The United States and China in Northeast Asia

This chapter examines alliance dynamics in U.S.–China relations in Northeast Asia. It analyzes how each nation has used third-party coercive diplomacy to compel the other to restrain its allies' challenges to great power security. A major objective of U.S. policy toward North Korea and the corresponding tension of the Korean Peninsula has been to compel China to exercise greater control over North Korea's nuclear weapons program. A major objective of Chinese policy toward Japan and the corresponding tension in the East China Sea has been to compel the United States to restrain Japanese challenges to Chinese sovereignty claims in disputed waters in the East China Sea. For a brief period, third-party coercion contributed to greater U.S.–China cooperation as each country adjusted its policies toward its respective ally, easing regional tension and U.S.–China conflict.