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Category: Kremlinology

March 7, 2008

Can Kim Jong Il Outlive “Military First?”

In the last two months, I’ve come to believe that the decay of Kim Jong Il’s control of North Korea is accelerating. I’m not quite on board with Jane’s, which predicts imminent collapse, because regime collapse is not proceeding at equal rates in all areas of North Korea, and history tells us that there’s been plenty of dissent in North Korea that the regime was able to contain, localize, and suppress. There are, however, clear signs that chaos is taking...
Categories Kremlinology/Regime Change
November 27, 2007

Still Collapsing?

The Weekly Standard publishes a very non-specific, unsourced prediction that North Korea is on the verge of collapse.  Read it for yourself, but I don’t find it very persuasive.  While collapse is a distinct possibility for the reasons Andrei Lankov has recently repeated (see yesterday’s post), I don’t see signs that it’s more imminent today than it was a  year ago.  If anything, the North Korean leadership has gained strength from its acceptance by the Bush Administration.
Categories Inside NK/Kremlinology
October 21, 2007

The Unstoppable Self-Destruction of Kim Jong Il

[Updated below]   We  often hear reports that China has curtailed or cut aid to the North Korean regime.  I’ve usually been skeptical of those reports because I believe that Kim Jong Il’s arch-patron  China wants us to believe that it’s being “helpful” in disarming North Korea of its nuclear programs, but actually considers  it a useful distraction  for  American power in the region.  Now,  a new report  claims that China is holding up cross-border rail traffic to the North  over...
Categories China & Korea/Diplomacy/Famine & Food Aid/Kim Jong Il/NK Economics
June 10, 2007

To Your Health, Part 2

[Update:   Mostly dead or slightly alive?  The Daily NK passes along an alleged eyewitness report of a  recent sighting in which Kim seemed relatively healthy.  Once again, I strongly suggest a fresh consignment of whiskey, bacon, and maybe some Italian sausage  as a gesture of, you know, friendship.  Heck, if we can get him to consume enough  of it, we might eventually be able to get some corn into the bellies of his poor  subjects.  If the report is...
Categories Kim Jong Il
April 24, 2007

Anju Links for 24 April 2007: China and South Korea Claim Their Largesse Has Limits, Another Fresh-Faced Septuagenarian Rises in Pyongyang, and Why the Defunding Debate Should Focus on the U.N., Not Our Troops

*   North Korea is now eleven days past the April 13th deadline by which  it agreed to shut down and seal the Yongbyon reactor, make a meaningful showing at another session of six-party talks,  begin discussions about the full extent of its nuclear programs, and invite U.N. inspectors back in.  As of today, it has failed to fulfill any of those conditions.  I  just  wanted to point that out in case Chris Hill is reading or Kim Jong  Bill...
Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/China/China & Korea/Human Rights/Human Trafficking/Kremlinology/NK Economics
April 23, 2007

Anju Links for 23 April 2007

*   The Ides of April.   I’ve previously blogged about the replacement of Premier  Pak Pong Ju with Kim Yong Il.  Now, we learn that Kim Kyok-Sik is taking over as the new “military first,” to borrow a tired  expression,  which technically makes him second only to Korigula himself (ht: Richardson).  Two other old party hacks have gone off to that Eternal Party Congress chaired by Mephistopheles himself, or soon will:  Foreign Minister  Paek Nam-Sun  and Marshall Cho Myong-Rok.  All...
Categories "United" Nations/Appeasement/Diplomacy/Drugs & N Korea/Korean Society/Kremlinology/Money Laundering/Six-Party Talks/Southeast Asia/Uncategorized/WMD
April 19, 2007

Anju Links for 19 April 2007

*   Cho Myong Rok, who is probably the second or third-most important North Korean official, is reported to be dying.  Cho is the one Kim Jong Il designated to visit Washington and meet with President Clinton years ago.  Doctors expect the 79-year-old vice marshal to live another month or two, as he already had one of his kidneys removed 10 years ago, and has gone through treatment for cancer in his intestines, the organization said.  Here’s a brief Global...
Categories "United" Nations/Korean Society/Kremlinology/WMD
April 13, 2007

Agony and Ecstasy in Wonsan

When I put up my post on Kim Jong Il’s palace northeast of Pyongyang, Curtis Melvin  commented and pasted  in a link to this Daily NK article, a guide to Kim Jong Il’s various palaces and residences.  (If you haven’t seen it yet, by the way, we’ve revealed an interesting answer to our pyramid mystery.) One passage in the article sounded like something I’d seen: Wonsan Chalet Where Kim Jong Il and his relatives hunt guillemots or ful seals, enjoy...
Categories Google Earth/Japan & Korea/Kim Jong Il/NK Military
April 11, 2007

Anju Links for 11 April 2007

*   Are You Effing Kidding Me?   The Bush administration, reversing a six-year-old North Korea policy based on deep mistrust, said it will now rely on Pyongyang’s “good faith” to ensure that funds released yesterday from a Macao bank are not misused…. Mr. McCormack said the North Koreans had promised “to spend the money for the betterment of the North Korean people,” and not for the personal benefit of its officials. [Wash Times] Stupidity with malice aforethought is its...
Categories Activism/Anju Links/Appeasement/Kremlinology/Terrorism/Iraq/U.S. Politics
April 10, 2007

North Korea by Google Earth: Kim Jong Il’s Largest Palace

[Updated; The Mystery of the Tangun Tomb] Remember my March 28th post,  a stream of consciousness  that washed against  the subject of EU sanctions against North Korea?   Among the items sanctioned were  pure-bred horses, which are the kind not even  North Koreans would dare eat — because of who owns them.   That led me  to the one location in North Korea where I suspected that such horses might be kept.  I had recently found that location on Google Earth  while...
Categories Google Earth/History/Kim Jong Il
April 4, 2007

Stage 4 Watch: Are North Korean Diplomats Going Native?

An order from Pyongyang directing North Korean diplomats in overseas posts to send their children back home has been met with defiance, sources in Beijing said yesterday. Pyongyang has extended the deadline for sending the children home until the end of this month in the face of the diplomats’ reluctance to obey. On March 6, the JoongAng Ilbo reported that the communist Workers’ Party of North Korea had issued the order in February, but no explanation was provided. Under the...
Categories Kremlinology/Resistance
March 28, 2007

A novel definition for ‘denuclearization;’ and where to keep a horse (from being eaten) in N. Korea

According to this Chosun Ilbo report, North Korea recently floated a novel interpretation of “denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” under which it could, you know, keep its nuclear weapons.  I wonder what they expected: The assistant secretary of state made it clear that Washington’s goal is complete denuclearization saying, “The U.S. will not form any kind of ties with a nuclear-armed North Korea. He stipulated that “the case of India (which signed a nuclear pact despite possessing nuclear programs) will...
Categories Human Rights/Kim Jong Il/Money Laundering/Proliferation/Six-Party Talks/WMD
March 12, 2007

Kim Jong Nam’s Bachelor Pad Burgled, and How the Other Side Lives

The Zhuyuan Haoyuan villa complex is 15 minutes from downtown Macau and its 80 villas are among the territory’s most exclusive. The average price of each villa is estimated HK$15 million, roughly US$1.92 million. Yellow sunflower symbols adorning the doors of nos. 361 and 371 easily identify them as Kim Jong-nam’s.  [Chosun Ilbo] If Kim Jong Nam is really estranged from his father, you really have to wonder where this money came from.  Meanwhile, the Daily NK reports on the...
Categories China & Korea/Famine & Food Aid/Inside NK/Kim Jong Il/Kremlinology
February 25, 2007

Will a Junta Replace Kim Jong Il?

                                [Update:   The Scotsman says that Kim Jong Il is already putting the system through a dry run.] The bad news is that so far, this development is scheduled to take place after Kim Jong Il’s natural death.  North Korean leader Kim Jong-il might consider a “collective” leadership system after he leaves office, a move away from the long-anticipated father-to-son power transfer, diplomatic sources...
Categories Kremlinology
February 21, 2007

Kim Jong Il Loses North Korean Soccer Mom Demographic

According to the Daily NK’s various sources, Kim Jong Il has  banned  either some or all Japanese cars, after one of them broke down on the road and blocked his path. So far, most of the middle-class North Koreans or low-ranking party officials have been using Japanese cars, whereas the richest riding Mercedes. Also, Korean-Japanese who immigrated into the North are fond of the cars they used to drive in Japan. So the number of Japanese-built cars is more than...
Categories Inside NK/Kim Jong Il