Category: North Korea

Korean newspaper runs with @NewYorker Kim Jong Un cartoon to show other leaders with toys. https://t.co/tjojZFN2Dl pic.twitter.com/i9PSkVaT2b

— Alastair Gale (@AlastairGale) January 18, 2016

I have always said that the Chinese have the power to bring the Kim regime into line if they wanted to.  The biggest card the Chinese could use against the Kim regime is to indefinitely suspend oil shipments.  They won’t do this though because they fear the collapse of the Kim regime more than they fear them developing nuclear weapons:

If China were to pull the plug on its oil supply to North Korea as a countermeasure against Pyongyang’s fourth nuclear test, what kind of impact would it have on the country? Most agree that a halt in oil would trigger a ‘mass oil panic’ across the Party, military, and state, crippling all agencies, given that the North currently imports more than 90 percent of its oil from its neighbor. In an event such as this, a still young leadership that lacks stability would not be able to hold up for a week, according to experts.

The oil that goes into the North either after for free or at a cost first goes to a storage facility in Baekma, North Pyongan Province (near Sinuiju) and is stored there until being supplied to state agencies, transport-related factories, and military bases, which have priority. The main route of supply is through the pipeline that runs from China’s Dandong to the North’s Baekma. The first area this stored oil is then sent to is Pyongyang by train and truck after which it is delivered to main Party agencies, transport, and shipping bodies.

Next in line is Nampo as well as ports and military bases near the west coast. The supply in Baekma is also transported to another storage facility in Munchon on the east coast, which provides for state enterprises, agencies, and military bases in that area. In short, oil from China powers nearly all of the North’s state entities, military facilities, and factories, explaining why cutting off that supply would grind the country to a halt.

A North Korean defector who once worked within the oil supply chain speculates the suspension would create conditions that are so bad Kim Jong Un would be desperate to restore the supply. Although the North has a three-month emergency supply, that is reserved for times of war and would therefore be untouchable.

The freeze would disrupt operations within the Central Party, related agencies, administrative bodies, and the military. Cadres of all affiliations would face no heat in their offices, making it hard to work in a normal capacity, and their movements would also be restricted as there would be no gasoline or diesel to run their cars. Workers would also not have a means to get around, likely shuttering state agencies and factories.  [Daily NK]

You can read more at the link.

https://twitter.com/pearswick/status/687807710365007872

https://twitter.com/RimjingangNK/status/687929976654544896

Successful defections peaked in 2009 at 2,914.
Since then decreased by > 50%, particularly in KJU era, mostly due to increased border sec.

— Sokeel Park 박석길 (@Sokeel) January 11, 2016

The mass refugee issue is why I believe if the regime was to collapse the DMZ should remain in place to stop a mass population movement to the South.  It would be up to the ROK to quickly move and distribute aid to the North which would help mitigate a mass population movement:

U.S. experts have urged South Korea and the U.S. to jointly devise measures to improve assimilation of North Korean defectors to other countries in the event of a North Korean collapse.

Olivia Enos and Bruce Klingner, researchers at the conservative U.S. think tank the Heritage Foundation, released a report titled “Next Steps for Human Rights in North Korea” on Tuesday.

The report said the U.S. must adopt a multi-pronged strategy that acknowledges the two important stakeholders in the human rights debate: people inside North Korea and defectors outside the country.

It said the U.S. and South Korea should strive to remedy problems before a potential Kim Jong-un regime collapse and the humanitarian crisis that would follow.

The researchers said that if the North were to collapse, as many as three-point-65 million North Koreans could look to resettle in South Korea.

They said that such a large-scale humanitarian crisis would threaten the stability of South Korea, unless a comprehensive assimilation plan was created well in advance.   [KBS World Radio]

.@BonnieGlaser says there are many more ways the US could pressure #DPRK by applying sanctions that have not yet been applied @HouseForeign

— CSIS Korea Chair (@CSISKoreaChair) January 13, 2016

More threats from North Korea being made against the US:

North Korea said Tuesday that it is ready to detonate hydrogen bombs capable of wiping out the United States “all at once,” claiming that it has succeeded in developing miniaturized nuclear weapons.

North Korea’s latest nuclear test helped the North “get fully armed with smaller and standardized H-bombs for ballistic rockets and get possessed of ultra-modern strike means for delivering nuclear bombs of various kinds,” the Korean Central News Agency said in its commentary.

The North threatened that its nuclear scientists and technicians are “in high spirits” to detonate hydrogen bombs capable of “wiping out” the whole U.S. territory all at once as Washington moves to stifle the North. [Yonhap]

You can read more at the link.

It is important to remember that just because the test failed doesn’t mean the North Koreans did not learn something from it to improve the bomb for a second test:

The yield, or the total energy produced by the bomb, also contradicts Pyongyang’s claim.

It is estimated that the Wednesday test generated 6 kilotons of yield, which is less than the 8-kiloton yield of the third nuclear test in 2013.

The North’s second nuclear test in 2009 had 2-kiloton yield, and the first in 2006 yielded less than 1 kiloton of total energy. A yield of 1 kiloton can be approximately compared to 1,000 tons of TNT exploding.

In an H-bomb test by the Soviet Union in 1961, the yield produced by the destructive bomb known as “Czar Bomb” was estimated at 50,000 kilotons.

One government official involved in the assessment of the test last week told the JoongAng Ilbo that the government thinks Pyongyang carried out a failed hydrogen test after reviewing various scientific data and evidence. “We have reviewed a wide range of scientific data such as the strength of the seismic event and sound wave and the detonation location before coming up with the assessment [that it was a failed H-bomb test],” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.  [Joong Ang Ilbo]

You can read more at the link.

North Korea Activates Loudspeakers to Cope with S. Korean Psy-Ops https://t.co/o74MgVZGaS

— KBS WORLD Radio (@KBSWorldRadio) January 11, 2016