1. North Korea has nukes and they're probably safe from international military intervention at this point. 2. Major threat to Kim regime is likely internal instability. Opening up _economically_ might mitigate this, without the family having to sacrifice too much control.
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3. Obvious comparison: China! CPC liberalized markets (kind of, partly, etc), became rich; this seems to have cemented the regime rather than weakening it, at least medium-term. Country much less susceptible to idiosyncratic economic (+other?) shocks now, I bet
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4. Suppose DPRK slowly, carefully, but consistently moves away from Juche. They no longer have to rely on China as a backstop, and can perhaps play off US and China more effectively. 5. And this is really bad for China! They suddenly have another nuclear neighbor on their flank.
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6. I think China is at risk of overplaying their hand, regionally. If they get aggressive, equilibrium is being completely encircled by powerful nuclear states: already India and Pakistan and Russia, and perhaps a newly-independent DPRK; then Japan and ROK in a heartbeat
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7. Anyway, I don't *love* American power but China spooks me. If we end up with a less-awful (if only because not-starving, but I think we can do better) DPRK invested in international system . . . that seems like at least a marginal improvement on status quo ante,
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8. and much much better than ongoing brinksmanship around the Korean peninsula that maybe ends up killing half the population of Seoul in an artillery barrage when principals slip up. So I'm feeling pretty optimistic regardless of terms of agreement. /fin
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Addendum I have no special knowledge of China, North Korea, South Korea, America, Japan, geopolitics, or anything else relevant to this space. Place low weight on this thread when updating your own beliefs please!
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Hmm this is my optimistic read as well. But it depends on 1) market liberalization actually helping Kim remain God-King 2)Kim being smart enough to realize it and 3)Kim being smart enough to pull it off. Although he has been impressive so far.
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