U.S.-China Trade Dispute Likely to Morph into Technology War, Says President of the U.S.-China Business Council
News Type
News
Date
Paragraphs
U.S. and Chinese trade negotiators remain engaged in intensive talks, although it is yet to be seen whether and when they can strike a final deal. But even if they are able to reach an agreement, in the confrontation between Washington and Beijing “the trade part is incidental: it’s a technology war, not a trade war,” said Ambassador Craig Allen, president of the U.S.-China Business Council (USCBC), speaking at Shorenstien APARC on March 11.
Allen has spent much of his career in Asia and dealing with China-related issues from various posts within government, including serving as deputy assistant secretary for China at the U.S. Department of Commerce. As head of USCBC, he now leads an organization representing over 200 American companies doing business with China. He delivered his remarks at a seminar that is part of the China Program’s colloquia series about the future of U.S.-China relations.
Allen first brought the audience up to speed on the latest developments in the U.S.-China trade talks, where there are still outstanding questions such as whether the tariffs end now or later and whether a trade agreement will include a unilateral or bilateral enforcement mechanism. He expressed optimism that an agreement would bring significant progress on multiple fronts from the U.S. perspective, including enormous expansion in Chinese purchase of U.S. goods in various sectors; progress over IP rights; progress in eliminating forced technology transfers; improved market access to China; and even renewed commitment to reducing cybertheft. Yet Allen also suggested that these changes, which the Chinese are willing to make, are the ones that they know serve to make their markets more competitive in the end.
Structural vs. Cosmetic Changes
Allen was far less confident, however, about the prospects of addressing structural issues with China, that is, areas where the Chinese economy is an outlier to the global economy, violates WTO rules, and greatly differs from OECD norms. This is because these core dimensions touch on the role of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the government and in the economy.
He counted among these structural issues the enormous role of state-owned enterprises (SOEs); the scale of subsidies going to the technology sector and their lack of transparency; prohibitions on foreign investment in sensitive industries like telecommunications and media; the unequal treatment of foreign companies; discriminatory implementation of regulations and the lack of an appeals process; uneven implementation of IP rights; the outsized role of the CCP in the economy; the dominant role of industrial policy; Xi Jinping government’s aggressive techno-nationalism, which is manifested in its calls for indigenous innovation and for self-reliance; and its excessive control over the information space.
“China is willing to make cosmetic changes to these problems,” said Allen, “even muscular changes, but no changes to the skeleton, the core, the system under which the CCP has complete control.”
A trade deal might remove the immediate threat of tariffs as a source of friction between the United States and China, noted Allen, but the essence of the conflict is not about trade: rather, it has to do with technology. “The trade war will morph into a technology war,” he predicted, and 2019 will mark a change in that direction, making life much more complicated for both American—especially Silicon Valley—and Chinese companies.
A Security Dilemma
Both the United States and China are now locked in a “security dilemma,” noted Allen. “One side takes defensive measures which the other side perceives as aggressive measures,” and “we are ratcheting up on national security.” The U.S. Department of Commerce, for instance, is looking to change the ways of dealing with Chinese companies and to expand export controls, extending their scope to a whole new category of “emerging technologies,” regarding whose definition there is intensive debate in Washington. Depending on its scope, a broad definition could jeopardize hundreds of thousands of projects and disrupt investment and global supply chains.
On the Chinese side, Allen noted, there is a parallel process going on. In 2019, we should expect China to similarly impose tightened export controls, he cautioned, cybersecurity law, personal identification information law, data localization requirements, and a strengthened national security law that, among other requirements, will ratchet up audit requirements of American companies seeking market access and the type of companies allowed to have only Chinese-origin equipment.
Both countries have given in to exaggerated security concerns that threaten the global commons, argued Allen. “American and Chinese companies have worked together in the innovation space for years in a beautiful manner. It has been a remarkably productive exercise over the last four decades that brought tremendous benefit for everyone. You can't imagine a company like Apple without China, and you can't imagine China without a company like Apple. Now all this is being put into question.”
The heightened security measures on both sides are fraught with threats to research institutions, businesses, and the innovation ecosystem at large. Academic exchanges, students, and professors will be deemed exports of knowledge subject to technology licensing laws, cautioned Allen. He asked: “How many thousands of collaborative research ventures will be impacted?”
We are entering the technology war at the wrong time, said Allen, just as China is becoming a middle-income country with hundreds of millions of middle-class citizens who want to buy American-made goods and services that U.S. companies want to sell to them. Now is the time to take advantage of China’s transitioning to a consumption-led economy, he claimed, and “become a good friend of Chinese middle-class consumers.”
China is also forging ahead with its innovative economy, particularly in areas such as AI, 5G, and aspects of the life sciences. “This isn’t a one-way street,” emphasized Allen. “We need their brains as much as they need ours […] China will remain an innovative country, and we need to deal with that.”
“This is not a time to panic,” he pointed out, “but a time to reset and ask: ‘What are the rules of the road for technology cooperation and competition? What are the rules for enforcement and how do we enforce the new rules fairly?”
“If China follows its WTO obligations then we would get there,” Allen claimed. “But if President Xi is going to be single-minded about self-reliance and cutting foreign influence on the Chinese economy, then we’re up for rough sledding and 2019 will be a definitive year in determining the course forward.”
Trade deal or no deal, in the U.S.-China race for technology supremacy, he concluded, trust is a commodity in short supply.
Hero Image
All News button
1
U.S.-Taiwan Relations in a Changing Indo-Pacific Region
-
Image
Previously, Mr. Schriver served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs. He was responsible for China, Taiwan, Mongolia, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, and the Pacific Islands. From 2001 to 2003, he served as Chief of Staff and Senior Policy Advisor to the Deputy Secretary of State. From 1994 to 1998, he worked in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, including as the senior official responsible for the day-to-day management of U.S. bilateral relations with the People's Liberation Army and the bilateral security and military relationships with Taiwan.
Prior to his civilian service, he served as an active duty Navy Intelligence Officer from 1989 to 1991, including a deployment in support of Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm. After active duty, he served in the Navy Reserves for nine years, including as Special Assistant to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and an attaché at U.S. Embassy Beijing and U.S. Embassy Ulaanbaatar.
Mr. Schriver has won numerous military and civilian awards from the U.S. government and was presented while at the State Department with the Order of the Propitious Clouds by the President of Taiwan for service promoting U.S.-Taiwan relations. Mr. Schriver received a Bachelor of Arts degree in history from Williams College and a Master of Arts degree from Harvard University.
Oksenberg Conference Room
616 Serra Mall
Encina Hall, 3rd Floor, Central S350
Stanford, CA 94305
Randall Schriver
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Indo-Pacific Security Affairs
On the Brink: A New Cold War with China
-
NOTE: THIS EVENT IS CLOSED TO THE MEDIA
No recording will be allowed during the program. RSVP required for admission. No walk-ins.
Experts talk about a new Cold War between China and the United States. The world’s two largest economies are in open trade conflict, engaged in technological competition and stoking geopolitical uncertainty. The Oksenberg Conference will explore the causes that underlie today’s intensified conflict between the United States and China. We ask: What has precipitated the confrontational approach that currently unites U.S. policy towards China? What is the future of our strategic competition in the technological, economic and security realms? If U.S.-China rivalry is allowed to escalate, what might its implications be for our international liberal order? If a “new” Cold War is forming, how might it follow or diverge from the “old” Soviet-era Cold War?
Image
Agenda
2:35-3:05 PM Conversation with Dr. Condoleezza Rice, former U.S. Secretary of State and National Security Advisor
3:05-3:30 PM Audience Q & A
3:30-3:45 PM Break
3:45-4:25 PM Panel discussion with Prof. David M. Lampton and Amb. Michael A. McFaul
4:25-5:00 PM Audience Q & A
Speakers
David M. Lampton is Oksenberg-Rohlen Fellow and Research Scholar at FSI and affiliated with Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC). He also is the Hyman Professor of China Studies and Director of the China Studies Program at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) Emeritus. Dr. Lampton's current book project is focused on the development of high-speed railways from southern China to Singapore. He is the author of a dozen books and monographs, including Following the Leader: Ruling China, from Deng Xiaoping to Xi Jinping (University of California Press, 2014, and second edition 2019) and The Three Faces of Chinese Power: Might, Money, and Minds (University of California Press, 2008). He has testified at multiple congressional and commission sessions and published numerous articles, essays, book reviews, and opinion pieces in many venues popular and academic in both the western world and in Chinese-speaking societies, including Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The American Political Science Review, The China Quarterly, The New York Times, The Washington Post,and many others.Image
Formerly President of the National Committee on United States-China Relations, Professor Lampton consults with government, business, and social sector organizations, and has served on the boards of several non-governmental and educational organizations, including the Asia Foundation for which he served as chairman. The recipient of many academic awards, he is an Honorary Senior Fellow of the American Studies Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, former Gilman Scholar at Johns Hopkins, and the inaugural winner of the Scalapino Prize in 2010, awarded by the National Bureau of Asian Research and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in recognition of his exceptional contributions to America’s understanding of the vast changes underway in Asia.
Michael McFaul is the Ken Olivier and Angela Nomellini Professor of International Studies in Political Science; Director and Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI); and the Peter and Helen Bing Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, all at Stanford University. He was also the Distinguished Mingde Faculty Fellow at the Stanford Center at Peking University from June to August of 2015. He joined the Stanford faculty in 1995. Professor McFaul is also an analyst for NBC News and a contributing columnist to The Washington Post. Image
Dr. McFaul served for five years in the Obama administration, first as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Russian and Eurasian Affairs at the National Security Council at the White House (2009-2012), and then as U.S. Ambassador to the Russian Federation (2012-2014). He has authored several books, most recently TheNew York Timesbestseller, From Cold War to Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin’s Russia. Earlier books include Advancing Democracy Abroad: Why We Should, How We Can; Transitions to Democracy: A Comparative Perspective(eds. with Kathryn Stoner); Power and Purpose: American Policy toward Russia after the Cold War (with James Goldgeier); and Russia’s Unfinished Revolution: Political Change from Gorbachev to Putin.
Image
Jean C. Oi is the William Haas Professor of Chinese Politics in the Department of Political Science and a Senior Fellow of FSI at Stanford University. She is the founding director of the Stanford China Program at Shorenstein APARC and is the founding Lee Shau Kee Director of the Stanford Center at Peking University. Professor Oi has published extensively on political economy and the process of reform in China. Her books include Zouping Revisited: Adaptive Governance in a Chinese County, co-edited with Steven Goldstein (2018); and Challenges in the Process of China’s Urbanization, co-edited with Karen Eggleston and Wang Yiming (2017); Rural China Takes Off (1999); Property Rights and Economic Reform in China (1999), co-edited with Andrew Walder; and State and Peasant in Contemporary China (1989). Professor Oi also has an edited volume, China’s Path to the Future: Challenges, Constraints, and Choices, co-edited with Dr. Thomas Fingar (forthcoming, Stanford University Press). Her recent articles include “Unpacking the Patterns of Corporate Restructuring during China’s SOE Reform,” co-authored with Xiaojun Li in Economic and Political Studies (2018); and “Reflections on 40 Years of Rural Reform,” in Jacques deLisle and Avery Goldstein, eds., Reform and Opening: 40 Years and Counting, forthcoming. Her current research centers on fiscal reform and local government debt as well as continuing SOE reforms in China.
Image
Secretary Condoleezza Rice is currently the Denning Professor in Global Business and the Economy at the Stanford Graduate School of Business; the Thomas and Barbara Stephenson Senior Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution; and a professor of Political Science at Stanford University. She is also a founding partner of RiceHadleyGates, LLC.
From January 2005 to 2009, Rice served as the 66th Secretary of State of the United States, the second woman and first African American woman to hold the post. Rice also served as President George W. Bush’s Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (National Security Advisor) from January 2001 to 2005, the first woman to hold the position.
Rice served as Stanford University’s Provost from 1993 to 1999, during which she was the institution's chief budget and academic officer. As Provost, she was responsible for a $1.5 billion annual budget and the academic program involving 1,400 faculty members and 14,000 students. In 1997, she also served on the Federal Advisory Committee on Gender -- Integrated Training in the Military.
From 1989 through March 1991, Rice served on President George H.W. Bush’s National Security Council staff. She served as Director; Senior Director of Soviet and East European Affairs; and, Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs. In 1986, while an international affairs fellow of the Council on Foreign Relations, Rice also served as Special Assistant to the Director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
As professor of Political Science, Rice has been on the Stanford faculty since 1981 and has won two of the highest teaching honors – the 1984 Walter J. Gores Award for Excellence in Teaching and the 1993 School of Humanities and Sciences Dean's Award for Distinguished Teaching.
She has authored and coauthored numerous books, including three bestsellers, Democracy: Stories from the Long Road to Freedom (2017); No Higher Honor: A Memoir of My Years in Washington (2011); and Extraordinary, Ordinary People: A Memoir of Family (2010). She also wrote Germany Unified and Europe Transformed: A Study in Statecraft (1995) with Philip Zelikow; The Gorbachev Era (1986) with Alexander Dallin; and Uncertain Allegiance: The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army (1984).
In 1991, Rice cofounded the Center for a New Generation (CNG), an innovative, after-school academic enrichment program for students in East Palo Alto and East Menlo Park, California. In 1996, CNG merged with the Boys and Girls Club of the Peninsula (an affiliate club of the Boys and Girls Clubs of America). CNG has since expanded to local BGCA chapters in Birmingham, Atlanta, and Dallas. She remains an active proponent of an extended learning day through after school programs.
Since 2009, Rice has served as a founding partner at Rice Hadley Gates, LLC, an international strategic consulting firm based in Silicon Valley and Washington, D.C. The firm works with senior executives of major companies to implement strategic plans and expand in emerging markets. Other partners include former National Security Advisor Stephen J. Hadley and former Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.
Rice currently serves on the boards of Dropbox, an online-storage technology company; C3, an energy software company; and Makena Capital, a private endowment firm. In addition, she is vice chair of the board of governors of the Boys and Girls Clubs of America; a member of the board of the Foundation for Excellence in Education; and a trustee of the Aspen Institute. Previously, Rice served on various additional boards, including those of: the George W. Bush Institute; the Commonwealth Club; KiOR, Inc.; the Chevron Corporation; the Charles Schwab Corporation; the Transamerica Corporation; the Hewlett-Packard Company; the University of Notre Dame; the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts; and, the San Francisco Symphony Board of Governors.
In 2013, Rice was appointed to the College Football Playoff Committee, formerly the Bowl Championship Series.
Born in Birmingham, Alabama, Rice earned her bachelor's degree in political science, cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of Denver; her master’s from the University of Notre Dame; and her Ph.D. from the Graduate School of International Studies at the University of Denver.
Rice is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has been awarded fifteen honorary doctorates. She currently resides in Stanford, California.
Bechtel Conference Center
616 Serra Mall
Encina Hall, Central, 1st Floor
Stanford, CA 94305
David M. Lampton
<br><i>Oksenberg-Rohlen Fellow, FSI, Stanford University</i><br><br>
Michael A. McFaul
<br><i>Director, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI); Professor, Political Science, Stanford University; Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution </i><br><br>
Jean C. Oi (Moderator)
<br><i>Director, Stanford China Program; William Haas Professor of Chinese Studies, Stanford University</i><br><br>
Secretary Condoleezza Rice
<br><i>The Denning Professor in Global Business and the Economy, Stanford Graduate School of Business; The Thomas and Barbara Stephenson Senior Fellow on Public Policy, Hoover Institution; Professor of Political Science, Stanford University</i><br><br>
Lectures
Shorenstein APARC Introduces New Journalism Award Selection Committee, Seeks 2019 Award Nominations
News Type
News
Date
Paragraphs
STANFORD, CA, March 11, 2019 — The Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC), Stanford University’s hub for interdisciplinary research, education, and engagement on contemporary Asia and the sponsor of the Shorenstein Journalism Award for excellence in coverage of the Asia-Pacific, is pleased to introduce an all-new selection committee for the award, comprising diverse journalistic and Asia expertise. APARC now welcomes nominations for the 2019 award. The deadline for nomination submissions is 5pm Pacific time on Friday, March 29, 2019.
An annual tradition since 2002, the Shorenstein Journalism Award carries a cash prize of US $10,000 and recognizes outstanding veteran journalists who have spent their careers helping audiences around the world interpret the complexities of the Asia-Pacific region. It honors the legacy of APARC’s benefactor, Mr. Walter H. Shorenstein, and his twin passions for promoting excellence in journalism and understanding of Asia. “With this award we are committed to advancing journalism that persistently and courageously seeks accuracy, deep reporting, and nuanced U.S.-Asia dialogue,” said APARC Director Gi-Wook Shin.
Over the course of its history, the award has recognized world-class journalists who push the boundaries of coverage of the Asia-Pacific region and help advance mutual understanding between audiences in the United States and their Asian counterparts. Recent honorees include Anna Fifield, Caixin Media, Ian Johnson, Jacob Schlesinger, Siddharth Varadarajan, and Aung Zaw. The award alternates between recipients whose work has mostly been published through American news media and recipients whose work has mostly been conveyed through news media in one or more parts of the Asia-Pacific region. The 2019 award will recognize a recipient from the latter category, which oftentimes includes candidates who work at the forefront of the battle for press freedom.
APARC has recently assembled a new selection committee for the award that presides over the judging of nominees and is responsible for the selection of honorees. “I am delighted to welcome our new committee members who have all distinguished themselves in their careers and bring expertise across journalism, policy, and Asia research and reporting,” noted Director Shin.
The selection committee for the Shorenstein Journalism Award includes Wendy Cutler, Vice President and Managing Director, Washington, D.C. Office, Asia Society Policy Institute; James Hamilton, Hearst Professor of Communication, Chair of the Department of Communication, and Director of the Stanford Journalism Program, Stanford University; Raju Narisetti, Director of the Knight-Bagehot Fellowship in Economics and Business Journalism and Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia Journalism School; Philip Pan, Asia Editor, The New York Times; and Prashanth Parameswaran, Senior Editor, The Diplomat.
For the Shorenstein award, the Asia-Pacific region is defined broadly to include Northeast, Southeast, South, and Central Asia and Australasia. Both individual journalists with considerable body of work and journalism organizations are eligible for the award. Nominees’ work may be in traditional forms of print or broadcast journalism and/or in new forms of multimedia journalism. APARC is seeking 2019 award nomination submissions from editors, publishers, scholars, journalism-related associations, and entities focused on researching and interpreting the Asia-Pacific region. The award will be presented by APARC at Stanford in the Autumn quarter of 2019.
For complete details about the award, nominations and procedures, and past winners, please visit the Shorenstein Journalism Award page. Submissions are accepted electronically through 5pm Pacific time on Friday, March 29, 2019, via an online form.
Please direct all inquiries to aparc-communications@stanford.edu.
###
About the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center
The Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) addresses critical issues affecting the countries of Asia, their regional and global affairs, and U.S.-Asia relations. As Stanford University’s hub for the interdisciplinary study of contemporary Asia, APARC produces policy-relevant research, provides education and training to students, scholars, and practitioners, and strengthens dialogue and cooperation between counterparts in the Asia-Pacific and the United States. Founded in 1983, APARC today is home to a scholar community of distinguished academics and practitioners in government, business, and civil society, who specialize in trends that cut across the entire Asia-Pacific region. For more information, visit https://aparc.fsi.stanford.edu.
Hero Image
All News button
1
After Hanoi: APARC and CISAC Experts Discuss the Outcome of the Trump-Kim Summit and the Future of U.S.-DPRK Diplomacy
News Type
Q&As
Date
Paragraphs
Following the abrupt ending of the highly anticipated second bilateral summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Hanoi, APARC and CISAC scholars evaluate the result of the summit, its implications for regional relations in Northeast Asia, and the opportunities moving forward towards the goal of denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.
This Q&A with Noa Ronkin features Andray Abrahamian, the 2018-19 Koret Fellow in Korean Studies at APARC, whose work with the nonprofit Choson Exchange has taken him to the DPRK nearly 30 times; Siegfried S. Hecker, top nuclear security expert, former Director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, Research Professor of Management Science and Engineering, Emeritus, and Senior Fellow at CISAC/FSI, Emeritus; and Gi-Wook Shin, Professor of Sociology, William J. Perry Professor of Contemporary Korea, Director of APARC, and founding Director of the Korea Program.
Q: What is your assessment of the summit outcome? Considering Trump's decision to end the summit early, do you support that “no deal is better than a bad deal?” Do you think the summit would have been better off with even a small deal just significant enough to keep the momentum going?
Abrahamian: It's a disappointment, but we don't know yet if it is a catastrophe. I think that, ideally, once it was clear that both sides were escalating towards a grand bargain no one was ready for, the U.S. and DPRK teams could have taken a break and reconvened to attempt something less ambitious. For both sides it is better domestically to go back and be able to look tough rather than concede too much, but I do wonder why there was no intermediary position available between no deal and something too big.
Hecker: I am disappointed, but still optimistic. Disappointed because the opportunity to take concrete steps toward denuclearization and normalization was missed. Optimistic, because Trump and Kim did not return to the ‘fire and fury’ days of 2017. They left Hanoi on good terms. I don’t believe it was a question of bad deal or no deal. Rather, it appears the two sides were actually quite close to taking important steps, but couldn’t quite get there this time. It is not clear whether time just ran out or if President Trump’s challenge to Kim Jong-un to “go bigger” moved the goal posts at the last minute.
Shin: Trump made the right move. No deal is better than a small or pointless deal that could hamper future negotiations. His decision sent a warning signal to North Korea that he wouldn’t let the country continue to set the tone and pace for the negotiations. Also, he gained more domestic political slack than the alternative would have gained him. The misfortune in Hanoi may impart a new, different kind of momentum to what is destined to be a fluctuating, arduous diplomatic process.
Q: So what's next? What do you expect from the US and DPRK given this new dynamic? What do you think needs to be done at the working level and at the leadership level? And what do you think will be the biggest hurdle in future negotiations?
Abrahamian: Both sides carefully left future talks open through their statements after the summit. If one is searching for a positive outcome, it's that the leaders perhaps now realize that much, much more will have to be agreed upon before they meet again. This should help empower working-level talks. But time is short: a U.S. election looms next year and Donald Trump faces political challenges at home. This was a missed opportunity to consolidate a relationship-building process.
Hecker: The American and North Korean statements following the summit paint different pictures of the final bargaining positions, but both were positive and committed to return to the bargaining table. These differences should be surmountable at the bargaining table, but it will take time and a more concerted effort. So long as North Korea ends nuclear and missile testing, we have time to come to a proper compromise, but it must clearly involve some sanctions relief for the North Korean economy. One of the biggest hurdles on the American side is to overcome internal political divisions.
Shin: A return to hostility is unlikely. Both sides have refrained from escalating tension and are still committed to a diplomatic solution. The negotiations will resume. The Hanoi summit served as an opportunity for a much-needed reality check, for both sides, of the lingering divergences. The biggest hurdle continues to be how to define the terms and scope of denuclearization and the U.S. corresponding measures (simultaneous and parallel actions). Now that the discrepancies have become more apparent and starker, the working-level discussions need to agree on basic yet fundamental concepts and principles, while Trump and Kim should continue the process of trust-building; confidence and trust are a must in a top-down setting.
Q: Are there some roles that other key players can play, such as South Korea and China? Are there any impacts of this outcome on regional relations in Northeast Asia, such as inter-Korean and China-DPRK relations?
Abrahamian: Perhaps South Korea can play a bridging role again, the way it did before the Singapore summit, when Trump "pre-emptively pulled out." In that case, President Moon's intervention helped get things back on track. It is unclear if he has the political capital with either side to make that happen again, but I suspect he will try. The collapse impacts a Kim Jong-un visit to Seoul, as now it would seem to be pressure on the US, rather than operating in space the US created. China is relatively marginalized, but happy to see no secondary sanctions threats or additional testing of missiles. Japan is perhaps the most pleased of all, given how isolated it has become on North Korea issues.
Hecker: The Moon Jae-in administration was hoping for a more positive outcome to allow it to promote economic cooperation with the North, which I consider to be one of the most important elements of achieving a peaceful Korean Peninsula. The Hanoi outcome may require an intensified North-South dialogue to assist the North-U.S. deliberations. I am not sure how all of this will affect China-DPRK relations. I would have preferred an outcome that allows DPRK to move closer to South Korea through some sanctions relief, than to have it depend more on China through continued maximum pressure.
Shin: The outcome is clearly a major setback for South Korea, as it was anticipating progress on core issues that could jumpstart inter-Korean projects. It also became unclear whether Kim would make the planned visit to Seoul anytime soon. At the same time, this might be a perfect time for South Korea to play a meaningful role. So far, the country has been seen as advocating North Korea’s position with regards to an end-of-war declaration and to a lifting or easing of sanctions. This time around, President Moon needs to convince Chairman Kim that North Korea’s bold move toward denuclearization cannot be delayed if he wishes not to lose this rare opportunity with a U.S. president who is eager to make a “big” deal.
###
For more U.S.-DPRK diplomacy analysis and commentarty by APARC scholars, see our recent media coverage.
Hero Image
All News button
1
Video: KQED Newsroom Talks to Yong Suk Lee about the Trump-Kim Hanoi Summit
News Type
Commentary
Date
Paragraphs
Following the anticlimactic conclusion of the Trump-Kim summit in Hanoi, KQED Newsroom spoke with our Korea Program Deputy Director Yong Suk Lee about the surprising outcome of the summit and what's next for U.S.-DPRK diplomacy. Watch:
Hero Image
All News button
1
Video Interview with Koret Fellow Andray Abrahamian
News Type
Q&As
Date
Paragraphs
We sat down with our 2018-19 Koret Fellow in Korean Studies Andray Abrahamian to discuss North Korea denuclearization and the approaching Trump-Kim second summit in Hanoi; Abrahamian's work with the nonprofit organization Choson Exchange that took him to North Korea nearly thirty times; his book that compares North Korea and Myanmar; and his fellowship experience. Watch:
Hero Image
All News button
1
There’s a Silver Lining in the Clouds Over the North Korea Negotiations
News Type
Commentary
Date
Paragraphs
The failure of high-level discussions may force Washington and Pyongyang to start more effective working-level talks.
HANOI—On Thursday afternoon, as it became clear that lunch between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump was off and that there would be no signing of an agreement between their two countries, storm clouds briefly gathered over Hoan Kiem Lake in Hanoi.
In the nearby Metropole hotel, the mood had darkened as well. The summit between the leaders was supposed to kick off a process of some form of denuclearization, through which the two countries would try to build a better relationship. Eventually, the sides hoped, zero-sum “I win, you lose” politics would be replaced by win-win cooperation.
But the United States and North Korea couldn’t agree on the value of the Yongbyon nuclear complex. In a press conference that took the place of the scheduled lunch and signing, Trump said the North Koreans had wanted all sanctions lifted in return for the closure of Yongbyon. At midnight, North Korea’s Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho contradicted the U.S. president, saying that his team had only sought some sanctions relief as per five articles adopted by the United Nations Security Council in 2016 and 2017. A Trump administration official later confirmed that Ri’s description was more accurate. Regardless, the two sides couldn’t agree on the core issue, and the summit was abruptly adjourned.
Read the full article in Foreign Policy.
Hero Image
All News button
1
The Chemistry Between Donald Trump and Kim Jong Un
News Type
Commentary
Date
Paragraphs
Trump and Kim share a common desire for development.
At first glance U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un seem like an unlikely pair. A few years back they were calling each other “Rocket Man” and a “dotard,” and tension between the United States and North Korea was escalating rapidly in 2017. But in a few days they are slated to meet for the second time, and according to Trump they had “fallen in love” not long after their first encounter. What could have created such intimate bond between the two? The common interest that brings the two together is the desire for development — economic development in the case of Kim and property development in the case of Trump.
Read the full article on The Diplomat.
Hero Image
All News button
1