Asia's Biggest Nightmare: A U.S.-China War in North Korea

Kyle Mizokami

Security, Asia

It could happen.

One of the most dangerous places in the world is North Korea, and not entirely in the ways one might think. Although North Korea is a nuclear state with nuclear arms, a far more dangerous scenario is the collapse of the regime in Pyongyang and the political vacuum that would create. Competing interests could draw two of the most powerful countries on Earth, the United States and China, into direct military conflict.

North Korea lies at the intersection of two strategic fault lines. The first is its proximity to China, and China’s desire to keep a friendly—if unwholesome—regime in place to safeguard its borders. China’s borders are probably the most secure than they’ve been in a thousand years, no mean feat for a country stretching from Central Asia to the Yalu River, and China would like to keep it that way. Instability along the 880-mile-long Sino–North Korean border would be an unwanted distraction, even more so than the dilemma of the nuclear-armed dictatorship.

The second fault line is the regime itself and its interaction with the United States. Pyongyang has repeatedly threatened to unify the Korean peninsula by force, resulting in a strategic alliance between the United States and South Korea. To counter the overwhelming might of the Pentagon, North Korea has developed nuclear weapons and is making rapid progress to delivery vehicles, from land-based long-range missiles to missile submarines.

North Korea has one-quarter the GDP of Ethiopia. Even in the best of times it struggles to feed all of its people. The government is brutal and alienating to the lowest tiers of society. Neighboring a rich South Korea and increasingly prosperous China, North Korean citizens are increasingly aware of the disparity in their standard of living versus their neighbors. This is not a new situation, and a collapse of the Pyongyang regime—or a revolt against it—has been prophesied many times over the past three decades. While it’s smart not to bet on a collapse any time soon, no government lasts forever, and this particular one has severe structural weaknesses.

Read full article