West's hostility fuels tensions on peninsula

DPRK refuses to buckle to pressure as US stretches regional influence

On Sept 30, when Russian President Vladimir Putin gave a speech in Moscow announcing the incorporation of Lugansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson into Russia, a viral Facebook post claimed that Kim Jong-un, top leader of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, was in Moscow for the speech.

The post includes a video of Kim walking with Putin and shaking hands with various officials.

"In an unprecedented visit …North Korean (the DPRK) president arrives in Moscow to coincide with an upcoming speech by Russian president today," a video caption says.

The video has had thousands of views, and similar viral iterations have been shared on other social media platforms as well.

However, before long the newspaper USA Today did a fact check. It turned out to be a video clip of Kim visiting Russia in April 2019, the two leaders' first person-to-person meeting.

Social media is a breeding ground for misinformation and disinformation, but at least at some level this anecdote may reveal the US-led West's sentiment toward the DPRK: suspicion, distrust and, as many analysts have long pointed out, outright hostility.

The distrust this year has divided the Korean Peninsula further, escalating already heightened tensions.

One sign of this is intensified joint military drills between the US and the Republic of Korea.

In August the two allies resumed long-suspended live field training as a way of "boosting deterrence "against the DPRK. A month later, Washington and Seoul began their first combined naval exercise near the Korean Peninsula in five years.

Furthermore, the US and the ROK conducted their largest joint aerial drills involving about 1,600 sorties and 240 aircraft on Oct 31, US Air Forces Korea said.

The drills, named Vigilant Storm and involving US F-35A and F-35B fighter jets from the ROK, focused on eliminating assets including enemy leadership and ballistic missiles, the Financial Times said.

Li Nan, a researcher specializing in the Korean Peninsula at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said it is clear Washington is stepping up efforts to consolidate its alliance with Seoul and stretching its military influence in Northeast Asia.

"Bolstering alliances in the region is what Joe Biden's administration has been doing and will continue to do," he said.

The US President has worked on repairing a fissure between Seoul and Tokyo that loomed large during the presidency of Moon Jae-in, which was referred to in a US report on its "Indo-Pacific strategy" in February, Li said.

Since Yoon Suk-yeol succeeded Moon in May, Seoul has adopted a harder stance toward Pyongyang and expressed a desire to strengthen defense collaboration with the US and Japan.

Senior officials of the three countries have met several times, during which they have talked of forming a united front in denuclearizing the DPRK.

Last month Biden met Yoon and Japan's Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in a trilateral summit in Cambodia, after which the three leaders declared they were "more aligned than ever" on DPRK's "provocative behavior".

The three countries also conducted an anti-submarine exercise for the first time in five years in late September, as well as a joint drill to detect ballistic missiles in early October.

"The Korean Peninsula this year has entered a more unstable phase featuring confrontation and crisis," Li said, adding that the US does not care about Pyongyang's long-term call for sanctions to be dropped, joint military exercises to cease and for a "bolstered offer of extended deterrence" to its allies to end.

Strong opposition

Even though Pyongyang has repeatedly expressed its anger and strong opposition over such things, Zhan Debin, a professor of international relations at Shanghai University of International Business and Economics, said Pyongyang's response has been different from what it was in the past.

"The DPRK has reacted very swiftly," he said.

This year the DPRK has carried out a record number of weapons launches and advanced its military technology.

On Dec 16 Kim Jong-un observed the successful static firing test of a high-thrust solid-fuel motor, the country's state media KCNA reported, and on Monday Pyongyang announced that it had launched a test satellite in an important final-stage test for the development of reconnaissance satellites.

"Second, Pyongyang's response is more intense," Zhan said. "Among those missiles fired by the DPRK this year, several were intercontinental ones. It also fired a missile into the ROK's waters for the first time. This demonstrates Pyongyang's growing military confidence."

So it is more and more difficult for the US and its allies to force the DPRK to bend to their will through military deterrence, which indicates the two sides will increasingly be at loggerheads, Zhan said.

Li said the risk of conflict on the peninsula is spiraling.

"Like an endless loop with no exit, Pyongyang and the US-led alliance see each other as a provocation and threat, so it has to do something and vice versa."

Washington and its ally have kept stirring up tensions on the pretext of boosting security, Li said, adding that there is no trust between the two sides. The only way out is for the US to cease its hostility and bring the DPRK back to the negotiating table, Zhan said, even if at the moment there is no sign of an easing of tensions.