China & Korea – Page 4

May 24, 2012

If Ever so Briefly, China Picks a Public Fight with North Korea

Not that it matters much to the Chinese government, but North Korea’s seizure of those 28 or 29 fishermen has pissed off a lot of Chinese netizens. No, the Chinese government isn’t about to bow to the demands of Weibo commenters, but the other side of this cause-and-effect relationship is interesting. This outrage, as temporary as it’s sure to be, has to be a consequence of a deliberate decision by the Chinese government to make a public issue of this...

China & Korea

April 29, 2012

What an Interesting Coincidence: China Arms N. Korea, We Arm Taiwan!

Shortly after the disclosure that China sold missile transporters to North Korea, in violation of UNSCR 1695, 1718, and 1874, the White House decides to reconsider a decision about weapons sales to Taiwan: Taiwan said it welcomed the pledge by the United States to reconsider a proposed sale of new fighter jets to the island, a defence deal likely to upset Beijing. Taiwan has been pushing for the purchase of 66 new US-made F-16 fighter jets, but the deal has...

China & Korea/Missiles/Proliferation/Taiwan

June 7, 2011

Will China Finally Pay a Price for Enabling North Korea?

A staffer for the new, improved, media-savvy Republican Staff for the House Foreign Affairs Committee forwards some interesting video clips of its senior members talking about U.S. policy toward China. First up is Committee Chair Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who calls President Obama’s treatment of the Dalai Lama “shameful.” Next, Dan Burton contrasts this with the effusive welcome given to the ChiCom emperor, who used the occasion to embarrass his hosts and score points with nationalist, anti-American netizens at home. Finally, Chris...

China/China & Korea/U.S. Politics

January 18, 2011

The Great Wall of Rason: Kim Jong Il’s Grand Sell-Out

Over the weekend, as I was poring over relatively recent new imagery on Google Earth, I spotted the chilling sight of a fence line — the kind of fence line that until now, I’ve only seen around North Korea’s political prison camps. This was a mystery to me, since I believed that I’d located and delineated the last of the large prison camps years ago. I followed the fence line, wondering what I’d found, until I’d traced it for the...

China & Korea/NK Economics

January 10, 2011

North Korea Murders Five Refugees Inside Chinese Territory

My God: Five North Koreans were shot dead and two others wounded by North Korean border guards on the Chinese side of the border when they tried to flee the Stalinist country, a source said Sunday. The high-level source in Changbai in the Chinese province of Jilin said the seven had left Hyesan, Yanggang Province and walked across the frozen Apnok (or Yalu) River and reached the Chinese side on Dec. 14. But five of them died instantly under intensive...

China & Korea/Refugees

December 12, 2010

I wonder if China is pleased with Japan’s new plans to expand defense spending, deploy more PAC-3 Patriot missile batteries, build more submarines to patrol disputed waters, and arm more Aegis cruisers with Standard-3 missiles. Again, there is even talk of acquiring nuclear weapons. China has only its own reckless backing of North Korea to blame for this. Me, I’d be happier if we sold the same types of gear to Taiwan, which as I take delight in repeating, happens...

China & Korea/Japan/Korean War II/Regime Change/Washington Views

December 10, 2010

China’s Very Bad Week

I’ll begin this post by offering my congratulations to Liu Xiabao, and extending my hope that he’ll soon collect his Nobel Peace Prize in person. In recent years, Nobel Committee has tarnished the prize with some poor choices, and it may be that a man of Liu’s courage and character lends the Nobel more credibility than the other way around. Even President Obama had to concede that Liu deserved the prize far more than he ever did. The last regime...

China & Korea/Korean War II/Yeonpyeong Attack

December 1, 2010

I’ll bet China could stop North Korea from giving the Dalai Lama a visa!

The nation’s top military officer challenged China to respond forcefully to North Korea’s recent attacks on South Korea and rejected Beijing’s calls for a return to negotiations with Kim Jong Il’s regime. “There is significant leverage [China] could apply to avoiding escalations and improving this troubling situation,” Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at a Washington think tank on Wednesday. “We need China to step up. [Stars and Stripes, Kevin Baron] China is just about...

China/China & Korea/Yeonpyeong Attack

November 30, 2010

Shen Dingli is a man who really knows the value of a fish.

Shen Dingli has become my favorite poster child for showing just what a bunch of maleficent assholes run China today, and in the aftermath of the Yeonpyeong shelling, he does not disappoint: Shen Dingli, a security expert at Fudan University in Shanghai, was more direct in laying the blame on Seoul. “South Korea provoked the Yeonpyeong conflict first,” he said. “The area where this incident happened is South Korean territory from a ‘South Korean perspective’. But it is a disputed...

China/China & Korea/Yeonpyeong Attack

November 26, 2010

Before We Start Bombing North Korea, Let’s Try Turning It into Afghanistan

I don’t know about you, but when North Korea decided to shell South Korean homes and kill South Korean civilians in South Korean territory, my balance of risks shifted. We’ve always known that if U.S. and South Korean forces attack North Korea, North Korea would respond by trying to kill as many American and South Korean civilians as possible. Estimates that this would result in hundreds of thousands of casualties are probably worst-case scenarios, but a toll of several thousand...

China & Korea/NK Military/Regime Change/Yeonpyeong Attack

November 23, 2010

Thoughts on North Korea’s Shelling of Yeonpyeong-Do (Updated: Video, President Lee Calls for Retaliation)

Since I served in Korea years ago, I’ve feared that North Korea would try a limited artillery strike as a way to raise the stakes. It looks like my fears have been realized: South Korea says two marines have been killed and 16 others injured in a North Korean bombardment of a South Korean island near the countries’ disputed western sea border. South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said Tuesday that it returned fire and scrambled fighter jets in response....

China & Korea/Yeonpyeong Attack

November 4, 2010

Congressional Research Service: China Ignoring U.N. Sanctions on N. Korea

A Foreign Policy blog links to what looks to be a very interesting report from the Congressional Research Service (in pdf) on the effect of, and various nations’ compliance with, international sanctions against North Korea. Considerate fellow that I am, I decided to link the report so you could start reading it before I even find the time to read it myself. Not surprisingly, China’s compliance gets low marks: The report makes clear that China has almost zero interest in...

China & Korea/Sanctions

October 28, 2010

President Lee Leases Tokdo to Japan for 100 Years to Build Porn Studio

Oh, wait — that’s not it. It was North Korea that actually leased two islands to China to build (what else?) casinos. Yes, casinos. File that one under “stuff Chinese people like.” It might also go under “stuff that North Korean money launderers like.” The difference being, the islands of Hwan Geum Pyong and Ui Hwa Do actually consist of arable farmland. Not that North has any shortage of that, of course. I eagerly await the Hankyoreh’s reaction and the...

China & Korea/Korean Politics/Korean Society

August 18, 2010

North Korean Fighter Pilot Dies in Possible Defection Attempt

A fighter plane from North Korea has crashed in China, killing its pilot. The pilot may have been trying to flee North Korea. Yonhap has a photograph of the aircraft, which has a delta wing characteristic of a Soviet MiG-21 or an early-model ChiCom F-7. [Yonhap photo] China may seem an unlikely destination for a defector who must have known that he’d be repatriated and killed if caught, but Yonhap, quoting South Korean government sources, claims that the pilot was...

China & Korea/NK Military

July 28, 2010

Plan B Watch: A Shot Across China’s Bow?

Hey, did the State Department threaten the Bank of China and the Bank of Shanghai? Or to put the question more bluntly, did someone just grow a pair? A diplomatic source here said the U.S. will blacklist more North Korean entities and individuals in the coming weeks so that international financial institutions would cut off ties with them. Any foreign banks refusing to sever business ties with the North Korean entities and individuals in question will have U.S. financial institutions...

China/China & Korea/Counterfeiting/Money Laundering/Sanctions/U.S. Law

July 28, 2010

Why There Is a Cold War in Asia

When someone escapes from North Korea and makes contact with South Koreans, and when China then repatriates that person to North Korea, the North Korean authorities typically execute that person, or send him to die in a prison camp. China has known this for years. That’s why the Chinese government is an accessory to murder when it does things like this: China has repatriated an 81-year-old former South Korean prisoner of war who had fled North Korea decades after being...

China/China & Korea/Korean War/Refugees

July 21, 2010

Will a North Korean Attack Win the Yellow Sea for China?

Is the Yellow Sea a Chinese lake? Under ordinary circumstances, I’d understand China’s complaints about a U.S. naval exercise in an inland sea near its shores. It’s not as if I’d want Chinese ships in the Gulf of Mexico, either, but these are not ordinary circumstances. This time, North Korea has sunk a South Korean warship, and China has both shielded North Korea from any consequences for that attack and continued to provide necessary financial support to the regime that...

China/China & Korea

July 12, 2010

China’s North Korean Puppet Is Getting Away With Murder … Again (Updated, Bumped)

[Update 12 Jul 2010: I’ve located the full text of the Presidential Statement, and contrary to reports I linked below, it does use the word “attack.” It takes note of “the findings of the Joint Civilian-Military Investigation Group led by the ROK with the participation of five nations, which concluded that the DPRK was responsible for sinking the Cheonan” before noting North Korea’s denial. But because the statement is completely toothless, none of this was terribly upsetting to the North...

"United" Nations/Cheonan Incident/China & Korea

Category: China & Korea