Tag: Kim Jong-un

I doubt Kim Jong-un is very concerned about this when he knows there is almost zero chance the ROK President is willing to execute such a preemptive strike.  This report seems more for domestic consumption to show the ROK public the government is “doing something”:

South Korea’s defense minister is publicly boasting that it will create a new “decapitation unit” called the Spartan 3000 with the express intent of taking out North Korean leadership, The New York Times reports.

The brigade-sized unit of between 2,000 and 4,000 soldiers will be established by year’s end, The Times reported the defense minister, Song Young-moo, as saying, adding that the military was already “retooling” helicopters and transporting planes to be able to penetrate North Korean airspace at night.

It’s out of the ordinary for a senior government leader to publicly say they are working on a plan to assassinate a foreign head of state. But there’s an interesting reason behind it: The South is trying to freak out its northern neighbor and get it to the negotiating table instead of further developing nuclear weapons.

“The best deterrence we can have, next to having our own nukes, is to make Kim Jong Un fear for his life,” retired South Korean Lt. Gen. Shin Won-sik told The Times.  [Business Insider]

You can read more at the link.

Meanwhile in California:

pic.twitter.com/vMbq5gNwQV

— Bruce Klingner (@BruceKlingner) September 8, 2017

Peace in our time with North Korea is just around the corner, US ambassador to North Korea former NBA basketball player Dennis Rodman is on the case:

With tensions brewing between the leaders of the United States and North Korea, one man believes he can help keep the peace.

Former NBA star Dennis Rodman hopes to “straighten things out” between President Donald Trump and supreme leader Kim Jong Un, two men Rodman calls friends.

He appeared on “Good Morning Britain” via satellite from Los Angeles on Wednesday and was asked about his relationship with Kim and the multiple trips to North Korea.

As I have said before, despite all the provocations and deadly aggressive behavior over the past few years by Kim Jong-un, some how South Koreans are more fearful of President Trump:

“My firm belief is that war will not happen. The general consensus among my friends is that war won’t break out since the U.S. and China are involved,” Choi Yong-kwan, a 20-year-old college student, said as he read an article on his mobile phone.”But I definitely do feel a sense of growing tension and fear ― it’s their sixth nuclear test and they are on their way to refining their nukes.”

“I’ll leave Korea and head for Canada or something” was the initial response from Park, an elementary school teacher. But as she went on, she dismissed the idea of war. “To be honest I don’t put too much thought into this because it’s always been this way. War does not come easily,” she said. “And we shouldn’t be worried. Fear is what leads to war.”

For the public in the South, North Korea’s provocations are not treated as something new. Although most stuck to this instinct, some added U.S. President Donald Trump as a new, unpredictable and perhaps even more frightening variable.

“This is nothing new. Just another provocation by the North as I see it and it’s been worse before but still did not lead to war. I don’t think any South Korean male who has been in the military is scared,” 29-year-old Yoon Tae-jun from Busan said, adding “But then again I’m not sure this time because of Trump.

“I’m not keeping an eye on this ― maybe this is the problem. But this time, maybe Trump will take some sort of action,” Kwon Suk-in, 27, said. “There must be no war.”  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un observes the launch of a Hwasong-12 intermediate-range ballistic missile in Pyongyang on Aug. 29, 2017, North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) reported Aug. 30. The missile flew over Japan and landed in the northern Pacific Ocean. (For Use Only in the Republic of Korea. No Redistribution) (Yonhap)

Kim Jong-un is having a good month, besides a successful ballistic missile launch over Japan his wife has given birth to another baby:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and his wife Ri Sol-ju had their third child earlier this year, according to the National Intelligence Service.

The spy agency submitted a written report to the National Assembly Intelligence Committee Monday that Ri seems to have given birth to their third child in February.

According to the agency, Kim and Ri, who married in 2009, had their first child in 2010 and second one in 2013. There was speculation about Ri’s third pregnancy as she had not appeared at public events for about nine months last year.

The only information known about their children is that the second one is a girl named Ju-ae, which U.S. basketball star Dennis Rodman disclosed after visiting Pyongyang in 2013 at the invitation of Kim, an avid basketball fan.

No other information about the other two children, including their sexes, has been revealed.  [Korea Times]

You can read more at the link.

It has long been suspected that the Chinese government kept close ties with Kim Jong-nam as sort of a Plan B if needed in North Korea.  According to the below article Kim Jong-nam made sure a Chinese Plan B could never happen after he got word of a possible coup:

When Kim Jong Nam was killed with a deadly nerve agent in an airport in Malaysia in February, it may have thwarted an attempt backed by the Chinese government to overthrow his half-brother, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

Citing three sources, Nikkei Asian Review reported on Monday that top government officials in China and North Korea in 2012 seriously considered a plot to remove Kim Jong Un.

Nikkei reports that Hu Jintao, China’s president at the time, met with Kim Jong Un’s uncle, who floated the idea of replacing him with his half-brother, a politically unmotivated gambler.

But because of a recent scandal involving the death of the son of one of Hu’s advisers, the Chinese leader did not immediately act.

According to the report, a top adviser to Jiang Zemin, Hu’s predecessor and rival, caught wind of the plot and informed Kim Jong Un, who in 2013 had his uncle executed and purged several officials with ties to China.  [American Military News]

You can read more at the link.

I guess if you discount political executions, mass malnourishment of its people, gulags, military attacks on neighbors, state sponsored criminal activity, and being an international pariah than I guess yes you could make a comparison between Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un:

Not to be outdone, North Korea’s military revealed a detailed plan to strike the U.S. island territory of Guam, which hosts key Air Force and Navy bases. After further brinkmanship between the two leaders, North Korea’s state-run media showed footage of Kim himself reviewing the plans. But the leader said he would not attack unless the U.S. struck first, effectively ending an imminent missile scare.

While a number of Western media outlets portrayed this as a retreat on Kim’s part, North Korea expert Michael Madden says it actually boosted Kim’s credibility on the international stage.

“This allowed Kim Jong Un to portray himself as the more experienced leader,” Madden, a visiting scholar at the U.S.-Korea Institute, tells Newsweek, adding that Kim also appeared more likely to defer to his advisers than Trump.

“Who would have thought that when we said ‘let cooler heads prevail,’ it would be the 33-year-old leader of the DPRK?” said Madden, referring to North Korea’s official title: the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

Trump hailed Kim’s “very wise and well-reasoned decision” in a tweet Wednesday, but Town and Madden agree that Kim has come out stronger from the latest crisis. While Trump fired off a number of statements that were widely challenged at home—including the claim that he had improved the country’s nuclear arsenal and that U.S. missiles were “locked and loaded”—Kim remained largely silent and delegated his words to lower-level outlets of his government’s propaganda, allowing ample room for de-escalation. Even his strategic missile force’s Guam attack plan included language that offered North Korea a way out from actually going through with it.

“Kim has been very careful with his words as not to back himself into a corner by shooting from the hip, like the Trump administration,” Town says.  [Newsweek]

You can read the rest at the link.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un tours the Chemical Material Institute of the Academy of Defense Science, according to North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency on Aug. 23, 2017, without saying when the visit was made. The institute develops and produces parts for intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). (Yonhap)