Another rumor of war in Korea. I have no insights into the validity of this information, but report it at is. These are the only two stories I see reporting on an article by Zhang Liangui in the Chinese-language magazine World Affairs. The second is the more detailed. I see no full translation Zhang’s article. This might be the magazine’s website (Chinese only).
- “ANALYSIS – Grim Chinese views of North Korea suggest rethink“, Reuters, 30 June 2009
- “Top China Advisor Sees Possible New Korean War“, Mark O’Neil, Asia Sentinal, 6 July 2009
Excerpts
(1) “ANALYSIS – Grim Chinese views of North Korea suggest rethink“, Reuters, 30 June 2009 — Excerpt:
Since North Korea conducted a second nuclear test on May 25, China has mostly stuck to its customary even-handed rhetoric on the dispute, but its officials, including a senior military officer, have been pointedly open in their worries about their much smaller neighbour. Bleak commentary on North Korea has also multiplied in the government-controlled press, some of it going well beyond the usual official rhetoric.
“Judging from current trends, I believe a military conflict could well break out on the Korean Peninsula, first at sea and then possibly pushing towards the 38th Parallel,” Zhang Liangui, an expert on North Korea at the Central Party School in Beijing, wrote this month in a Chinese-language magazine, World Affairs.
… Zhang said fresh international sanctions against North Korea are unlikely to work unless backed by the threat of force. “In North Korea, economic and political sanctions cannot influence the concrete interests of its decision-makers. Only sanctions against North Korea backed by force will get enough attention from it,” he wrote in the magazine, which is sponsored by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
(2) “Top China Advisor Sees Possible New Korean War“, Mark O’Neil, Asia Sentinal, 6 July 2009
In an alarming analysis in an official Chinese publication, a senior advisor to the Chinese government expects North Korea to launch a war on the South in the belief that it has overwhelming military superiority. Zhang Lianggui, a professor of International Strategy at the Central Communist Party School in Beijing, also writes that he regards Pyongyang’s nuclear program as posing a significant and unprecedented danger to China.
Zhang, who has been at the school since 1989, is a specialist on North Korea, where he studied at Kim Il-Sung University in Pyongyang from 1964-1968. His analysis, in the June 16 issue of World Affairsmagazine, is one of the most critical of the North ever to appear in an official publication. It reflects Beijing’s rising anger with its neighbor and frustration that it can do so little to change its nuclear policy – despite the fact that the country relies upon it for supplies of food and oil.
… “If we look at the situation as it is, the likelihood of a military confrontation on the Korean Peninsula is very high … It will start on the sea and then could spread to the 38th parallel. If a war breaks out, it is very difficult to forecast how it would develop. North Korea believes it now has nuclear weapons and has become stronger. It believes that it has overwhelming military superiority over the south and would certainly win a war … {North’s nuclear tests pose} a risk that it [China] had never faced for thousands of years. … The tests are close to densely populated areas of East Asia. If there were an accident, it would not only make the Korean nation homeless but also turn to nothing plans to revive the northeast of China … The danger for China is extremely grave. We have not paid sufficient attention to this risk. If we cannot bring about a denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, mankind will pay a heavy price, especially the countries bordering Korea … North Korea has turned from being a non-nuclear state into a nuclear one.”
Zhang said that Kim Jong-Il is racing to fulfill the mission given to him by his father before he hands over power to his successor, expected to be his youngest son Kim Jong-woon, 25. This includes making North Korea a nuclear state, a symbol of a powerful country: developing missiles capable of delivering these nuclear weapons, re-negotiating the NLL and obtaining possession of the five major islands in the western sea and their rich fishing grounds, using nuclear weapons to create a new international environment and achieve reunification.
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