Faced with an increase in strategic maneuvering by Moscow and Pyongyang, Beijing will not sit idly by and allow Putin and Kim to shape the security environment on its behalf.
By Tong Zhao
Published on July 10, 2024
The June 2024 summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has elicited mixed feelings in Beijing. On the one hand, enhanced cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang addresses critical needs for both countries, alleviating Beijing’s burden of bailing them out. Additionally, a more militarily capable North Korea serves to divert the attention and military resources of Washington and its allies.
On the other hand, the fact that Moscow and Pyongyang do not always disclose their plans to Beijing contributes to China’s concern about its diluted influence and the potential negative impact of their bilateral cooperation on China’s security. Chinese strategists increasingly recognize the connection between North Korea’s expansion of strategic military capabilities and the growing interest in Seoul and Tokyo for stronger military ties with Washington, as well as U.S. allies’ pursuit of indigenous strategic military technologies, potentially including nuclear weapon capabilities.
China’s anxiety has intensified as Putin has extended his diplomatic efforts beyond Pyongyang to Hanoi, signing agreements on joint oil and gas exploration in the South China Sea, potentially bolstering Vietnam’s position in its maritime disputes with China. Putin also recently approved a draft logistics agreement with India, which would facilitate joint military exercises, training, and mutual access to military facilities at a time when border clashes have exacerbated the rivalry between India and China.
A Delicate Intra-Alignment Balancing Act
The strategic alignment among Moscow, Beijing, and Pyongyang has grown significantly in recent years. However, seeking to maintain access to Western technologies, investment, and markets, China has a vested interest in avoiding the appearance of an emerging trilateral alliance with Russia and North Korea. As Beijing seeks to navigate an increasingly complex web of relationships with these aligned powers involving elements of cooperation and competition, China strives to cultivate influence over both Russia and North Korea while carefully avoiding entrapment by either.
This endeavor has proven challenging for Beijing. Undemocratic states tend to place less faith in bonds of trust underpinned by universal values and put more stock in maximizing self-interest and autonomy. While Chinese strategists admire Putin and Kim’s masterful geopolitical maneuvering, they are increasingly mindful of the importance of maintaining a clear-eyed approach when dealing with these two staunchly nationalist partners.
In recent months, China has downplayed trilateral cooperation in sensitive areas, notably remaining silent on a reported Russian proposal of trilateral military drills. Beijing also has stepped up engagement with U.S. allies in East Asia and Europe through high-level visits and dialogues, and it has sought to avoid crossing the most explicit Western red lines in developing bilateral ties with Russia and North Korea, including by refraining from directly arming Russia and gradually implementing new export control rules on civilian-military dual-use technologies. These measures have likely complicated Beijing’s relationships with Moscow and Pyongyang.
Even so, deepening Russian–North Korean military cooperation, while it causes certain troubles for China, helps Beijing cultivate an image as a more responsible power. It strengthens Beijing’s value to Western countries as a partner to engage with rather than as an adversary to isolate. Western officials are increasingly keen to explore how they can collaborate with China to curtail Russian–North Korean military cooperation or mitigate its consequences.
This has positioned China in a relatively advantageous spot. Since the start of the full-scale Russia-Ukraine war in February 2022, China has faced the challenging task of supporting Russia while maintaining ties with key Western nations. It has also struggled to defend its nonproliferation credentials while accommodating North Korea’s ongoing nuclear and missile development. Now, the increasingly blatant disregard for international laws and norms in Russian–North Korean cooperation inadvertently places China in a more neutral position between the two extreme poles of the new “Iron Curtain.” This situation, reminiscent of China’s position in the latter half of the Cold War, allows Beijing to more effectively conduct strategic balancing and maximize its own interests.
Opportunities for a Constructive Chinese Role in Northeast Asian Security
However, this comfortable position might diminish China’s motivation to make substantial efforts to contain Russia and North Korea’s problematic behaviors. Consequently, Western countries are strategizing on how to sharpen the choices facing Beijing. South Korea, Japan, and some European countries have sought to directly highlight the security costs of Russian–North Korean military cooperation, thereby forcing them to rely more on the U.S. security umbrella and extended nuclear deterrence. In contrast to China’s usual dismissal of similar complaints from the United States, Beijing has paid more serious attention to the voices of Asian and European officials, experts, and public opinion polls.
A remaining challenge is Beijing’s deep aversion to publicly pressuring Pyongyang, an aversion that applies even more so to pressuring Moscow. This reluctance was notably evident in the failure at the ninth trilateral summit between China, Japan, and South Korea to explicitly endorse the goal of denuclearizing the Korean Peninsula—an unprecedented failure in its recent history. Thus, a more pragmatic approach for the international community would be to encourage China to privately influence North Korean and Russian policies by emphasizing the counterproductive aspects of their current strategies.
For instance, Chinese strategists generally believe that North Korea’s development of nuclear capabilities is primarily aimed at deterring external aggression, rather than pushing for coercive unification with South Korea. Indeed, Kim’s recent public renunciation of the goal of unification has eliminated a significant pretext that North Korea could have used to justify a potential invasion of South Korea. If North Korea’s strategic goals are focused mainly on regime and territorial security, then its high-profile approach to expanding nuclear capabilities—including occasional attempts to display greater prowess than it actually possesses—is counterproductive to its own objectives. As a recent proliferator seeking international acceptance of its illicit nuclear status, North Korea’s provocative military behaviors and diplomatic postures have worsened its own position, not least by stimulating interest in nuclear weapons in South Korea and Japan.
It’s difficult to imagine that Kim or Putin desired such outcomes. Beijing is uniquely positioned to highlight these consequences and encourage self-restraint in Pyongyang regarding the expansion of its nuclear arsenal and in Moscow concerning the provision of technological assistance to North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs.
Furthermore, Kim’s explicit renunciation of the unification goal presents a rare opportunity for other countries to work with China on a serious discussion about a future regional security regime. China has long maintained that a security framework accepted by all regional actors is crucial to reducing tensions on the Korean Peninsula and to diminishing North Korea’s reliance on nuclear weapons. However, countries have struggled to find a starting point for such discussions.
Kim’s subtle declaration of defensive intentions, by abandoning the aim to acquire South Korean territory, creates conditions for a political agreement among all regional countries. This agreement could stipulate that no party should seek to alter the territorial status quo on the Korean Peninsula through force. Shared principles of behavior like this could provide mutual reassurance of strategic intentions and serve as the cornerstone for a future security regime.
A status quo–seeking North Korean leader, however, could still act assertively to defend perceived territory within North Korea’s boundaries. Given that the land border between the two Koreas is clearly delineated, the remaining dispute over the maritime border in the Yellow (West) Sea is the most likely trigger for future territorial conflicts on the Korean Peninsula. As a risk reduction measure, the United States, along with other regional stakeholders such as Japan, should engage China to support a regionally endorsed, inter-Korean process. This initiative would aim to negotiate the delineation of the maritime boundary between North and South Korea or to establish common codes of conduct over disputed maritime territories.
The rapid expansion of North Korea’s tactical nuclear-weapons arsenal and Kim’s threat of early employment of such weapons in future crises contribute more directly to South Korea and Japan’s pursuit of military countermeasures than North Korea’s arsenal of intercontinental nuclear weapons. The emphasis on tactical nuclear weapons, combined with Pyongyang’s vulnerable command and control system and its lack of experience in safely operating such battlefield nuclear weapons, poses a significant risk of triggering a nuclear conflict near China’s doorstep. This presents an opportunity for other regional countries to seek China’s cooperation in jointly discouraging Pyongyang from further expanding its tactical nuclear arsenal. They should also prioritize limiting the development or deployment of tactical nuclear weapons in potential future risk reduction talks with North Korea.
Other nuclear-weapons states should also respond positively to China’s advocacy for a no-first-use policy for nuclear weapons by discussing ways to promote this policy among smaller nuclear-armed states like North Korea. Given its own history of adhering to a no-first-use policy when facing much stronger adversaries, China is well-positioned to make a compelling case for North Korea to adopt a more restrained and cautious nuclear posture. This would help reduce the risk of nuclear conflict in the region.
Faced with an increase in strategic maneuvering by Moscow and Pyongyang, Beijing will not sit idly by and allow Putin and Kim to shape the security environment on its behalf. The international community has options to proactively engage Beijing and preserve regional stability.