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OpEdNews Op Eds    H3'ed 4/30/18

Trump Did NOT Convince Kim to Ditch His Nukes. China Did

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Mike Whitney
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"South and North Korea agreed to actively implement the projects previously agreed in the 2007 October 4 Declaration, in order to promote balanced economic growth and co-prosperity of the nation. As a first step, the two sides agreed to adopt practical steps towards the connection and modernization of the railways and roads on the eastern transportation corridor as well as between Seoul and Sinuiju for their utilization."

The clause articulates the same vision for the future as an earlier integration plan that was drafted at the the Eastern Economic Forum (EEF) in Vladivostok on September 6-7, 2017. The meetings -- which included North and South Korea, Japan, Russia and China -- focused on drawing neighboring states into a common economic space with lowered trade barriers to promote development and prosperity. The strategy has been dubbed the Putin Plan and it is designed in a way that it can be easily linked to the Eurasian Union project and China's strategic "Silk Road Economic Belt" project. The ultimate objective is to create a free-trade zone ("Greater Europe") that extends from Lisbon to Vladivostok.

The plan is explained in greater detail in Gavan McCormick's excellent article at The Asia-Pacific Journal titled "North Korea and a Rules-Based Order for the Indo-Pacific, East Asia, and the World." The Putin Plan anticipates multiple Siberian oil and gas pipelines criss-crossing the two Koreas to railways and ports that are linked to Japan, China, the Middle East, South Asia, and Europe. Here's an excerpt from the article:

"South Korea's President Moon projected his understanding of this within the frame of what he called 'Northeast Asia-plus,' which involved construction of 'nine bridges of cooperation' (gas, railroads, ports, electricity, a northern sea route, shipbuilding, jobs, agriculture, and fisheries), embedding the Korean peninsula in the frame of the Russian and Chinese-led BRICS, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) organizations, extending and consolidating those vast, China- and Russia-centred geo-political and economic groupings. Though billed as 'economic,' and having no explicit 'security' element, the Vladivostok conference was nevertheless one that would go a long way towards meeting North Korea's security concerns and making redundant its nuclear and missile programs. 'Unstated, but plainly crucial, North Korea would accept the security guarantee of the five (Japan included), refrain from any further nuclear or missile testing, shelve ('freeze') its existing programs and gain its longed for 'normalization' in the form of incorporation in regional groupings, the lifting of sanctions and normalized relations with its neighbor states, without surrender.

"...Vladivostok might mark a first step towards a comprehensive, long overdue, post-Cold War re-think of regional relationships..." ("North Korea and a Rules-Based Order for the Indo-Pacific, East Asia, and the World," Gavan McCormick, The Asia-Pacific Journal)

In my opinion, Kim Jong-un is prepared to liquidate his nuclear weapons stockpile in order to join this massive regional development project that will draw the continents closer together, create new centers of power and prosperity, undermine Washington's self-aggrandizing "pivot to Asia" strategy, and strengthen a rules-based multi-polar world order that protects the sovereignty and rights of all its members. Thus, "denuclearization" conceals a tectonic shift in the global power structure.

Bravo, for that.

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Mike is a freelance writer living in Washington state.

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