China's Burden

China Seems to Be Proposing to Serve as the Guardian of the North Korean Regime, Which Is Under Threat of Attack From the U.s. Because of Its Defiant Nuclear Tests, Provided It Denuclearises. 
 

- Atul Aneja

FACED WITH INTENSE PRESSURE FROM THE United States to denuclearise North Korea, reinforced by effective gunboat diplomacy and other forms of coercion in the Korean waters, China is engaged in a feverish exercise to protect its core interests in North Korea and the surrounding areas in the Asia-Pacific.

Essentially, Beijing’s response to an effective show of strength by the domestically beleaguered Trump Administration has boiled down to fusing two equally important goals: ensuring that North Korea is nuclear weapons free and ensuring the preservation of the regime there.

In redefining the ground rules in North Korea, the Chinese had to ensure that they were not caught flatfooted. Speed was essential as the U.S. was doing all it could to demonstrate that the use of military force against North Korea was not an empty threat. The Tom a hawk missile attack on the Al Shayrat airfield in Syria by theU.S., carried out deliberately while Chinese President Xi Jinping was in the U.S. as President Donald Trump’s guest, conveyed a simple message: if Tomahawk cruise missiles could rain down in Syria, they could very well do so in North Korea too.

If there was any ambiguity in the message, it was clarified by the shock-and-awe “mother of all bombs” U.S. attack on Afghanistan. In Chinese minds, there was no doubt that bombing in the Achin province of Afghanistan was specifically tailored to convey a message to North Korea.