OPINION — The Camp David Summit of the U.S., South Korea and Japan was emblematic of an alliance that, despite historical issues, showed that democracies with the rule of law, responsive to the people, can and will unite to deter and if necessary, defeat a threatening adversary.
Much has been said about the alliance of Russia, China, Iran and North Korea and their effort to appeal to the Global South and others, espousing a line that these autocracies represent a form of governance that others should emulate. It’s hard to understand why any of these countries, based on their behavior, would be a model for others to emulate.
Russia discarded the security assurances they provided to Ukraine in 1994 with the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances, pledging to respect Ukraine’s territorial integrity and inviolability of its borders or to use or threaten the use of force. Russia blatantly violated these security assurances in 2014 with its invasion and annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. Russia then doubled down with its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, with the ongoing carnage in this unprovoked war. Is this the model for others to emulate?
North Korea, unable to feed its own people, with a record of extreme human rights abuses, has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in its nuclear and missile programs, determined to be accepted as a nuclear weapons state. A desperate and isolated Vladimir Putin has reportedly reached out to Kim Jung Un for military assistance: artillery shells, rockets, and other weaponry, in exchange for food and energy assistance and possibly assistance with North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs – all in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.
Recent media reporting of a planned visit of Kim Jung Un to Russia to meet with Putin, most likely in Vladivostok, appears to be imminent. The former Soviet Union had provided North Korea with a research reactor in 1963 and in 1985 got North Korea to join the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of nuclear weapons (NPT) – that North Korea quit in January 2003 – while also helping with North Korea’s ballistic missile programs. This ended with the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, when North Korea then looked to China for greater economic assistance and geopolitical support. Russia was an active member of the Six-Party Talks, hosted by China, from 2003-2009, committed to securing the complete and verifiable dismantlement of North Korea’s nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons facilities.
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The irony is that Russia now needs North Korea’s military support to persist with their invasion of Ukraine. And North Korea, desperate for attention and economic and military assistance, not only openly supports Russia’s invasion of a sovereign nation but is willing to provide military support to Russia.
Are these the countries others want to emulate?
Six months after the death of Mahsa Amini, protests in Iran continue. The demonstrations are indicative of the resentment the people have toward the ruling theocracy, an elite group apparently oblivious to severe economic conditions affecting the people, with high inflation and unemployment, living under an oppressive regime. A regime that supports proxies in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen, with Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and Qods Force providing weapons, training and financial support to militias and political organizations in these – and other – countries, challenging legitimate governments.
Is this the country others want to emulate?
Since the normalization of relations with China in January 1979, the U.S. has been China’s major trading partner, with over $600 billion annually in trade, and significant U.S. foreign direct investment throughout China, with over 300,000 Chinese students annually attending our universities and colleges. Indeed, this was Deng Xiaoping’s strategy when he took over in 1978: Ensuring a close economic and strategic relationship with the U.S.
Since Xi Jinping took over in 2013, there has been considerable tension in relations with the U.S. and others, to ensure a free and open Indo-Pacific region and Taiwan Strait, with concern about the treatment of the Uighurs in Xinjiang Province and the 2020 National Security Law for Hong Kong that nullified the Basic Law that allowed for fifty years of a “one country two systems” form of governance for Hong Kong, established in July 1997 when Hong Kong reverted back to China after 150 years of British Rule.
There is an opportunity for China to cooperate with the U.S. on a multitude of issues for the common good, like North Korea, climate change, pandemics, counter-narcotics and counter-international organized crime and other issues.
Most importantly for the U.S., there is a need for continued U.S. global leadership. A pressing need to better disseminate information about our values – life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in a liberal democracy tethered to the rule of law. We should reconstitute the U.S. Information Service, abolished in 1999, with offices and dedicated personnel in all our embassies, focused on this important mission.
If left to the people, autocracies will be replaced by democracies dedicated to the rule of law. Our job should be to communicate with the people.
This piece by Cipher Brief Expert Ambassador Joe Detrani was first published in The Washington Times
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