Unlike many other places in the world a popular uprising in North Korea I don’t think will do much. This is because the Kim regime will just kill the people and then pretend it didn’t happen just like what their primary sponsors in Beijing did at Tiananmen Square back in 1989. What I do see the outside information flowing in doing is discrediting the regime with the North Korean public. This would make it easier for someone in the military down the road perhaps to launch a coup with little public resistance:
Thae Yong-ho
North Korea’s former deputy ambassador to Britain has told a group of reporters that a “popular uprising” against North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un is imminent. Thae Yong Ho, who defected to South Korea in August of 2016, said that sanctions against the regime and its inability to control the flow of information about the outside world were weakening its grip on authority.
Thae’s comments came during a press conference in Seoul, the first time he has spoken to international media since his defection.
During the press conference, Thae, who speaks fluent English, declared that “Kim Jong-Un’s days are numbered,” as information about the outside world becomes more accessible. “Low-level dissent or criticism of the regime, until recently unthinkable, is becoming more frequent,” he added. [Yahoo News]
This combined photo, provided by North Korea’s ruling party organ Rodong Sinmun on Jan. 26, 2017, shows a new developed district under construction in Pyongyang, named “Ryomyong Street.” North Korean leader Kim Jong-un toured the construction site, ordering the project to be completed by April 15, the birth anniversary of late founder Kim Il-song, according to the newspaper. (Yonhap)
Here is what General Brown, the US Army Pacific commander had to say about North Korea recently:
Gen. Robert Brown, commander of U.S. Army Pacific, speaks during a discussion at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington on Jan. 25. (Yonhap)
The U.S. Pacific Army commander said Wednesday North Korea is his biggest concern as the unpredictable communist nation has aggressively forged ahead with its nuclear and missile programs.
“The thing that keeps me up at night, though, the thing I worry the most about is North Korea. The most likely threat to all of us sitting here, in my opinion,” Gen. Robert Brown, commander of U.S. Army Pacific, said during a discussion at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Brown said North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has conducted many more missile launches since taking power following the death of his late father in 2011 than the late leader did in his 17 years of rule. He also said the North’s leader is the only individual in the 21st century to test a nuclear weapon.
“There’s something going on there and there’s this belligerent aggressiveness,” he said.
The general highlighted the North’s unpredictability, calling its actions a “black swan.”
“I do worry about the most likely threat: North Korea, because obviously, every soldier that I lead, every individual that I am in charge of would be involved, would be there — some within hours, some are already there on the peninsula, and some would move in that direction very quickly,” Brown said.
“I have significant responsibilities. Things like: noncombatant evacuation operations on the peninsula and getting several half a million people out of there, minor and little things that are easy. Those types of challenges. I do worry about that. There’s just so many things,” he said. [Yonhap]
This is pretty significant that the US, ROK and Japanese Navies continue to do this interoperability missile defense exercises. Hopefully a new administration in the ROK does not stop ROK participation in the future:
The United States, South Korea and Japan kicked off naval missile-defense drills Friday, joining forces to counter the growing threat from North Korea.
The three-day exercise began amid fears that the North may test-fire an intercontinental ballistic missile or stage another provocation in connection with Donald Trump’s inauguration ceremony on Friday.
The Yokosuka, Japan-based guided-missile destroyer USS Stethem, Japan’s JDS Kirishima and South Korea’s Sejong the Great participated in missile detection and tracking drills in the waters off the divided peninsula and Japan. [Stars & Stripes]
This satellite image, captured from the website 38 North on Jan. 23, 2017, shows a series of improvements at the Kalma missile test site near North Korea’s eastern coastal city of Wonsan that the North has made. Joseph Bermudez, a North Korea military expert, said the satellite imagery raises the possibility of the regime carrying out a threatened test of an intercontinental ballistic missile from there. (Yonhap)
I have always thought that any deal signed with the North Koreans should first include the return of the USS Pueblo for this very reason:
This photo, captured from the North’s Central TV on April 6, 2012, shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-un inspecting the captured U.S. spy ship Pueblo. (Yonhap)
North Korea boastfully threatened to strongly confront future U.S. hostility Monday, when it marked the 49th anniversary of its seizure of the U.S. intelligence boat Pueblo.
The 906-ton U.S. Navy ship was captured by the North in January 1968. The North claimed the ship violated its territorial waters, while the U.S. argued it was in international waters at the time of the attack. One crew member was killed in the attack, and 80 others and two civilian oceanographers were seized. All of them were freed from an 11-month captivity after the U.S. signed a letter of apology. Since then, Pueblo, named after a city in Colorado, has been on display at the War Victory Hall along the Taedong River in Pyongyang for propaganda purposes.
The U.S. should remember the shameful lesson from the Pueblo case, the North’s propaganda website Uriminjokkiri said.
“Our republic has the mighty military power to counter any kind of war that the U.S. chooses,” it said.
The North has the power to completely eliminate U.S. imperialism from the Earth, which has inflicted immeasurable misfortune and sufferings on the Korean people, it added.
“The U.S. will face a position more miserable than that in the Pueblo case if it forgets that lesson and frantically pursues new ways to provoke war against the North,” the North’s Central TV station said. [Yonhap]
This is the same thing I have been saying for years that the North Koreans want a peace treaty in order to separate the US from the ROK. As long as the US-ROK alliance is solid Kim knows he has no chance of reunification with the ROK on his terms:
“What does Kim Jong-un want?” Cha said repeating the question. “I think he wants to … he wants a peace treaty with the United States as a nuclear weapons state. I think that’s what he wants.”
“I would add to that, that the North Koreans clearly would like to loosen, if not fracture, US alliances with Seoul and Tokyo, beginning with Seoul, certainly,” said Ambassador Robert Gallucci, the lead negotiator with North Korea in the 1990s in the Agreed Framework process.
“And they will do a lot to achieve that, and including, perhaps, enter negotiations,” Gallucci noted. [Business Insider]
I think the Kim regime is taking a wait and see approach with the incoming Trump administration because of the high possibility of a left wing government being elected in the ROK. As many long time readers know a left wing ROK government means a lot of free cash going North with little to nothing in return. Causing trouble now could cause ROK voters to rally around an anti-North Korean candidate. Plus I think the Kim regime is betting on that President Trump’s demands for more funding for US forces in South Korea will lead to increased tensions between the ROK and US governments that they can later capitalize on:
North Korea’s state media issued a short report on the inauguration of U.S. President Trump on Sunday but refrained from making significant comments.
“Donald Trump of the Republican Party was inaugurated as the 45th president of the United States on Jan. 20,” reported the Rodong Sinmun, a daily of the North’s ruling Workers’ Party. “The inauguration ceremony took place in Washington.”
The newspaper, however, did not deliver a separate commentary or statements on Trump. North Korean media outlets have not been making significant statements on the new administration in Washington since Trump’s victory in the election last year.
Political pundits said Pyongyang is apparently taking a wait-and-see stance until the new administration comes up with details on its polices against North Korea. [Yonhap]
