ramana wrote:We can close this thread as NoKo has cooled down now that US-PRC got what it wants for trade ties.
Can you enumerate what the US got?
PRC got a lot of "respect" from Trump, including sending a mission to their Belt and Road Forum (BARF) extravaganza. Also, Trump declared (in a direct reversal of his campaign platform) that PRC is "not a currency manipulator".
Thus, since this thread opened,
1) PRC has won explicit US approval for OBOR .
2) PRC has extracted a US declaration that Beijing is a fair trading partner, not a "currency manipulator" or any such thing.
3) PRC has been enjoying a period of less USN pressure and "freedom of navigation" ops in the SCS, which they can sell domestically as a "win" and a demonstration that US "pivot to Asia" is crumbling.
4) PRC ALSO got a pro-Beijing, pro-Pyongyang, anti-US regime elected in SoKo which will make the THAAD deployment problematic for the USA. This was partially achieved as an electoral reaction by South Koreans to Trump's belligerent (but eventually empty) posturing.
So Beijing definitely got what it wants, on many counts.
Pyongyang continued to test its missiles all through the so-called "crisis". No one can conclusively prove that they were "deterred" by any of Trump's posturing.
However, I do not see what the US got that was any different from what they had before. US deep state (which wanted US-China status quo) has managed to preserve relative normalcy in US-China trade ties. But they never wanted a war over NoKo in any case. Net net, this is a setback for US interests by conceding numerous Chinese interests.
If this is the point where the whole business fizzles out, then the entire exercise by Trump was sound and fury, signifying nothing. Brutus fulmen with a lot of energy (and credibility) wasted. Trump should realize that the world is not Manhattan high-society, where people forget today that your bluster of yesterday amounted to zilch. Governments in the region are just going to yawn and
at USN CBGs from now on.