North Korea: 2012-2016

[SWJED]

What would the benefits be if the US publicly renounced its treaty obligations with Taiwan in order to gain Chinese support with North Korea, and further forge a Sino-Japanese--Korean-American alliance?

While sending a long-term message that we abandon democracies in order to gain those same short-term benefits. Bad idea…

Moreover, memories run deep in three of the four countries you include in this alliance. Any alliance between the PRC, Japan and the ROK would be fragile at best and subject to abandonment at the slightest of perceived provocations - Japanese PM visiting a war shrine in Tokyo, Japanese text-books, PRC and ROK maritime claims and surveys - you name it.

Your proposed alliance would also be a major disruption of the financial status-quo in East Asia. I believe, rhetoric aside, Japan and the PRC like the idea of a financial gateway into their countries via the ROC. Regardless of the public statements - business rules and quite a bit of it is done between the three.

[Stu-6]

My thought on the subject is that the military threat to Taiwan is overstated; I also feel no sense of obligation to the defense of Taiwan so the idea is somewhat appealing to me. Personal I think there is a lot of value in rethinking our relationship with China in general. I think a little flexibility on our part could further our international goals without any appreciable increasing of the threat to Taiwan or any of China’s neighbors.