The linked article is hyperbolic if we're generous, in my opinion it qualifies as an instance of "fake news".

>China has prohibited all hallyu, or Korean Wave (K-pop), content in the country

This and the headline are false. K-pop is available on Chinese music streaming services, Korean dramas are similarly still airing, etc. What is true is that Korean stars are increasingly being barred from having concerts, events, and TV appearances in China, and that is leading to concern about whether more regulations are to come. BTW, MAMA 2016 went ahead without issues.

A non-clickbait account: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/12/04/south-koreas-k-po...

If China didn't want a missile shield at their doorstep, maybe, just maybe, they should've stop propping up a regime that carries out provocative ballistic missile tests in the region and threatens nuclear strikes against neighbors ad nauseam. China has nobody but themselves and shortsighted foreign policy to blame for this mess.

Yes China. Stop propping up the USA!

They don't want a multimillion person refuge crisis on their doorstep.

Curious how China's escalating displeasure with the THAAD system will affect the 2M Korean-speaking Chinese known as Joseonok[1]. One would have hoped their fortunes were on the rise, even if only slowly, but national attention on "Koreans" in general might be misconstrued against them.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koreans_in_China

For those, like me, who were not in the know regarding THAAD, it stands for Terminal High Altitude Area Defense and is a US made antimissile defense system. The US is working with South Korea to install THAAD systems there. China is not happy about this.

It seems like pure defense system. Why should anyone object to it?

Currently China's nuclear strike doctrine is "no first strike". To be clear, this means that China won't launch first, even in the case of a warning of a nuclear strike[1].

This isn't the same as the US or Russian policy (since 1993), which both retain the policy option of preemtive strikes.

Tools like THAAD reduce China's ability to present a credible second-strike, which has led them to object extremely strenuously to it.

Partially because of THAAD it seems that China is considering changing their doctrine[2]. This would be unfortunate, and it seems likely that there are many in the Chinese government who would prefer not to have to do that. If they could get THAAD deployment in Korea cancelled it would be likely to strengthen their hand.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_first_use

[2] http://thediplomat.com/2016/02/is-china-considering-a-high-r...

Because it breaks the doctrine of mutually assured destruction. If China loses the ability to effectively retaliate against a hypothetical US nuclear strike, it loses its superpower status.

THAAD isn't overly destablising to MAD, which operates on the strategic level. It has little effectiveness against ICBM re-entry vehicles which move very, very fast ( about 8 to 10 km / s ) and have all sorts of decoys and countermeasures.

It is designed for dealing with theatre missiles, IRBMs and the like, which move much more slowly, aren't well protected and aren't generally considered in the MAD calcul

Per state.gov:

Many of our regional defense deployments, like the Patriot system and the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD system, are inherently designed for theater use. They are not capable of defending against ICBMs launched at the United States. THAAD, however, is capable of defending against the medium-range and intermediate-range ballistic missile that North Korea is deploying.

China and NK consider themselves allies, as do the US and SK. And China+NK are not allied with US+SK. And that region is unlikely to be affected by any significant non-aligned players.

[It's a bit more complicated than that, of course. And THAAD isn't 100% effective. But the details don't change the overall picture much.]

If a missile is ever stopped by THAAD, it means SK+US didn't want it to land. Which probably means China+NK launched it, and did want it to land. Meanwhile, if SK+US decide to go on the offensive, THAAD won't stop their attack, but will mitigate any retaliation from China+NK.

THAAD is bad for China+NK in both scenarios.

In addition, since THAAD's existence makes it a whole lot less risky for US+SK to go on the offensive -- it makes it more likely that they would do so. And China+NK certainly wouldn't want to defend against a US+SK with THAAD being in place.

Because ABM was and is considered by most nations a threat to world peace as it increases the chance of a first strike by the party who has it. There was an Anti-ABM treaty which he US signed and then unilaterally withdrew from. US missile defense is progressing to the point of making the Russian (and Chinese) strategic arensals ineffective once it reaches that point the US can execute a first strike without fearing retaliation. Russia can't afford ABM so they are building new delivery systems, China doesn't have the tech nor does it seem to want to develop its nuclear arsenal any further. Both of them look at the US missile shield as a clear threat to their national security and regional and world peace because it would give the US the ability to do what every they want with impunity.

If one party in a standoff think they have a chance to survive/win they may turn aggressive.

Because the difference between a defensive system and and offensive system is only a few small modifications.

Most Chaoxianzu immigrated before the ROK existed, and there's one other "Korea" that the PRC is ostensibly allied with. So I don't think that would be an issue, though there is certainly a possibility.

So it's a response to American imperial ambitions?

Note how missile defence in the nuclear arena can't be interpreted as purely defensive as it increases the viability of a first strike.

America also has retained the right to the "first strike" option unlikely China which has declined such an option.

There's something truly childish about Chinese diplomacy. They regularly release statements to the effect that the Chinese people have been insulted by some obscure diplomatic statement, and now they're implementing sanctions in the form of banning pop music of all things.

Anyone have any recommendations for books or articles that shed some light on this seemingly bizarre behavior?

It does not seem childish to me.

From the article:

> Why? .... South Korea made the decision to deploy the THAAD American missile defense system in the country

They are responding to increased military tension with their neighbor, with a minor economic sanction that will not hurt the health, welfare, or stability of their neighbouring country.

Such sanctions are a warning shot---a way of saying "yes you see what we did to the pop industry? we can do that to your heavy mining industry next".

> we can do that to your heavy mining industry next

You're ostensibly incorrect because China is a member of the WTO and can't unilaterally start economic sanctions against other WTO members.

I'm no expert but a particular kind of music (k-pop) is more cultural than anything else and so it may be one of the few legal options China has.

The US is a member of the WTO, but banned online gambling for years without any real sanctions against them.

Countries can and often do unilaterally break portions of global trade deals, and don't care unless there's action taken against them.

Oil producing countries are in a full blown international cartel, but does anyone stop them? Nope.

Is China going to get hit, whilst they're producing so much of the raw materials needed for electronics?

> The US is a member of the WTO, but banned online gambling for years without any real sanctions against them.

I see you're trying to cast a hypocritical light on the US, even though the US has nothing to do with it.

The complainants (Antigua and Barbuda) were compensated in 2014, by the US.

Ultimately a country can build a case for banning a thing (a good, service, etc.) but if a country says 'These widgets are OK, in fact we manufacture them ourselves, but we've decided to ban the ones that come from country X' then that usually is anti-trade in no uncertain terms, in WTO language it is 'unfair.'

It's not like the US banned online gambling on purpose so as to try to cripple the Antiguan economy, as would be the case for banning Korean exports to China.

The article reminds me how Obama stopped the burgeoning deployment of this system in various European countries at Russia's request, right after he took office, and I wonder if Trump will try to restart the effort to deploy them.

I'd be surprised if he tried to start a diplomatic crisis with Russia right away, just yesterday he said the US will have good relations with Russia under his admin.

The whole Trump/Russia situation is similar to Obama's pledges to warm relations with Russia (most famously, the "reset"), complete with the opposition's foreign policy hawks being perpetually outraged. Of course, the economic crisis was first through tenth on everyone's minds, so it never became a top issue for Obama.

A few concerts and other media products weren't approved. I didn't see in the article any official government statement categorically banning K-pop.

That's one way to protect the local industry.

Actually, it's not aiming at protecting local music industry, if so they would do that years ago. It's more like to push political/business pressure on South Korea to stop them installing THAAD.

Yep, it said so in the article. But it's also possibly going to have the effect of protecting the local industry.

It is always hard to tell why they do things. The pretext is...retaliation, but they look at all the other wins, and protectionism has a lot to do with it. Heck, Korean dramas were getting way too popular for local media comfort before the THAAD cut backs.

S. Korea is also a democracy. The regime is highly suspicious of any foreign culture which might make people more interested in control of their own government.

When we press the right buttons, we see that the world is plenty of crazy leaders.