GOP and North Korea Agree on One Thing: Blinken’s Foray to Beijing Was a Fiasco

North Korea and Republican members of Congress agree on one thing: Secretary of State Blinken’s meeting with Communist China’s leader, Xi Jinping, was a failure.The North Koreans are clearly angered by Mr. Blinken’s message in his conversations with Mr. Xi and other Chinese officials: please try and get Pyongyang to return to dialogue and stop its “dangerous behavior.”That plea triggered a stream of rhetoric via Pyongyang’s Korean Central News Agency describing Mr. Blinken’s “recent junket” as a “disgraceful begging trip” that proves “the failure of the policy of putting pressure on China.”The North Korean news agency dispatch did not say a word about Mr. Blinken’s appeal for Chinese intervention in North Korea. Rather, the agency said, quoting a hitherto unknown commentator named Jong Yong-hak, Mr. Blinken’s “attempt to press and restrain China may become a boomerang striking a fatal blow to the U.S. economy.”To Mr. Jong, presumably speaking for North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong-un, it was “the height of the double-dealing and impudence peculiar to the U.S. to provoke first and then talk about the so-called ‘responsible control over divergence of opinion.’”Like the North Korean news agency, Republican members of Congress did not mention whatever Mr. Blinken said about North Korea. They had their own reasons for denouncing Mr. Blinken for his two days of meetings in Beijing“Why won’t this administration stand up to bullies and stand for freedom?” asked Senator Blackburn, taking umbrage over Mr. Blinken’s remark that Washington “does not support Taiwan’s independence.” To Congressman Ben Cline, Mr. Blinken had engaged in a “dangerous display of weakness towards our adversaries,” giving China “a green light to increase its intimidation” of Taiwan.The North Korean commentary did not explicitly say so, but underlying the response was the question of Chinese influence, pressure and support for a regime that Chinese often say privately is extremely difficult to manage.North Korea appeared to reflect the concern that China might not fully support its extremely hard-line policies, including nonstop development and production of nuclear warheads and missiles even as a new cycle of starvation, poverty, and disease threatens everyone in the country beyond the privileged elite.Mr. Blinken angered the North Koreans by noting, “All members of the international community have an interest in encouraging” the Pyongyang regime “to act responsibly, to stop launching missiles, to start engaging on its nuclear program.”China, after Mr. Blinken’s departure offered a guarded, almost ambivalent response on the question of Chinese intervention. NK News, a website in South Korea that monitors the North, reported that China’s foreign minister had “made clear that Beijing doesn’t view itself as primarily responsible for changing North Korea’s behavior.”The spokeswoman for the Chinese foreign ministry, Mao Ning, was quoted as saying “all parties need to face the crux of the issues squarely” and engage in “meaningful dialogue.”Those words may not be welcome at Pyongyang. NK News cited diplomatic sources as saying “China has been actively promoting a return to the Six-Party Talks” — negotiations involving America, China, Japan, Russia, and the two Koreas — despite North Korea’s “far less diplomatic response to Blinken’s China visit.”Mr. Xi and Mr. Biden may actually be edging toward a one-on-one meeting later this year — possibly if Mr. Xi visits New York for the opening of the United Nations General Assembly in September. The fact that China and Russia have vetoed new sanctions against the North in the Security Council should not stand in the way.As for Mr. Blinken’s performance at Beijing, regardless of the dueling criticism from Republicans in Congress and from Mr. Kim’s regime, Mr. Biden has said the secretary did “a helluva job.”

GOP and North Korea Agree on One Thing: Blinken’s Foray to Beijing Was a Fiasco

GOP and North Korea Agree on One Thing: Blinken’s Foray to Beijing Was a Fiasco

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