... its plans to eradicate North Korea as a state and have it swallowed up by its neighbour to the south. Meanwhile, the people of South Korea, for whom reunification has long been part of the national mentality, have started to come to the realization that ... ... economic and social problems will be so great that they may jeopardize the country’s status and economic position. Moving on to China and Russia, they do not want to see a conflict breaking out on the Korean peninsula and call for stability, in the hope that it may eventually lead to the peaceful coexistence of the two Koreas....
... their
reasoning
that “the U.S.-South Korean alliance is the pillar of the U.S. presence in the Asia-Pacific”, and that “South Korea is the only place in Asia where the U.S. has a military foothold”. Beijing hardly believes Washington's reassurances that it “is not seeking an excuse to garrison U.S. troops
north of the Demilitarized Zone
”.
At the very least China is determined to prevent an expansion of the U.S. “foothold” further to the north; ideally, it would like for U.S. troops to leave the Korean Peninsula entirely, and for the alliance between Washington and Seoul to become a thing of the past. Pyongyang's nuclear ...
... countries.
Given the current balance of powers on Russia’s Far Eastern borders, it would be in the country’s interests for Korea to become a united, independent, neutral and nuclear-free country.
The end of the Cold War left its mark on the Korean Peninsula. Moscow took the first step by establishing diplomatic relations with South Korea in 1990. In 1992, China followed Moscow’s lead by opening an embassy in Seoul. In 1991, both North and South Korea were admitted into the United Nations, although the United States did not officially recognize North Korea at the time.
The Koreans, meanwhile, occupied ...
