Anti-Kim Jong Il Posters Trigger Massive Dragnet in Small Farming Town

A story sourced to Open Radio (link in Korean) reports that in the small farming town of Kwaksan-Up, North Pyongan Province, anti-government posters were placed on the door and window of the local party office. The posters denounced the top local party official, complaining that in his ambition to curry favor with Kim Jong Il, he had created unbearable conditions for the local people. The posters were signed by a group calling itself “Seo namu dan,” or “pine tree group.”

The posters are a matter of some concern to the local party apparatus, in part because Kim Jong Il’s name was used without any honorific title (Great General, Grand Kleagle, Most Omnipotent Plenipotentiary, His Previously Porcine Majesty). How concerned are they? Apparently, the security forces have plans to haul in 80,000 people for handwriting samples.

Me: the response will probably create more dissidents than it uncovers. Otherwise, the most likely result will be a massive waste of time and much expense for some anjon-bu and bowi-bu agents, which will probably get them off someone’s back for a little while. Of course, small and isolated acts of dissent are no real challenge to the regime, but if North Korea were flooded with cell phones, someone in Seoul could blast out a signal to thousands of North Koreans who knew nothing about each others’ identity, directing them to put up posters like these in multiple locations in multiple towns. It would be enough to overwhelm and preoccupy the security services while more consequential things were organized, and it would be a propaganda coup that would signal the birth of a national resistance network.

Hat tip to Her Hotness.