S Korea’s high-stakes missile deployment

South Korea’s plan to deploy a US-built missile shield furnishes it with a crucial level of defence against Mr Kim Jong-un, a capricious dictator whose nuclear-armed North Korean regime releases mocked-up videos of Seoul being hit by Pyongyang’s rocket attacks. But while the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defence system (Thaad) is a legitimate defensive option for South Korea, it is also seen as a threat by China, with whom Seoul has been assiduously improving relations in recent years.

China’s position is not without justification. Thaad’s radar systems, though ostensibly pointed toward the threat from the North, are also capable of looking deep into Chinese territory, thus providing Seoul — and potentially its ally, Washington — with an important source of intelligence. In addition, Beijing is worried that Thaad could form part of a broad regional American missile shield that would constrain China’s strategic ambitions and room for manoeuvring.

While both South Korea and China have a case, it must be recognised that Seoul’s imperative for self-defence against an increasingly unhinged regime in Pyongyang is the greater. No country should be denied such legitimate defence needs.

China’s leaders must also recognise their share of responsibility for the stand-off. Since taking office in 2013, South Korean President Park Geun-hye has gone to great lengths to court China — her country’s biggest export market, but also the sole ally and principal underwriter of the bellicose North Korean regime.

Her outreach to Beijing has largely been met by one-sided demands in a pattern that has been repeated in much of China’s foreign relations. Beijing’s reluctance to rein in its recalcitrant client state has left Ms Park with diminished options and, in effect, forced her to turn to the Americans for help. Washington’s past willingness to show sensitivity to Beijing’s concerns has been sorely tested by the latter’s belligerent moves in the region, particularly in the South China Sea.

The more China seeks to assert its dominance in the region, the more likely it is to push neighbouring countries into closer military ties with the United States. This has been happening for years, but it is accelerating as China’s leaders appear to view any accommodation as a sign of weakness and an opportunity to push their claims harder.

If Beijing responds to Seoul’s deployment of Thaad with an economic boycott or other punitive measures, as many in South Korea now fear, it would be a further strategic miscalculation. Such a move could promote closer relations between America’s two regional allies, South Korea and Japan, overcoming antipathies in Seoul that stem from the colonial period and frustrating Beijing’s longstanding policy of divide and rule.

Following the historic ruling by an international tribunal that negated many of China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea, this is a moment for all sides to realise that strategic tensions have escalated to dangerous levels.

The time has come for Washington and Beijing to begin serious negotiations that seek to accommodate the concerns of the US and its allies while recognising the legitimate aspirations of the region’s rising superpower.

The millions that died in the Korean war in the early 1950s serve as a harrowing reminder of the costs of strategic inflexibility between great powers. The longer the US and China wait to negotiate in the spirit of compromise, the less able they may become to retreat from a path that risks leading to military confrontation.

FINANCIAL TIMES