A few points on North Korea and South Korea

A few points on North Korea and South Korea

by Gregory C. Eaves

Aug. 8, 2017

 

 

English-language press in the U.S. has been reporting on North Korean missile tests recently, as if those were a dangerous thing. Here’s an amateur foreign affairs analyst’s take on things.

 

First, PyeongYang cannot conquer Seoul. There will be no unification under Northern auspices. PyeongYang is ideologically bunk. The 51 million Southerners wouldn’t stand for it. Also, the North doesn’t have the ammunition or the prison camps — or even the political will — to kill or imprison that many Southerners. Shopping at Olive Young is more powerful than fascist police-state propaganda. The towers of glass and steel can be rebuilt. In short, South Korean society has nothing to fear.

 

Second, PyeongYang has chosen Washington, D.C., as its nominal enemy. The U.S. is different enough and far enough away to be an “Alien Other” to the North Korean people, and yet still close enough so that the government in PyeongYang can pretend that it’s a threat. Yes, the U.S. Air Force did bomb — severely bomb — northern Korea from 1950 to 1953, and, yes, bombs are quite scary. That’s why the North uses a lot of tunnels. They’ve been psychologically scarred: put everything underground. Nonetheless, the U.S. has largely been a force for stability in Northeast Asia since the mid-1950s. Notice that no borders have changed, trade flourishes among belligerents, talks continue and peace reigns.

 

Note that the U.S. invasions of Iraq or Afghanistan, or its meddling in Nicaragua or Panama earlier, do not equate to an invasion of North Korea. Those are very different parts of the world, with very different rules of engagement. Pentagon, Foggy Bottom, beltway analysts, Seoul analysts, Tokyo analysts and Beijing analysts all agree on one thing: none of them have ever predicted that there would be a U.S. invasion or an ROK invasion northward. That would only be in response to a PyeongYang launch — which is equally unlikely — or if there’s a USS Maine or a USS Maddox sailing around. A reasonable threat of violence is needed for deterrence to work, and we are therefore required to believe that we’re going to be attacked, so this means that no one’s going to invade anyone. Deterrence is all bark, no bite. Jaw, jaw, not war, war.

 

Third, since PyeongYang has chosen Washington as its enemy (in a move to shore up domestic support) and since it now has missiles, this puts PyeongYang and Washington in an “assured annihilation versus unacceptable damage” relationship (h/t Siegfried Hecker). In the case of hot war, PyeongYang is assured of its own annihilation whereas Washington is only assured of unacceptable damage, and probably only to its ally(ies?). This hot war would cost 24 hours of artillery barrages on Seoul: maybe 10’000 deaths and the associated destruction. Water and internet should be up and running again within 24 hours. This isn’t Damascus or Mosul. Seoul functions. That would be the inexpensive price for reunification under Seoul/ Washington auspices.

 

The elephant in the room

 

The larger trends in the ethnic Han Chinese world are that the Communist Party of China, in control in the Manchu capital of Beijing since 1949, is losing control. There’re environment disasters, rampant corruption, no indigenous technology, the navy is reliant on old Soviet technology, the Han people are trapped geographically by mountains and deserts with no space to expand, and even the social space and the local art scene are being trapped politically. I mean, come one: if you ban the most petty and innocuous useless-cat-photo website that’s out there (Facebook), what sort of message are you sending to your citizens?

 

Beijing is unloved, un-trusted and un-believed by its most important citizens: the globalised ethnic Han elite who live in a string of 10 provinces from Guangdong up to Liaoning. Together, this predominantly Han Chinese population makes up a nation of 543 million (theoretically the third largest country in the world, after today’s mainland China and then India) and has a USD $6.22 trillion economy (theoretically the fourth largest economy in the world [by nominal GDP], after the U.S., the EU and today’s mainland China).

 

These rich, globalized Chinese can see only the following: China is a giant one-party state; China has an in-name-only communist/ socialist political party at its head, when in fact it’s a dystopian one-party state; China strictly censors media; China has no human rights; China has criminal activity eating away at social norms; China has vast fields of corruption across all social tiers; China has horrible environmental problems; and, finally, China teaches ethnic Han bigotry and racism to shore up a teetering polity.

 

Which brings us back to Korea. Reunification on the Korean Peninsula under Seoul/ Washington auspices will lead to the fall of Beijing. All other countries peripheral to the Han world — Vietnam, Tibet/ Qinghai, Xinjiang, Mongolia, Manchuria, the Soviet Far East, Korea — are either divided (North & South Korea, Mongolia & Nei Mongol), occupied by the Han (Tibet/ Qinghai, Xinjiang, Manchuria) or under control of another one-party state (Vietnam, the Soviet Far East). Mainland China has only one democracy on its border, Taiwan, and that’s only a maritime border, and maybe Hong Kong (laugh~, #notdemocratic, #occupied_by_Beijing). Mainland China has only one chance for a true open democracy on its border: a Korean Peninsula reunited under Seoul/ Washington auspices.

 

Toward whose heart is the knife pointed?

 

Beginning in the 1880s, and developing in 1894-1895 and then in 1904-1905, Japan had to seize Korea before Russia did. Russia was building train tracks across Manchuria (through Harbin) to link Vladivostok with Lake Baikal. Japan had to secure Korea first. The Meiji generation genro saw that the Korean Peninsula was a knife pointed at the Japanese heart and that it would give Russia direct access to Japanese waters. (China, much like today, wasn’t a threat to anyone. Russia was the worry.)

 

Similarly, a reunited Korea is a democratic knife pointed at the Putin-Russian emptiness of Siberia and the crumbling Xi-Chinese Han world. Putin meddling in Korea will be less than in Ukraine, because Putin already has all of Siberia as a buffer. (There’s no buffer with eastern Ukraine, so he had to intervene.) That leaves Xi-Chinese meddling.

 

Beijing needs to keep the democratic Korean knife as far away as possible from the dictatorial Beijing heart. So Beijing continues to support PyeongYang, no matter what. The alternative of a reunified Korea under Seoul/ Washington auspices is too great a risk for dictatorial Beijing to bear.

 

Situation normal: nothing will happen

 

Continuing into the second half of 2017, PyeongYang will continue to jump up and down, begging for attention and money. Beijing will continue to say that PyeongYang and Washington both need to calm down, pretending they are equals. Putin doesn’t even know where Vladivostok is, let alone Sakhalin. Tokyo will remain wary and armed, but will do nothing. Washington will continue to do nothing: no one — honestly — cares about East Asia, except for cheap T-shirts and fat Kim JeongEun jokes. Seoul will keep calm and carry on. It has the most to lose and has the least control over the situation.

 

Build a new world: South Korea removes its side of the DMZ

 

The USFK is scheduled to move from downtown Seoul (Yongsan Garrison) to PyeongTaek/ Osan (Camp Humphreys). What with technology and better military practice, U.S. troops aren’t required along the corridors of EuiJeong-bu or CheorWeon as tripwires. In 20th century war games, like the Fulda Gap, those were the two valleys down which Gog and Magog would come. However, with our more Rumsfeldian armed forces, and with wealth, speed and tech, the ROK/ U.S. side can remain calm and safe with U.S. troops in Humphreys. Also, politically, it really helps out the South. So no Yanks north of the Han River anymore.

 

ROK troops can retreat to their bases. Remove the entire southern half of the DMZ and the world would change.

 

North Korea’s strength lies in artillery focused on Seoul.

 

1. Remove the entire southern side of the DMZ and the impact of the artillery barrage that will hit Seoul for 24 hours is politically lessened.

 

2. This would allow refugees to flow southward, not into Manchuria, putting less stress on Beijing. What’s the No. 1 rule about doing anything in Northeast Asia? Don’t stress Beijing. If Beijing gets stressed, you’ll likely fail. So let the refugees come southward, not into Manchuria, and Beijing will be less unpleased.

 

Seoul needs to set up a refugee processing system. Northerners fleeing south will get some stipend. They will retain title to their property in the North. No pre-1950 property titles (held by old grandpas or families in the South for land their families used to own up North) will be recognized.

 

3. Assure Beijing beforehand — and quite clearly and repeatedly — that there will be no new U.S. bases in the North. Read my lips. No new bases. (The truth is that we don’t need ’em. With a democratic Korea, Beijing will fall. Who needs bases now?)

 

4. Get South Korean citizen groups organized to stand just south of the border to offer blankets, water bottles, shoes and other donations to families walking southward.

 

 

If no families walk south, then Seoul knows it can make peace with PyeongYang. That would mean that Northerners are, actually, happy up North and that they want to stay. Fine. No problem. Let’s open embassies and be friends.

 

If, however, streams of people walk southward, Seoul knows it’s morally right. Seoul is now Berlin. History is on its side. Like Kim DaeJung said, democracy and light will prevail against dictatorships and darkness. (Or maybe that was Fukuyama?)

 

In short, the ruined edifice of Northeast Asian governance, still locked in the well-worn embrace of August 1945, must be demolished in order to be rebuilt anew. Fix Korea, and you fix Beijing. However, like layered pickup sticks, all hands are holding back and are careful not to jostle the pile. No one can move. So now, it’s South Korea’s turn. South Korea can cut this Gordian knot by removing its side of the DMZ.