Dear readers,
North Korea, famous for its nuclear brinksmanship, has recentlycriticized its Chinese ally with unprecedented candor. Recent nuclear and ballistic missile tests have angered the Xi Jinping administration in Beijing, causing something of a fall-out between the two communist powers.
The state-run Korean Central News Agency published a report on May 3, warning China that there would be “grave consequences” for “chopping down the pillar of the DPRK–China relations.” (DPRK stands for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.)
Rumors abound that China is preparing armies along the Yalu River to secure its border with North Korea. This signifies a sharp reversal in relations from when the two countries formed a communist bloc that stopped United Nations forces in the Korean War and granted the Kim regime over six decades in power.
But if North Korea collapses, what's in store for Beijing?
As the ancient Chinese political saying goes, “without lips, the teeth are cold.” The end of Kim Jong Un's multigenerational communist regime would weigh heavily on China, which is under another communist regime that formerly, under Mao Zedong, resembled today's North Korea writ large.
Since the launch of China's economic reforms, Pyongyang's eccentricity has allowed China to project an image of normalcy and progress even as grievous human rights abuses—including those unprecedented in the history of totalitarian abuse, such as forced live organ harvesting—took place en masse under the direction of the Chinese regime’s communist leaders.
North Korea's nuclear threat also provided a convenient point of crisis that leaders in Beijing could use to leverage against its neighbors and the United States.
Under Xi, however, Beijing has arrived at a crossroads. The nuclear threat is too grave to tolerate for much longer. And as U.S. President Donald Trump's many recent negotiations with his Chinese counterpart suggest, the Xi administration is open to cooperating to neutralize the Kim regime.
At the same time, viewed from the lens of Communist Party doctrine, Xi and his cohorts cannot afford to simply give up on North Korea, which still holds a solid place in the revolutionary mythos.
Adding another dimension to the problem is the upcoming 19th Party Congress of the Chinese Communist Party, where Xi Jinping has a chance to clear the Politburo Standing Committee of his factional rivals—or spend another five years locked in some degree of political impasse.
How Xi's government handles North Korea, should the crisis flare up again, could make—or break—his designs for the reconstitution of China's leadership.
—Leo Timm
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