On Tuesday, North Korea launched a ballistic intercontinental missile in a test that was meant to send a loud and clear message to Washington as Americans celebrated their Independence Day holiday. It was the latest in a series of provocative tests in its quest for a nuclear weapon and the ability to deliver it to its perceived enemies.
These transgressions by the regime in Pyongyang are deliberately provocative, demonstrating increasingly advanced abilities and technologies, and are coming at closer intervals. On the technological side, they are a worry. On the political side, they are dangerous, showing that the rogue state has no intention of complying with a series of United Nations Security Council resolutions and sanctions that are meant to dissuade it from its nuclear ambitions. Clearly, they are not working.
United States President Donald Trump is increasingly bellicose in his language. But he should be under no illusion. Any unilateral action against Pyongyang will be reckless and sure to prompt the severest of responses from a North Korean military state with all conventional guns pointed at Seoul and targets south of the Demilitarised Zone. China can directly influence the regime in Pyongyang, and the North Korean state depends almost exclusively on Beijing for trade, food and material. But Trump too has ensured that relations with Beijing are strained, given his words on the South China Sea, currency manipulation, Chinese steel and now, by selling military hardware to Taiwan.
What is noteworthy is that both China and Russia have signed a new friendship pact to increase trade and areas of mutual cooperation. It is they who must now hold sway over Pyongyang. That is a sensible way forward — regardless of what Trump tweets.
