The China-North Korea Relationship

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The China-North Korea Relationship
Author:  Jayshree Bajoria, Staff Writer


Updated: June 18, 2008

Introduction
China is North Korea's most important ally, biggest trading partner, and main source of food, arms, and fuel. In the hope of avoiding regime collapse and an uncontrolled influx of refugees across its 800-mile border with North Korea, China has helped sustain Kim Jong-Il's regime and opposed harsh international economic sanctions. After Pyongyang tested a nuclear weapon in October 2006, experts say that China has reconsidered the nature of its alliance to include both pressure and inducements. But Beijing, arguably, continues to have more leverage over Pyongyang than any other nation and has played a central role in the ongoing Six-Party Talks, the multilateral framework aimed at denuclearizing North Korea.

Strong Allies
China has supported North Korea ever since Chinese fighters flooded onto the Korean peninsula to fight for their comrades in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) in 1950. Since the Korean War divided the peninsula between the North and South, China has lent political and economic backing to North Korea's leaders: Kim Il Sung and his son and successor, Kim Jong-Il.

In recent years, China has been one of the authoritarian regime's few allies. But this long-standing relationship suffered a strain when Pyongyang tested a nuclear weapon in October 2006 and China agreed to UN Security Council Resolution 1718, which imposed sanctions on Pyongyang. By signing off on this resolution—as well as earlier UN sanctions that followed the DPRK's July 2006 missile tests—Beijing departed from its traditional relationship with North Korea, changing from a tone of diplomacy to one of punishment. Jonathan D. Pollack, an East Asia expert at the Naval War College, describes the DPRK's tests as "jarring" to China's  diplomatic effort to compel North Korea to the Six-Party Talks. He says Kim Jong-Il was effectively telling Beijing, "You can not tell us what to do and we can not be taken for granted.'" Despite their long alliance, experts say Beijing does not control Pyongyang. "In general, Americans tend to overestimate the influence China has over North Korea," says Daniel Pinkston, a Northeast Asia expert at the International Crisis Group.

In general, Americans tend to overestimate the influence China has over North Korea. – Daniel Pinkston, International Crisis Group

At the same time, China has too much at stake in North Korea to halt or withdraw its support entirely. "The idea that the Chinese would turn their backs on the North Koreans is clearly wrong," says Adam Segal, CFR senior fellow for China studies. Beijing only agreed to UN Resolution 1718 after revisions that removed requirements for tough economic sanctions beyond those targeting luxury goods, and China's trade with North Korea has continued to increase. The Chinese are "doing just what they have to do and no more" in terms of punishing North Korea, says Selig S. Harrison, Asia program director at the Center for International Policy. He says the two countries will not jeopardize their mutually beneficial economic relationship.

Pyongyang's Gains
Pyongyang is economically dependent on China, which provides most of its food and energy supplies. According to Nicholas Eberstadt, a consultant at the World Bank, since the early 1990s, China has served as North Korea's chief food supplier and has accounted for nearly 90 percent of the country’s energy imports.

China also provides aid directly to Pyongyang. "It is widely believed that Chinese food aid is channeled to the military," (PDF) reports the Congressional Research Service, which allows the World Food Program’s food aid to be targeted at the general population "without risk that the military-first policy or regime stability would be undermined by foreign aid policies of other countries."

China is also a strong political ally. "As an authoritarian regime that reformed, they understand what Kim Jong-Il is most concerned with—survival," Segal says. China has repeatedly blocked UN Security Council resolutions against North Korea, including some threatening sanctions.

China's Priorities
China's support for Pyongyang ensures a friendly nation on its northeastern border, as well as providing a buffer zone between China and democratic South Korea, which is home to around 29,000 U.S. troops and marines. This allows China to reduce its military deployment in its Northeast and "focus more directly on the issue of Taiwanese independence," Shen Dingli of the Institute of International Studies at Fudan University in Shanghai writes in China Security (PDF). North Korea's allegiance is important to Beijing as a bulwark against U.S. military dominance of the region as well as against the rise of Japan's military.

As an authoritarian regime that reformed, they understand what Kim Jong-Il is most concerned with—survival. – Adam Segal

China also gains economically from its association with North Korea; growing numbers of Chinese firms are investing in North Korea and gaining concessions like preferable trading terms and port operations. Chinese trade and investment in North Korea now totals $2 billion per year. "They're becoming a stakeholder in the North Korean economy," Pinkston says.

"For the Chinese, stability and the avoidance of war are the top priorities," says Daniel Sneider, the associate director for research at Stanford's Asia-Pacific Research Center. "From that point of view, the North Koreans are a huge problem for them, because Pyongyang could trigger a war on its own." Stability is a huge worry for Beijing because of the specter of hundreds of thousands of North Korean refugees flooding into China. "The Chinese are most concerned about the collapse of North Korea leading to chaos on the border," Segal says. If North Korea does provoke a war with the United States, China and South Korea would bear the brunt of any military confrontation on the Korean peninsula. Yet both those countries have been hesitant about pushing Pyongyang too hard, for fear of making Kim's regime collapse. The current flow of refugees into China is already a problem: China has promised Pyongyang that it will repatriate North Koreans escaping across the border, but invites condemnation from human rights groups when sending them back to the DPRK. Jing-dong Yuan of the Center for Nonproliferation Studies in California says Beijing began its construction of a barbed wire fence along this border in 2006 for that reason.

Experts say China has also been ambiguous on the question of its commitment to intervene for the defense of North Korea in case of military conflict. According to the 1961 Sino–North Korean Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance, China is obliged to defend North Korea against unprovoked aggression. But Jaewoo Choo, assistant professor of Chinese foreign policy at Kyung Hee University in South Korea, writes in Asian Survey that "China conceives itself to have the right to make an authoritative interpretation of the principle for intervention," (PDF) in the treaty.  As a result of changes in regional security in a post-Cold War world, he writes, "China now places more value on national interest, over alliances blinded by ideology." But, he argues, Chinese ambiguity deters others from taking military action against Pyongyang.

Beijing's Leverage
Beijing has been successful in bringing North Korean officials to the negotiating table at the Six-Party Talks many times. "It's clear that the Chinese have enormous leverage on North Korea in many respects," Sneider says. "But can China actually try to exercise that influence without destabilizing the regime? Probably not." Pinkston says that for all of North Korea's growing economic ties with China, Kim still makes up his own mind: "At the end of the day, China has little influence over the military decisions."

Also, China does not desire to utilize its leverage except for purposes consistent with its policy objectives and strategic interests, say experts. Choo writes, " After all, it is not about securing influence over North Korean affairs but is about peaceful management of the relationship with the intent to preserve the status quo of the peninsula." This CFR.org Crisis Guide offers an in-depth analysis of the dispute on the Korean peninsula.

A Difficult Relationship
Pyongyang is not an ally Beijing can count on. Kim Jong-Il's foreign policy is, like its leader, highly unpredictable. "North Korea is extremely difficult to deal with, even as an ally," according to Sneider. "This is not a warm and fuzzy relationship," he says. "North Korean officials look for reasons to defy Beijing." The relationship is further plagued by:

Mutual distrust. North Korea jeopardized relations with China, its most important ally after the fall of the Soviet Union, through its 2006 nuclear testing. Yet distrust between the two countries predates the nuclear blast. Peter Hayes, executive director of the Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainable Development, says it goes back in part to 1992, when China became a "bad patron" by opening up relations with South Korea without requiring Washington to do the same for the North. The test was also a way for North Korea to tell Beijing that it is not China’s tributary state, as it was until the Korean peninsula fell under Japanese control in the early twentieth century.
Japanese military spending. Pyongyang's reckless behavior has sparked increasing debate in Japan over whether it should go nuclear in the face of the North Korean threat. China has witnessed with growing wariness Japan's remilitarization in recent years and fears the DPRK test could set off an arms race in the region. The test also drives a wedge between China and South Korea, which share a softer approach to North Korea, and the United States, which supports a stronger Japanese military.
U.S. relations. The DPRK test complicated Beijing’s relations with Washington by calling into question China’s diplomatic approach to North Korea. Pollack of the Naval War College says Kim conducted the nuclear test to say, "Ok, now I am on a more equal level to the United States, whether they like it or not," and the result is a "palpable sense that [Chinese] strategy has failed." But if China ’s policy has disappointed, so has the United States' more severe stance and unwillingness to engage in bilateral talks with North Korea. "It's a shared failure," says Pollack.
Washington's Role
The United States has pushed North Korea to verifiably and irreversibly give up its uranium-enrichment activities before Washington will agree to bilateral talks. Experts say Washington and Beijing have very different views on the issue. "Washington believes in using pressure to influence North Korea to change its behavior, while Chinese diplomats and scholars have a much more negative view of sanctions and pressure tactics," Pinkston says. "They tend to see public measures as humiliating and counterproductive."

Having complained for years that the Bush administration was demanding too much, the Chinese now say they fear Washington is secretly prepared to accept North Korea as a nuclear-weapons state. – Gary Samore

After the October 2006 nuclear test, Beijing convinced Pyongyang to return to the negotiating table and the Six-Party Talks resumed on the basis of its last agreement, from February 2007. But now Beijing, which until then had been the central player in the nuclear negotiations that had first started in 2003, is increasingly feeling sidelined, says CFR Director of Studies Gary Samore. According to Samore, China perceives the February agreement as a U.S. surrender to North Korean nuclear weapons. "Having complained for years that the Bush administration was demanding too much, the Chinese now say they fear Washington is secretly prepared to accept North Korea as a nuclear-weapons state," he writes.

But Christopher R. Hill, U.S. envoy to the talks, in an interview with ABC News in February 2007 said: "This whole Six-Party process has done more to bring the U.S. and China together than any other process I’m aware of." Hill said the United States is working very closely with China and South Korea and hopes that "if the North Koreans were to ever think about walking away from this, they would understand they were walking away from all their neighbors as well."

Looking Forward
"Everyone who deals with North Korea recognizes them as a very unstable actor," Sneider says. However, some experts say North Korea is acting assertively both in its relationship with China and on the larger world stage. "The North Koreans are developing a much more realist approach to their foreign policy," Pinkston says. "They’re saying imbalances of power are dangerous and the United States has too much power—so by increasing their own power they’re helping to balance out world stability. It's neorealism straight out of an international relations textbook."

Despite the ongoing talks, fears of further testing still loom, and if North Korea conducts another one Sino-DPRK relations could get "dicey," says Pollack. But China will avoid moves—economic sanctions or aggressive actions—that would cause a sudden collapse of the regime. It no longer has the kind of deep knowledge of North Korean military personnel that it had twenty-five years ago when Beijing could have staged a coup. "It isn't as though China really has the option of overthrowing Kim Jong-Il," says Harrison.

But Asian military affairs expert Andrew Scobell writes, "No action by China should be ruled out where North Korea is concerned." According to Scobell, Beijingmight stop propping up Pyongyang and allow North Korea to fail if it believed a unified Korea under Seoul would be more favorably disposed toward Beijing. A January 2008 report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the U.S. Institute of Peace, two Washington-based think tanks, says China has its own contingency plans (PDF) to dispatch troops to North Korea in case of instability. According to the report, the Chinese army could be sent into North Korea on missions to keep order if unrest triggers broader violence, including attacks on nuclear facilities in the North or South.

Beijing may find ways to cause North Korea discomfort, but Hayes describes China as "patient" and foresees Beijing undertaking long-term training of North Koreans in China to help stabilize the country. "The Chinese are thinking one hundred years ahead," he says. "China will conduct inside-out transformation of North Korea over the next twenty years." Andrei Lankov, associate professor at Kookmin University in Seoul, writes in Foreign Affairs that Chinais tiring of pouring aid into the inefficient North Korean economy. "The Chinese government is promoting its own style of reform in Pyongyang: economic liberalization with limited, incremental political change," he writes. But he acknowledges that China, so far, has failed and "North Korea's leaders are in no hurry to introduce any reforms."

Esther Pan and Carin Zissis contributed to this Backgrounder.