Security dilemma over the sinking of a South Korean vessel

On May 20 2010, a five country panel composed of South Korea, Canada, Britain, Australia and the United States confirmed that the Cheonan, a South Korean ship that sank on March 26, killing 46 sailors, had been torpedoed by a North Korean midget-submarine. While North Korea continues to deny its involvement, the panel found that recovered parts of the torpedo matched the characteristics of torpedoes found on a North Korean brochure for arms exports and purchases.
Since the attack, the international community has largely rallied behind South Korea condemning the attack with Australia and Britain being the first to express their condolences, the US also offered its support. As US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton stated during a US-China meeting in Beijing on May 24, "The Republic of Korea can continue to count on the full support of the United States".
This attack has put the relationship between North and South Korea under serious strains. The two have yet to sign a peace treaty ending the Korean War, and according to international relations scholar Sean Kay, more than two thirds of North Korea's one million strong army is stationed within 150km of the border. It is also thought to have nuclear arms capable of reaching Seoul - South Korea's capital city - within minutes. Making military actions out of the question for South Korea and its allies, including the United States, who according to the New York Times, has an average of 28,500 soldiers stationed in the South.
Clinton has called for "strong but measured response" but the question of how to respond effectively to the North's threats is not an easy one to answer. As Reynolds, a BBC journalist puts it, "the South is left to make a lot of diplomatic noise, with American echoes".
According to the BBC Seoul responded with "a package of measures, including a halt to most trade". Pyongyang then closed the Kaesong industrial complex, a shared enterprise resulting from the Sunshine policy aimed at promoting exchange between the neighbours. The park was however reopened on May 26; Jang Cheol-hyeon, researcher at the Institute for National Security Strategy explains to the BBC that the North needs Kaesong to save "the cards it needs in order to play the game".
On June 4, the New York Times reported that South Korea had made a request for action at the UN Security Council. Sanctions will have little effect as Professor Nancy Stefureak, a Brock University Political Science professor noted. According to Stefureak, "sanctions don't work because Kim Jong-Ill is willing to let his people die". Such measures would require the approval of China, one of the last North Korean allies, who is unlikely to endorse any move which could further destabilize the Peninsula.
Prime Minister Wen Jiabao of China has given his condolences to South Korea for the incident on May 29, but has refused to stand behind the international panel's findings. It has however started its own review of the incident. BBC assessed that if China had sided with the South, "Kim Jong-Ill would have gone off the deep end immediately". While China seeks to prove its legitimacy as an upcoming superpower to the West, it also has great interests in preserving the somewhat stable status-quo in the region.
Since the incident, the usual rhetoric war between the North and the South has intensified; Song Hun from the New York Times reported a North Korean General Pak stating that the Korean Peninsula "was heading to the brink of war".
While much of the rhetoric noise is mostly attributed to the Pyongyang, Professor Stefureak notes that Lee Myung Bak, the South Korean President, has been much less open to communication than his predecessors. The BBC notes that "little economic relationship was left after Lee's election in 2008".
While anger over the attack is evident among the South Korean population, a Korean political analyst explains that the fear of war creates a dual perception of the North both as a brother and an enemy. New York Times' Fackler notes "a deep-seated resistance against returning to an era of cold-war politics and hostility toward the North". This, coupled with a need to preserve economic stability is expected to keep the situation in the realm of rhetoric. The situation, however, is likely to remain extremely tense for the months to come as noted by BBC's Reynolds who quotes the North announcing that, "there will be neither dialogue nor contact between the authorities during Lee Myung Bak's tenure of office," which is supposed to last until February 2013.