China’s Strategy on the Korean Peninsula at a Time of Great Transition: Changes and Tasks
October 2018 Lee Nam-joo / Professor, Department of Chinese Studies, Sungkonghoe University
1. After Economic Reform, China Shifts to Maintaining Status Quo on the Korean Peninsula Prior to the economic reforms of the late 1980s, the Chinese government strategy regarding the Korean Peninsula was centered on maintaining ties with the North, with the dual objectives of containing American influence and easing Soviet pressure on China. During this period, Beijing saw South Korea mainly as an enemy and as a simple forward base for the United States, which China saw as expanding its sphere of influence in Asia against China’s interests. The Chinese view of the Korean Peninsula began to transform in February 1972, when Mao Zedong and Richard Nixon held their historic summit, agreeing to develop strategic and cooperative relations between their countries. This strategic cooperation lessened China’s fear of the possible military role that the US Army stationed in South Korea would play. Moreover, its own interest in preventing escalations on the Korean Peninsula became clearer, if only so China could maintain its new relations with the US. Although the Chinese state refused to jettison its rhetoric in support of North Korea’s ambitions for unification of the peninsula, Chinese policymakers began to work at ensuring stability of the two separate Korean states, thus beginning the desire to maintain the status quo on the peninsula. Given its alliance with North Korea, however, China took care to avoid being too overt about its desires to improve relations with the South and of keep things as they were on the peninsula. The sweeping economic reforms that began in China in 1978, however, made it necessary for Beijing to begin improving economic relations with South Korea despite objections from Pyongyang. This was because, first, the paramount objective of China’s foreign policy at the time was to cultivate an international environment favorable to its reforms, which raised the importance of relations with South Korea. Second, Beijing was eager to attract economic and financial resources from abroad to ensure the success of its reforms, and the potential that South 1