hankyoreh

Part of an editorial that appeared in the Jan. 27 issue of the Global Times

China expressed its strong opposition to signs that the South Korean government is considering the idea of allowing the US military to deploy THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) - a system of interceptors used in missile defense - on the Korean Peninsula following North Korea’s fourth nuclear weapons test.

In a Jan. 27 editorial titled “Sanctions should target North Korea’s nuclear ambition, not public livelihoods,” the Global Times, a nationalist Chinese English-language paper under the auspices of the People’s Daily, urged South Korea not to push China too hard on the question of sanctions against North Korea.

“South Korea should avoid using the THAAD missile system as leverage against China,” the editorial said. “The system will pose a threat to China’s security. If Seoul does so, it will severely hurt mutual trust between China and South Korea.”

“South Korea will need to prepare to pay the price for its actions,” the newspaper added, a threat that only appeared in the Chinese language version of the article, but was omitted from the English version.

http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/965818.shtml

http://opinion.huanqiu.com/editorial/2016-01/8452853.html

The newspaper, which is affiliated with China’s state-run newspaper the People’s Daily, often hints at the real position of the Chinese government. Each time that the idea of deploying THAAD on the Korean Peninsula has been raised, China has expressed its concerns.

Even so, it is unusual for one of China’s state-run newspapers to talk about the “price” of deploying THAAD in South Korea.

This appears to be related to South Korea’s break with its previous ambiguous stance on THAAD after North Korea’s fourth nuclear test on Jan. 6, with South Korean President Park Geun-hye and Minister of National Defense Han Min-koo coming forward to talk about the need to deploy THAAD.

When the issue of deploying THAAD was brought up in Feb. and Mar. 2015, the South Korean government stated that the US had not asked to deploy THAAD and that South Korea had not discussed the issue with the US.

Even then, two Chinese officials who were visiting South Korea - Liu Jianchao, then-chief spokesman for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Minister of National Defense Chang Wanquan - expressed their concern. But now that the South Korean government has suddenly played the THAAD card after North Korea’s fourth nuclear test, China is responding more sternly.

China believes that THAAD would be targeted not at North Korea but at itself. Since the X-band radar, which is a key component of the THAAD system, has a detection radius of more than 3,000 kilometers, China considers it a major threat to its security. The prevailing view is that deploying THAAD on the Korean Peninsula is part of the US’s strategy of pivoting to Asia.

“North Korea’s fourth nuclear weapons test provided South Korea and the US with a pretext for deploying THAAD on the Korean Peninsula. If the South Korean president and defense minister are already referring to it in public, it would seem that the deployment is already being discussed on a national policy level,” said Cheng Xiaohe, a professor at Renmin University of China, during an interview with the Hankyoreh. Cheng believes that China adopted a tougher stance in accordance with these changes.

“No matter how good the excuse, China probably won’t relent in its opposition to deploying THAAD on the Korean Peninsula,” Cheng said.

“THAAD’s detection radius goes beyond North Korea into China and Russia,” said Lu Chao, a researcher at the Liaoning Academy of Social Sciences. “China and South Korea may be good friends, but how smooth can a relationship be when one party [South Korea] is holding a machine gun under the table? The US may be behind the THAAD issue, but South Korea gets to decide whether or not to deploy it.”

“THAAD would help the military respond to the threat posed by North Korea’s nuclear weapons and missiles. If the US decides to deploy the system with its forces in South Korea and asks us to discuss the issue, we will decide what to do in consideration of the national interest and national security,” said an official in South Korea’s Ministry of National Defense.

By Seong Yeon-cheol, Beijing correspondent

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