obstinacy, because the alternative was to surrender the country to the Soviet influence. Well there is no Soviet influence anymore, so how does that have relevance today? > Like Mao in 1956, Xi is tired of North Korea, but he is keen to emphasize that China won’t crack the whip on anyone’s behalf. So they would prefer the U…

[deleted]

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#14

Post by vkou »

rl3 wrote: post #2

> Mao claimed Kim, who “still does the Stalin thing,” appalled him. “He brooks no word of disagreement and kills all who tries to oppose him,” Mao said. That's rich. EDIT: For the assholes who put this comment at -2, have a history lesson: Mao Zedong was responsible for approximately 40 million deaths.[0][1][2] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mao_Zedong [1] http://necrometrics.com/20c5m.htm#Mao [2] https://www.wash…

National concerns are more important then whether or not you're a hypocrite.

At least, that's the justification that gets trotted out whenever an important politician gets caught in a lie.

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#15

Post by wangii »

all NK wants, according to what I've read so far, is a 'normal' relationship with US, a promise not to overthrow the leadership/govt. is it a ridiculous request given US happily has Saudi as an important ally?

here is an interesting review by former Deputy of Chinese Foreign Affair Minister: https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-korean-nuclear-issue-...

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#16

Post by vintageseltzer »

Endama wrote: post #3

As a Korean American, this conflict has always been so strange to me. My family members fought in this war, my grandfather ran from his village, in the middle of the night, to join the US-led Korean Army so that he wouldn't be conscripted by NK as they moved south. My mom's father joined as an intelligence officer and later continued on to work in the middle east for the US gov. That left his wife (my grandmother) to…

A big reason for the doom and gloom narrative that you constantly hear in the US is government-media propaganda efforts to manufacture citizens' consent for constant war in order to fuel the military-industrial complex. This has been happening since at least the 50s.

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#17

Post by _ptgt »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #8
ams6110 wrote: post #4

> It was in 1956 that Beijing realized it had to go easy on Pyongyang, despite Kim’s maddening obstinacy, because the alternative was to surrender the country to the Soviet influence. Well there is no Soviet influence anymore, so how does that have relevance today? > Like Mao in 1956, Xi is tired of North Korea, but he is keen to emphasize that China won’t crack the whip on anyone’s behalf. So they would prefer the U…

The US can't go in without either a direct act of war by North Korea or a UN resolution, anything else would allow China to declare war and that would be the US start of WWIII. Removing Kim would just provoke a new round of discussion about a unified Korea an China loosening control over Burma and other areas. They would be a five minute hero with negative long term results.

This is a pretty big misunderstanding of the situation imo. The reason the US won't directly strike NK is because of the risk to Seoul. It has nothing to do the UN (which is essentially a useless and meaningless body at this point, as Russia and China don't agree with the West on almost literally anything). Moreover, China isn't going to risk a war with the US over NK.

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#18

Post by _ptgt »

wangii wrote: post #15

all NK wants, according to what I've read so far, is a 'normal' relationship with US, a promise not to overthrow the leadership/govt. is it a ridiculous request given US happily has Saudi as an important ally? here is an interesting review by former Deputy of Chinese Foreign Affair Minister: https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-korean-nuclear-issue-...

NK (and every other autocratic regime in history) has a history of not being true to their word. We've played the appeasement game with them before and it failed.

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#19

Post by vkou »

_ptgt wrote: post #17
boomboomsubban wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US can't go in without either a direct act of war by North Korea or a UN resolution, anything else would allow China to declare war and that would be the US start of WWIII. Removing Kim would just provoke a new round of discussion about a unified Korea an China loosening control over Burma and other areas. They would be a five minute hero with negative long term results.

This is a pretty big misunderstanding of the situation imo. The reason the US won't directly strike NK is because of the risk to Seoul. It has nothing to do the UN (which is essentially a useless and meaningless body at this point, as Russia and China don't agree with the West on almost literally anything). Moreover, China isn't going to risk a war with the US over NK.

The United States risked a nuclear war with the USSR over Cuba. What makes you 100% certain that China won't risk a war over North Korea?

North Korea is an important buffer state for China.

Re: Why Won’t China Help with North Korea? Remember 1956

#20

Post by ourmandave »

Endama wrote: post #3

As a Korean American, this conflict has always been so strange to me. My family members fought in this war, my grandfather ran from his village, in the middle of the night, to join the US-led Korean Army so that he wouldn't be conscripted by NK as they moved south. My mom's father joined as an intelligence officer and later continued on to work in the middle east for the US gov. That left his wife (my grandmother) to…

The North Korean threat is all bluster, no action. Nothing is ever going to happen.

All that bluster is a very dangerous game and I don't understand why Kim plays it. It would be Mutually Assured Destruction without the Mutually, unless China joined in.

My thought is he wants The Bomb so he doesn't go the way of Sadam, Gaddafi, or Noriega if he's considered "no longer useful."

I think we're on a very short path to a nuclear armed South Korea. But that's like putting missiles in Cuba. D=

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