Weeping for monsters: North Korea's dynastic dues

I’ve been thinking all week about the hysterical sobbing in those images of North Koreans mourning Kim Jong-il. Was it pretend-crying just to avoid looking different to everyone else? Was it just group hysteria? Was it stage managed by the government and then exaggerated out of all proportion? Was it genuine grief for a leader that was a daily presence to them? Was it grief for their own loved one who have died in famines and their miserable fortune to live in such an accursed place? Was it fear that things could get worse under Kim Jong-un? Was it simply just a great chance to cry uncontrollably and not look out of place?

The ambiguities hidden in the tears define North Korea as it has done since the end of World War II. When the Democratic People's Republic of Korea set up shop in the northern part of the peninsula in 1946 they were faced with two big problems. The North had always been more remote and less developed and now 2 million more fled south to avoid the Communist DPRK. The three-war that followed left the new country in tatters.

North Korea converted to a centrally planned economy which strangled small business. Dissent was not tolerated and all good was embodied in leader Kim Il-sung. In turn Il-Sung promoted “Juche” as a concept of self-reliance which would have to make do in difficult times. Il-Sung said juche meant man was the master of everything and decided everything. That man was him and he mobilised the entire workforce to industrialise North Korea rapidly after the civil war.

But always suspicious of the South, they built up their military might to deter invasion. They ran up massive debts mainly to the USSR, China and Japan. By 1980 they defaulted on all their loans and the economy has been contracting ever since. The collapse of Soviet Communism in 1989 left Russia unimpressed with their poverty-stricken debtor. That meant an increasing reliance on China with which DPRK shared philosophies and its only open border. Il-sung refused to consider Gorbachev’s perestroika because he knew it led to glasnost. He died in 1994 and first son and heir apparent Kim Jong-il took over.

Born in 1942 Jong-il spent his first years in Siberia with his parents. His father commanded the 1st battalion of the 88th Brigade, a Red Army unit made up of Chinese and Korean exiles. Jong-il was born in Vyatskoye, a fishing village near Khabarovsk where the railway turns south to Vladivostok. As a schoolboy, Jong-il was interested in politics and Marxist literature. He learned English in Malta and as early as 1980, was effective head of the politburo with only his father to look up to. He inherited his father’s personality cult and was named head of the armed forces in 1991.

With Jong-il making all the decisions since they defaulted on their debts, North Korea’s economy collapsed. When Il-Sung finally collapsed in 1994, aged 82, Jong-il was undisputed leader. The US were worried by his nuclear ambitions and threats to leave the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty. The countries signed an Agreed Framework as one of Jong-il’s first achievements in office. It allowed the DPRK to continue developing nuclear technology at foreign expense but with light water reactors rather than the nuclear proliferating graphite reactors they already had.

The US overplayed its hand. President Clinton rashly assumed North Korea was on the verge of collapse and DPRK officials knew his assumption. Congress would not pass a bill to end the trade embargo in place since the end of the Korean War and the US dragged its feet in calling for tenders to build the new reactors. By October 2002, the US believed North Korea had an enrichment program and confronted them with their evidence. Three months later North Korea left the NNPT. The Framework was no longer Agreed and the subsequent Six Party talks were almost completely fruitless. North Korea had gone rogue.

While nuclear testing proceeded with Iranian and Pakistani know-how, the fate of the people of North Korea worsened. Jong-il oversaw a collapse in industry and technology and floods and storms in 1995 wrecked existing electricity and health infrastructure and destroyed harvests. Hungry peasants ate what survived before it was fully developed and the country could no longer feed itself. Women and children bore the brunt of the death toll of a million or more in the three years that followed.

Food from China, South Korea and the US eased the situation until Jong-il refused all overseas aid in 2002. Inclusion in Bush’s 2002 State of the Union “Axis of Evil” heightened the sense of North Korea’s isolation. Famine conditions worsened again. Recent escapees told the BBC hunger and starvation were common with homeless people dying in the railway station, and others too weak to beg. Complaining about this inside the country would lead to instant imprisonment.

It’s not difficult to imagine the logical leaps of doublethink North Koreans must take in order to make sense of their world. Death is all around them but so is a regime that demands obedience and Juche. Even when people were confronted on the street by evidence of the failure of the regime, their total reliance state media meant foreign powers and the evil South could always be conjured up as scapegoats.

The extraordinary scenes in Pyongyang after Jong-il’s death are not without precedence. This week’s public lamentation eerily resembles the carefully choreographed mourning after Kim Il-sung died. Life seemed almost too unbearable to go on without Dear Leader. But just as in 1994, the State machinery will be whipped into shape after a decent interval and the leadership cult will swing to Kim Jong-un. The world should learn from Clinton’s mistake. North Korea can survive dysfunction. Bellies may remain empty but the belicose dynasty of Dear Leader will continue. As the handpicked factory worker in the sobbing video said “I will change sorrow into strength and remain faithful to Comrade Kim Jong-un.” It’s best the North Koreans cry now because it will not be tolerated in six months time.

Dear Leader's birthday presents

Yesterday North Korean President Kim Il-Jong celebrated his 65th birthday as the nation entered what state media called a state of “war preparedness”. His birthday is the country’s biggest annual holiday and sees a host of flower shows, dances, exhibitions and most importantly, pledges of loyalty. A meeting on Thursday held by the Communist party, government and armed forces wrote a letter to Kim which vowed to follow his guidance to build a "powerful socialist state".

The party is upbeat after North Korea signed an agreement earlier in the week to halt its nuclear weapons programme in return for energy and other aid. Under the terms of the 12 February deal negotiated in Beijing, Pyongyang will close and disable its main nuclear facility. In return they will get 1 million tons of aid from the five powers that attended the talks (China, Japan, South Korea, US and Russia). North Korea will have to shut down Yongbyon reactor within 60 days in exchange for an initial 50,000 tonnes of fuel oil or equivalent aid. When the 60 day period expires, they will receive another 950,000 tonnes of fuel oil.

Some analysts are surprised that Kim has agreed to these conditions but Xu Guangyu, an analyst with the China Arms Control and Disarmament Association, told Reuters “their ultimate goal is not nuclear weapons but two things -- normalizing relations with the United States, especially economic and security ties, and becoming a normal state accepted in international society."

Conservative critics such as John Bolton, the former US ambassador to the UN, said the deal rewarded North Korea by relieving the economically strapped country of financial pressure for only partially dismantling its nuclear program. "This sends a very bad signal, not just to North Korea but to Iran and other would-be proliferates," he said. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice rejected this saying the deal shows strong diplomacy can achieve results.

But the deal is not as strong as it could be for those worried by Korea’s nuclear ambitions. While it prevents Pyongyang from creating new fissile material, it lets North Korea keep whatever nuclear weapons it has already built, plus it doesn’t stop them building more weapons with whatever fissile material it has already produced.

Such issues will be far from the minds of those who gathered in the capital yesterday celebrate the 65th birthday of 'dear leader'. North Koreans usually receive benefits such as extra food on holidays, though outsiders are unsure whether it will occur this time given the country’s chronic food shortage. National TV showed pictures of thousands dancing in the streets underneath a barrage of flags and banners. One woman told TV “At the time of this significant February holiday I want to see President Kim more than ever.” But it’s unclear whether she got her wish as the reclusive leader rarely makes public appearances.

Kim has led North Korea since 1994. According to Soviet research, he was born in an army camp in the far east of USSR in village of Vyatskoye. At the time, his father Kim Il-Sung was a member of the Communist Party and involved in the anti-Japanese resistance. He had fled to Siberia under pressure from the rampant Japanese. When the war ended, the Korean peninsula was divided along the 38th parallel into two military occupation zones, administered by the USSR in the north and the US in the South.

The northern Democratic People’s Republic of Korea was founded under Kim’s leadership in 1949. With the US in retreat, he convinced Stalin to bankroll his invasion of the south. The Korean war ended in stalemate after three years claiming three million casualties. Kim consolidated his control of the north under the program of 'Juche'. Also called 'Kim Il Sung Thought', the ideology demanded total loyalty to the paramount leader and the "religion of Kim Il Sungism".

Kim continued to develop a personality cult around him. In 1980 a party congress announced that Kim Il-Jong would succeed his father. But it would be a while yet before it could happen. In the meantime Kim senior took Korea into the nuclear age commissioning a nuclear reactor in 1986. Within three years they claimed they had the technology to produce weapons-grade enriched uranium. Kim died suddenly in 1994 and his death reportedly occurred during a heated argument with his son.

Initially Kim Il-Jong agreed to permanently shut down nuclear facilities and cooperate with IAEA inspectors. But the promised US aid in return never arrived. And in 1998 Korea declared its intention to continue to develop, test, deploy and sell missiles in order to counter the alleged military threat presented by the US despite a debt soaring to $10 billion, most of it with Russia.

North Korea still relies on Russia and China for its continued survival. Both Russian President Vladimir Putin and China's Communist Party sent congratulations on Kim's 65th birthday.

mixed results for North Korea missile tests

On Wednesday July 5 (not July 4, US Independence Day, as incorrectly reported by many media), North Korea carried out nuclear missile tests which have caused a storm of worldwide reaction.

North Korea's most dangerous potential weapon is the Taepodong-2 (named by outside observers for the launch site) missile, the range of which is thought to include Australia and parts of Alaska and Hawaii however Pyongyang has a very limited number of these experimental long-range missiles. The Taepodong-2 launch was unsuccessful with the first stage engine burning for just 40 seconds, less than half its expected time. Several minutes later, the missile fell into the Sea of Japan (East Sea) which lies between North Korea, Russia and Japan. The Taepodong-2 is a larger version of the Taepodong-1, which was tested in 1998 in a probable failed attempt to place Pyongyang's Kwangmyongsong satellite into orbit. The Koreans claimed the launch was successful and the satellite was transmitting the melody of the immortal revolutionary hymns ‘Song of General Kim Il Sung’ and ‘Song of General Kim Jong Il’ and the Morse signals ‘Juche Korea’ in 27 MHz'. Despite these explict details no evidence could be uncovered by Western intelligence agencies that the spacecraft had actually reached orbit.

Though North Korea failed in its longer-term ambitions on July 7, the test two days earlier was more successful when they launched the short range Hwasong and the medium range Nodong missiles. They have up to 200 Nadong missiles which have a range of up to 1,300 kilometres (putting it in reach of Japan and Okinawa.) The Nadong is based on Scud technology and Pyongyang has sold the weapon to Iran, Syria and Libya.

Unlike the 1998 launch, few were surprised by this week’s activities. Though the exact launch date was unknown, North Korea did little to hide the exercise. In June, American satellite photographs revealed that the North was proceeding with the test-firing of the long-range missile at a launching pad on a remote east coast site. Just days before the launch, the Chinese tried to put together an "informal" meeting of the dormant six-party talks on North Korea's nuclear program. The six parties are the US, Russia, China, Japan and the two Koreas. The North has boycotted the talks since September, citing American efforts to blacklist the Macau bank it uses for overseas financial transactions.

Because the long-range missile failed, the US has not played a large role in the response. US national security advisor, Stephen Hadley called the tests “provocative behaviour,” but added that they marked “no immediate threat” to the US. Japan, which views itself as the main military focus of the North Korean tests, reacted more strongly. It has implemented sanctions, including banning North Korean officials from visiting Japan and suspending the ferry from North Korea to Japan. Tokyo also took the North Korean missile tests to the U.N. Security Council. Japan asked the Council on Friday to ban international sales of North Korean missiles. The US States, Britain and France back the resolution but it is opposed by the other two permanent members China and Russia.

The South Korean response has been less clear-cut than Japan. Seoul political bickering and their desire for political unification mean that they have mixed threats of economic retaliation (withholding food and fertilizer shipments) with calls for dialogue with Pyongyang. Russia, who were not notified in advance, criticized the launch but called for a calm response. Russian President Putin was quoted as saying “We would prefer it if Russia and the international community did not receive such presents” but also cautioned "these events should not lead to emotions that would conquer common sense when considering such issues." Whereas China, which provides the North with its oil and much of its food, is apparently unconcerned by the launch despite the North's rebuff to their talks proposal. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said "we'll continue to work together with all the other parties and play a constructive role."

North Asia is a powderkeg. Since 2000, North Korea has more than quadrupled its suspected stockpile of plutonium, withdrawn from the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty and resumed flight testing of its missiles. China is arming heavily and South Korea and Japan are also keeping pace. The launch could increase support for hawkish candidates in the race to succeed Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, who is scheduled to retire in September. The chief cabinet secretary Shinzo Abe is favourite to succeed Koizumi has built his popularity with a tough stance on North Korea and China. Abe said the tests were "a serious problem from the standpoint of our national security, peace and stability of the international community and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction."

The North, however, said it had the right to test missiles. South Korea's Yonhap news agency on Friday quoted Choe Myong Nam, councillor at the North's UN mission in Geneva, as saying the launches were successful and could be continued. "It's an unfair logic to say that somebody can do something and others cannot. The same logic applies to nuclear possession," Choe said. He continued, “the missile launches are not intended to strike anyone and it's the North position that missile launches could be continued,"

It is safe to say that the world has not heard the last of Taepodong-2. That is one of few things that are safe in the troubled Sea of Japan.

Seoul Searching

Icy greetings from freezing Seoul. Today was quite mild as the temperatures rose to a balmy three degrees. Unlike Friday when it rose from a low of minus -8 to a sizzling -3 as those damn Siberian winds kicked in again. No snow, just a bitterly cold Russky breeze blowing in from the North.

Seoul is the most inaptly named city in the world. It is a soulless place. It changed hands five times in the Korean war and was destroyed many times over in the process. As a result the whole city was rebuilt and it looks like how the Gold Coast would look if you dropped the temps by 30 degrees and dragged it away from the sea. The city is gridlocked with a rushhour that really is a rushday starting at 7am and continuing to 10pm. Thats the despite having a terrific subway system which I have been using to get around quite easily.

Not much English spoken here despite the strong American influence, with about 50,000 US troops stationed here. I saw quite a few of them when we took a tour to the DMZ on Saturday. The demilitarised zone was the ceasefire line at the end of the Korean war in 1953 and is now awash with soldiers, weapons, barbed wire, landmines, and of course, a Viking longboat. The Viking longboat is like something you'd see at Dreamworld except it is in the middle of a warzone. I guess you need something to keep the kids occupied when you are staring past a forbidding looking South Korean soldier into the famine-ravished North. The South Koreans built the largest flag pole in the world at the border so the North Koreans had to build a bigger one. It is so big that they have to take it down as soon as it rains as the flagpole can't support it when it gets wet.

Haven't found any restaurants serving dog yet but I saw this delicious looking repast on a cafe menu near the hotel:
"Nolboo's Soondae Kukbob is being made by putting the tripe, the horsehair's cap of badger, the womb and soondae in the thick broth from soupbone. It is good for your health especially by getting rid of its peculiar smell. Its taste is light and refreshing".

Call me a wimp if you like, but so far, I have passed on Nolboo's Soondae Kukbob even the horsehair's cap of badger, the womb and soondae don't do it for me.