Retrieved from comments:
"[Do] you have any thoughts on the fact that Myanmar re-established diplomatic relations with the
DPRK this year? They had been cut after
DPRK assassinated visiting South Korean cabinet members in 1983. The Myanmar ambassador to China was recently appointed the concurrent ambassador to the
DPRK."
The longtime estrangement between the governments of the Union of Myanmar and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is evidence that narratives and self-image are at least as important as interests in the determination of relations between countries.
Under any analysis based on basic power goals, the State Peace and Development Council and the government of the
DPRK should have reconciled long ago. The two governments are clients of China...but want to keep Chinese influence at arm's length. Bilateral cooperative relations between Myanmar and the
DPRK are an innocuous means of strengthening each country's ability to avoid being be drawn into the whirlpool of the Greater Han.
The 1983 attack by
DPRK special security forces--the arm of the
DPRK government Kim
Il-sung had purportedly given his son Kim
Jong-
il as a plaything -- in the then Burmese capital humiliated Burma's security services. Even before the rise of the State Law and Order Restoration Council, the
Tatmadaw was brutally paranoid about developments that would lead anyone to question its capacity to maintain order. The assassination of so many honored guests was a crushing blow. Though the
Tatmadaw could not inflict a military reprisal for the assault upon its honor, it could certainly prevent the establishment of relations prior to a sincere apology from the
DPRK head of state.
As to what a Myanmar-
DPRK linkage means for Japan in terms of security, I do not think it is much.
Myanmarese oil and gas are being sold at world prices in order to prop up one rotten, wealth-destroying regime. I do not think the
SPDC would want to reduce its income just to help out its fellow rogue with its fuel needs. As for the
Myanmarese acquiring nuclear weapons or intermediate range missiles, I am not sure the
DPRK would consider the
Myanmarese good customers. In regards to North Korea's specialty, mid-range missiles, whom would the
Myanmarese target? As for nuclear devices, it is quite lucrative, as it turns out, for the
DPRK to be the only major breakout threat in East Asia. Helping the
Myanmarese develop
WMD would only deprive the
DPRK of an exclusive right to extort money and other goodies from the region's major powers.
It would be interesting to hear the Chinese inside line on the establishment of interconnections between the dictatorships that form a
cordon sanitaire about China. I can think it possible that at least one segment of the current Chinese leadership would want the pariah nations on China's periphery to remain as weak and divided as possible, preventing democratic pluralist states from acquiring something of value should one of the dictatorships decide wants to become a new "America's bastard" in East Asia, just like some current U.S. East Asian allies once were and some
GCC countries still are.
Later - Not to be forgotten in the shuffle is
the reported pledge between the Chinese and Japanese prime ministers to work together on Myanmar. China has far more influence over events in Myanmar than Japan. That China would commit itself to collaborating (there's a loaded word) with Japan represents a remarkable gesture. The
Fukuda administration's friendlier basic stance toward China should mean that the Chinese government does not have to be nearly as conciliatory as it had to been toward the Abe administration. However, the amount of cooperation offered is not commensurate with the amount conceded. In the post-
Jiang Zemin era, the Chinese government indeed seems to be making a point of being generous.
