by Luo Jun
BEIJING, Aug. 8 (Xinhua) -- The South Korean government is either making a historic misjudgment, or is using it as a weak excuse to state that the deployment of a U.S. anti-missile system could pit Beijing against Pyongyang.
Instead, the decision to deploy the anti-missile system will bring catastrophe to the Korean Peninsula and destroy the hard-won political mutual trust and economic ties between Seoul and its neighbors in Northeast Asia.
Trying to defend an unpopular decision to install the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system in Seongju county, southeast of Seoul, a South Korean government spokesman on Sunday called China's criticism unreasonable and shifted the blame to the "nuclear and missile threats" from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK).
However, Pyongyang's proposals for a halt of military and nuclear activities on both sides have repeatedly met cold rejection from Washington and Seoul, which have stuck to frequent military exercises and flown nuclear-capable B-52 bombers over the Korean Peninsula, in a clear show of hostility against Pyongyang.
Such measures were against the DPRK only. Now with the decision to deploy THAAD, which can snoop vast territories in China and Russia, the United States and South Korea have alienated China and Russia with severe threats to their national security.
It is unmistakably a strategic misjudgment for Seoul to violate the core interests of its two strong neighbors, at the cost of its own security, and only in the interests of American hegemony.
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