Seoul downgrading U.S. alliance in favor of closer military ties with China, Russia

East Asia Intel (via: The Horse Mouth) ^ | 04.14.05

[Dr. Marten]

South Korea is planning to bolster military ties with its long-time Cold War rivals China and Russia in an effort to play a balancing role in Northeast Asia and help stabilize the Korean peninsula, Seoul's defense chief said. The move is consistent with the stated intention of President Roh Moo-Hyun to adopt a more "independent" foreign policy from the United States.

 

 

[Paul Ross]

Correct. Although the degree of North Korean/Chinese subversion of South Korean universities should not be understated. We should be wary of their becoming, at the least, a communist satellite country. This is the long-term plan of the Chinese Communist Party for their surrounding neighbors. We need to back out, meanwhile...flood the country with a bunch of East Bloc European 'teachers' who can knock the commies back on their ears....and at least prepare the next generation for what is coming.

[Paul Ross]

My personal opinion is that going to war with N. Korea over S. Korea or China over Taiwan is not in the interests of the USA. We don't have anything to gain materially from a conflict like this. We just threaten both with massive nuclear retaliation if they threaten us. These folks are not idealogues or religious zealots ready to destroy the world for their philosophies like the muslim extremists.

Harry Wu might beg to differ, i.e., "Yes, they will trigger nuclear war to win. They are crazy."

Korea and Taiwan both have huge shares of the U.S.'s electronics market. China will, after capturing both Taiwan and South Korea, be able to monopolize its control over the supply to the U.S.'s electronics needs. We will then definitely be dealing from a position of industrial dependency...and self-created weakness.

And I would not be so sanguine about the long-term hegemonistic aspirations of China. They constantly accuse us of being the "Hegemon"...i.e., dominant power in all international relations. It appears to me that they are very envious...and that they are doing a great deal of "projection" here...what they hope to achieve: I.e., displacing us. Will that Chinese-Communist-Dominated world be one that will be better for Americans, our safety, liberty and prosperty?

No.

Can we do something about it now, before the Dragon overtakes us?

Yes.

Will we?

Not if the psuedo Free-Traders continue to control our policies.

[neverdem]

I have doubts about the credibility of your source, The Horses Mouth. I tried to Google the first sentence on Google News and then just the first part of the sentence, "South Korea is planning to bolster military ties with its long-time Cold War rivals China and Russia". I found nothing.

http://www.usiraqprocon.org/pop/coalitionuptodate4.htm#southkorea

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, stated in the report "South Korea Extends 3,600-Member Iraq Mission", broadcast on December 31, 2004 :

"South Korea deployed its forces in the Kurdish town of Irbil last month, becoming the third-largest contributor of troops to the coalition after the United States and Britian."

12/31/04 RFE/RL

Robin Wright and Bradley Graham, journalists, stated in the article "U.S. Works to Sustain Iraq Coalition", published in The Washington Post on July 15, 2004 :

"South Korea is increasing its force from 600 to 3,700." 07/15/04 R.WRIGHT & B.GRAHAM

[Paul_Denton]

Roh is a traitor to his own people and to the alliance as a whole. He is nothing more than a communist under the pay of other communists, or worse, even a mole. If he wants to side with the enemy then we should pull our troops out and put them in Taiwan.

[ChinaThreat]

"Can we do something about it now, before the Dragon overtakes us? "

Yes. But I don't think millitary intervention over Taiwan is worth the costs. Going to war with China over Taiwan would be tantamount to risking the Republic over a small island halfway around the world. The US Armed Forces and the POTUS are obligated to protect the Union, not Taiwan. In my opinion, the US Constitution trumps all treaties.

Your point about the electronics market is true. However, should we focus on creating an electronic manufactring base at home? Or should we prepare for war over this market? This is much the same dilemna as oil. But we can't provide enough oil domestically to meet our consumption needs so there is an argument for millitary intervention in the ME. We can certainly provide our own circuit boards and algorythms.

China views itself as the center of the world. It takes the "long view". China will not risk an all out challenge to the US any time in the next few decades. However, they have spent the last 15 years shaping their millitary with three goals in mind:

1. Recoup Taiwan and the Spratly Islands.
2. Repell any intervention by the US or any other regional power.
3. Exert its influence in the SE Asian and Western Pacific theatres.

Their millitary capabilities and geo-political strategy are designed to accomplish this mission. They have patiently been planning and building for this mission for over two decades. Unfortunately, while Clinton and Europe were celebrating the end of the Cold War, China was in full force production of naval interdiction platforms and tactical missle production. Its latest fighter is designed around the mission of taking Taiwan. The US would be forced to park its Carriers in deep blue due to the current subsurface naval abilities they have attained in the last 4 or 5 years. This greatly reduces the effectiveness of our strike packages and tactical air operations.

I don't know if you are old enough to remember the Falklands. But a rag tag 3rd world Argentina took a nice chunk out of Her Majesties ass with anti-shipping missles. These are very hard weapons to counter.

Frankly, I am afraid it is to late to solve this problem at an acceptable cost millitarily. I have been harping on this subject to my friends for 10 years. Bill Gertz and a few other prominent defense analysts were also but no one acted. Now it would be very costly to counter a Chinese grab for Formosa.

We need to accept that China is going to incorporate Taiwan. Hopefully peacefully. What we need to be doing is planning the long term containment of Chinese influence into to geographic and economic areas that are vital to our domestic needs.

[Paul Ross]

We need to accept that China is going to incorporate Taiwan

No, we don't.

The consequences are far more potentially "costly" to us and our Constitution, to use your major consideration. They vastly outweight the "cost" of defeating China...if we do it today, rather than wait until they have perfected their strategic force compositions. Old enough to remember the Falklands? Heck, I am old enough to remember blast drills in Elmentary School during the Cuban missile crisis.

I may be an alarmist, but I am not a defeatist. I think we can still prevail. And we needn't even risk the carriers. We have already surreptitiously helped the Taiwanese arm themselves with their new supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles, and now a new Surface to Air Missile system as well. They will mass manufacture each...and be able to 'flood the zone' and create a 'cordone sanitaire' between the Straits if we can keep the Chinese IRBMs from wreaking havoc with Taiwanese C4I.

And if we are not caught off guard (a big if..which is why I favor taking an offensive posture) we have striking power even beyond the Carriers. The modified Tridents will be able...with stealth cruise missiles...to effectively mop up the Chinese coastal military installations at liesure (inclusive of their C4I, their IRBMs, Su-30 Bases, SAM-300 bases)...all comfortably out of range of China's new littoral ASW capability. The Carriers meanwhile will feint towards the Strait, but then stay in Blue Water as you noted, and be able to lead China's whole ASW navy on a wild goose chase out to sea...stringing out their attack force, and destroying it in detail. And then interdict and throttle China's oil supply. Our pre-positioned Patriots and Aegis SM-2's & 3's will throw up an aerial umbrella around the Island, and the cruise missile attacks of the Chinese green-water coastal flotilla will be dealt with at an effective interception rate of 99%...while being blown out of the water. Dicey business for our surface fleet, and costly, yet unavoidably necessary.

But, we need the political will to put this confrontation and these assets into play, and this is the real key, recognizing that time is of the essence. The vectors of change are against us. We need to get the Reds to tip their bloody hand too soon. Taiwan should immediately be encouraged to declare itself a sovereign, independent nation of China...now...while we still have the capability to effectively defeat China. Meanwhile, we need to deploy our Aegis seabased missile defense in detail (rather than squander time and money on the land based approach) and aggressively go after China diplomatically...and destabilize its occupied territories...and police state oppressions of its citizens. From religious persecution, personal liberty, to union persecution, across the spectrum. A full court press is required, isolating it, and calling its depradations to account.

I don't for a second think a China that succeeds in militarily incorporating Taiwan and South Korea into its evil empire, (and it truly is evil...ask the denizens of the Laogai) will stop at the Asian region.

They have revolutionized their military outlook...just as Alfred T. Mahan, and T.R. (then acting Sec.Navy) did for our country and its navy.

Their alliances with Pakistan, Burma, Cambodia,Brazil, Venezuela, Cuba, and their bases around the Carribean...the Panama Canal, and the Bahamas...and on and on. They have a far flung 'string of pearls' strategy for global domination.

Not regional in the slightest. They are laying the groundwork to become top dog.

If we are to effectively contain China, best to defeat it outright, and do so where it will be the most effective place of confrontation...rather than premature capitulation and 'letting the genie out of the bottle'.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for sharing your views!

[s_asher]

The solution is simple. Open immigration with Russia, Korea, and China. Anyone from there who can afford to buy a ticket to America can come and get a green card, provided that you pass a background check (criminal record). A nation's wealth and power is dependent on its human resource, so let's suck out theirs.

At the rate that things are going around here, we'll be speaking spangalish in couple of generations anyway. So maybe with an influx of chinese we can offset the rising hispanic and muslim population here too.

[ken21]

shoulda left a long time ago.

taiwan would make an excellent aircraft carrier.

[ChinaThreat]

That is a wonderful tactical analysis. I mean that sincerely. If we were to analyze the situation in a vacuum, I would completely agree with your view.

However, commiting ourselves to this scenario would certainly end up in WWIII. As wonderful and mighty as our millitary is, there are too many opportunists in this world who will use the opportunity to act upon their own ambitions. We are currently embroiled in two conflicts with the potential for a third at any moment. To throw a major conflict with China in this mix at this moment is certainly not a good strategy.

I am not an isolationist by any means, but the cost economically, politically and millitarily to go to war with China over Taiwan is still simply not worth it. I don't mean to lend the impression that we couldn't stop the Chinese millitarily. What I mean to say is that it is not worth the costs.

I think it is in our best interests to accept this and develop a plan for containment. Much like the Cold War. It didn't make sense to challenge the USSR for Afghanastan, or Eastern Europe or any other land grab they made. Instead, we used a long term goal of containing their influence and eventually let their flawed form of government cave in on itself without any direct confrontation. The argument can be made that this policy saved 10s or 100s of millions of lives. That includes Americans.

You reference China's exerted influence in the western hemisphere. If you study closely, the sole purpose behind these strategic moves is to cause the US to think twice about intervention over what China consider's to be its "sphere of influence".

If you study China carefully, or read non-alarmist analysis of the Chinese state, you can see that they will soon implode. The communists may last a decade or two longer, but they are doomed to fade away into history's trash bin. In addition to this, China does not have the capability of supporting its own population. Here is where the true "China Threat" lies. If the Chinese continue on this growth rate, they will be required to attain natural resources they can't provide by themselves.

We need to be focusing on securing our major national security interests. Despite your argument, the fact is that the only fundamental security interests we have in East Asia are shipping lanes. Forget about Taiwan. We should be preparing for a major war in South Asia. All roads lead to the middle east. As i said in a previous post. We should be developing bases along the Malacca Straits and fortifying Japan and Australia, who the Chinese consider to be in their immediate sphere of influence. We should also be preparing for a major conflict in the ME. We are in the process of building a forward operating capability in Iraq and Afghanastan. CENTCOM is going to be where the next WW is fought. Not east Asia.

The world changed on Aug 7, 1945. China is not going to threaten our existence as a state our consider severe harm to the US. Why? Becuase they are intelligent enought to realize it would result in the utter destruction of their country. There is nothing for China to gain by challenging the US on a grand scale. Our market is the greatest market on the face of this planet. It would be ludicrous for them to hurt that market when it is what feeds a large part of their population or bring certain destruction on their country.

We should arm the Taiwaneese to the teeth and ignore the Chinese protests. I don't want to see China take Taiwan and if Taiwaneese want to be independent of China, they can fight for their own independence. I'm not advocating abonding them.

We should arm the Japaneese and encorage Australia to make major increases in defense spending. Many friendly southeast asian nations like Malyasia should be brought into a new NATO type organisation. Most of all, we should be forging a strong relationship with India to counter the Chinese and more than likely the Pakistanis. I

[Paul_Denton]

They shouldn't be getting F-15s from us if thats how they are going to treat us!

Or AH-64s

[Paul_Denton]

My personal opinion is that going to war with N. Korea over S. Korea or China over Taiwan is not in the interests of the USA. We don't have anything to gain materially from a conflict like this. We just threaten both with massive nuclear retaliation if they threaten us. These folks are not idealogues or religious zealots ready to destroy the world for their phillosophies like the muslim extremists.

We took the same risks to protect ungreatful western europe from the Soviets. Not only is Taiwan a free independant country (which is alone worth defending them for), they are also key along with Japan in containing China. Plus the Taiwanese have a majority in the electronics market.

[Paul_Denton]

the ChiComs will not stop at Taiwan. They want Japan, the phillipines, heck they are already expanding into South and Central America. They want to become the world's dominant power, and freedom is not their reason for doing it. The ChiComs must be stopped.

[Paul Ross]

China is not going to threaten our existence as a state our consider severe harm to the US.

Well, then by that logic, they wouldn't dream of launching a nuclear attack againsth us if we merely keep them, at a purely tactical level, from invading a free, democratic nation they have no legal claim to. If they would, on the contrary, launch such an attack as their top General threatened in '95, then perhaps we need to consider that the threshhold might be a lot lower for their other imperialistic ambitions than you suspect. Dissident Harry Wu has warned us that their ambitions are unlimited...and that their willingness to use nuclear options is clear.

I am convinced that they will only use their nuclear weapons if they are sure they can realize an effective first-strike scenario. But what if we aggressively go onto a posture, more or less daring them to take a shot at Taiwan...after, as you suggest, we arm them to the teeth. We are in fact, doing some of that now, surreptitiously.

But instead of playing sitting-duck...we must have the Aegis cruisers all up-rated to NMD status and deployed appropriately to shut down their ICBM attack. I personally would also be covertly launching Brilliant Pebbles satellite launching platforms as soon as possible. Just because you think their nuclear attack unlikely, the fact is they are deploying DF-31s and soon deploying JL-2s as fast as they can make them. And, as Hermann Kahn taught us, it is the capability that has to be mentally and strategically prepared for and countered.

Thus we must be ready to have an effective strategic...not limited...NMD and do it before their JL-2 forces are ready to deploy...we can stare them down...just like we did the Soviets as we protected Western Europe.

The Chinese have been carefully grooming their sock-puppet North Korea for the "opportunistic" strike, hence our meager NMD in Alaska. You don't find it strange that North Korea sold to AQ Kahn of Pakistan a set of Chinese blue-prints for our W-88 warhead do you?

Meanwhile, China's hands clearly are behind a number of deadly threats to the U.S. How about 9-11 for example? They met frequently and often with Bin Laden. Their "Asymmetric Warfare" colonels advised as one option a similar attack on the WTC before hand. They celebrated on their State TV the WTC towers being hit, saying in essence that we got what we deserved...all while Jiang Zemin was meeting with GWB in Washington D.C. putting on a friendly face.

China is NO ally in the War on Terror. Duplicitous is the kindest adjective to describe their real position. When GWB outlined the Axis of Evil...he neglected to name who was at the HUB of that Axis. A rogue regime that will not collapse any sooner than the Soviets collapsed...and then it took a really good and decisive push by the U.S. acting in concert with its allies.

That is my strongest recommendation of all...that we follow Reagan's formula...and implement it swiftly. Containment was not Reagan's policy...that was the liberals. Reagan's policy was victory:

I.e., "This is my idea: We win, they lose."