LETTERS TO THE EDITOR: Who really controls North Korea?

OPINION:

Is President Trump aware that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un may not control the nuclear missiles in his country, and that he is probably acting as an instrument of China (“Can North Korea become Vietnam? Probably not,” Web, Feb. 6)? Despite economic and political evidence to the contrary, our government has persisted in viewing North Korea as an independent rogue state rather than a Chinese agent. Clearly it is crucial for the president to know who controls the nuclear forces in North Korea.

The main reason Chinese leaders distrust the Kim dynasty and would not permit it to control nuclear weapons is that in their eyes Kim Jong-un’s grandfather, Kim Il Sung, is responsible for the Korean War, as a result of which U.S. forces are in South Korea, on the Asian mainland much too close to China.

Soviet and U.S. forces had both withdrawn from Korea in the late 1940s, and Stalin was content with that. But his North Korean puppet, grandfather Kim, insisted that he could easily and quickly conquer South Korea — and he won Stalin’s reluctant approval. When Kim invaded in June 1950, it looked briefly as though he might pull it off. But the U.S. and the United Nations intervened, Gen. Douglas MacArthur landed the Marines at Inchon, destroyed Kim’s forces and within weeks was sweeping over North Korea up to the Chinese border at the Yalu River. Mao, deeply alarmed at the threat to China, launched a massive and costly campaign against the U.S.-U.N., which concluded in 1953 with the armistice at the 38th Parallel.

Before Kim’s invasion there were no U.S. forces in South Korea. Since the Korean War there have been. These forces are a threat and thorn to China, less tolerable than even the Republic of China on Taiwan. Grandfather Kim put them there. The Kim dynasty survived the war and exists today only because China saved them. There would be no nuclear weapons in North Korea unless China wanted them there. President Trump is scheduled to meet again with Kim Jong-un to discuss the denuclearization of North Korea. Does Mr. Kim indeed control these weapons?

MARTIN E. WEINSTEIN

Davos, Switzerland