What Is the Chinese-American Goal vis-a-vis North Korea?

The North Korean army is warning Washington that its military has been cleared to wage an attack using "smaller, lighter and diversified nuclear" weapons. North Korea has loudly opposed the current joint US-South Korean military exercises taking place in South Korea and has expressed anger over the more severe sanctions imposed on it by rhe UN for its February nuclear test. The Pentagon, for its part, said Wednesday it was deploying a missile defense shield to Guam to protect the US and its Pacific allies from possible attack because of the increasingly hostile rhetoric from North Korea. The Pentagon said the system will boost defenses for American citizens in Guam, a US territory, and US forces stationed there, as well as protecting US allies. The North continues to threaten to launch a nuclear attack on the United States. Pyongyang says that America's ever-escalating hostile policy toward North Korea "will be smashed" by the North's nuclear strike and the "merciless operation" of its armed forces. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel labeled North Korea's rhetoric as a real, clear danger and threat to the US and its Asia-Pacific allies. He said the US is doing all it can to de-fuse the situation, echoing comments a day earlier by US Secretary of State John Kerry. Deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Air Defense System is the latest step the US has taken to bolster forces in the region in a far-reaching show of force aimed at countering the North Korea threat, including the deployment of bomber aircraft, stealth bombers and ships. Hagel told an audience at the National Defense University that there is a path to peace on the troubled Korean peninsula, but it doesn't include making nuclear threats or taking provocative actions. ~~~~~ Dear readers, US and South Korean media continue to report on the bellicose actions and words of North Korea even while largely debunking them. But today we have witnessed the American deployment of a sophisticated air defense system, undoubtedly meant to intercept any missiles actually fired toward South Korea, Japan or Guam. The North's missiles are said to lack precision flight control systems and so one has to wonder if the system might be less than completely useful. But the very act of deployment raises questions about just how serious the threat from North Korea's military and its young and inexperienced leader may be. While mainland America is said to be safe from a Pyongyang missile attack, we have to wonder how worried the US and its Pacific allies are about North Korea's threats. And, where is China in all this? Surely the US has consulted Beijing about the unusual US military build-up going on in China's backyard. But what is China actually doing to diffuse tensions. That North Korea is directly threatening America this time is new. Such threats in the past have been directed toward South Korea and Japan. Is China trying to talk to Pyongyang? Has China made any headway in calming the North Korean rhetoric? We hope so because if anyone can bring the North back from the brink of acts that would have catastrophic consequences for North Korea, it is China. Would it be stepping too far into fiction to suggest that perhaps both China and America have decided that a nuclear North Korea is too dangerous to permit and that they have simply agreed to let Pyongyang march over the cliff that will justify striking into the North to eliminate the nuclear threat and its halucinatory masters at the same time.