Quotes of the Day:
During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.”
- George Orwell
“Indeed, Clausewitz was wary of the general who tried to be too smart. He preferred those who kept their imaginations in check and a firm grip on the harsh realities of battle.”
- Sir Lawrence Freedman, Strategy: A History
"Truth exists, only lies are invented."
- Georges Braque
1. U.S. continues to seek dialogue with N. Korea: White House
2. White House still waiting to engage Pyongyang
3. Online Shopping for Nukes? Tune Into a North Korean Military Parade.
4. Old Enemies, New Friends: Repairing Japanese-Korean Relations and Moving to a Networked Approach Towards America’s Alliance
5. Facing food shortages, Storm Corps pilfer government storage facilities
6. North Korean leader urges young ex-convicts to become 'kindling spark' for national development
7. N.Korea Sends Young Elite into Internal Exile
8. Google, Apple Hit by First Law Threatening Dominance Over App-Store Payments
9. Pyongyang’s gambit over Yongbyon won’t help up the ante
10. South Korean democracy slowly eroding away
11. Int'l Condemnation Mounts of Attempts to Gag Press
12. Don’t sugarcoat it: Why candor is the best policy with North Korea
13. S. Korea, U.S. launch joint Korean War remains excavation project near DMZ
1. U.S. continues to seek dialogue with N. Korea: White House
I would caveat this: The US seeks dialogue with a responsible member of the international community to negotiate the denuclearization of the north. It is upto Kim if he is going to decide to be that responsible member.
(LEAD) U.S. continues to seek dialogue with N. Korea: White House | Yonhap News Agency
(ATTN: UPDATES with additional information in last 6 paras)
By Byun Duk-kun
WASHINGTON, Aug. 30 (Yonhap) -- The United States continues to seek negotiations with North Korea to discuss a range of issues related to denuclearization, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki affirmed Monday.
Her remark comes after the U.N. nuclear watchdog said the North appears to have restarted its plutonium-producing nuclear reactor at Yongbyon.
"We continue to seek dialogue with the DPRK so we can address this reported activity and the full range of issues related to denuclearization," Psaki said at a daily press briefing at the White House.
DPRK stands for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the North's official name.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in an annual report to its board of governors that the Yongbyon reactor may have been in operation since July.
A senior U.S. administration official on Sunday said the U.S. was aware of the IAEA report and that it highlighted the urgent need for dialogue with North Korea.
Psaki reiterated the need to resume dialogue with Pyongyang.
"This report underscores the urgent need for dialogue and diplomacy, so we can achieve the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula," she said.
North Korea has stayed away from denuclearization talks since leader Kim Jong-un's second summit with former U.S. President Donald Trump ended without a deal in Hanoi in February 2019.
The first Kim-Trump summit was in Singapore in June 2018.
The top nuclear envoys of South Korea and the U.S. met in Washington earlier in the day to discuss ways to bring North Korea back to the dialogue table.
Sung Kim, U.S. special representative for North Korea, said the countries were discussing possible humanitarian assistance for the North to that end.
"We exchanged views on the situation on the ground, as well as some ideas and initiatives for engagement, including possible humanitarian assistance," he said of his second meeting with his South Korean counterpart, Noh Kyu-duk, in less than two weeks following his recent visit to Seoul.
"We also, of course, reaffirmed our shared commitment to pursuing the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula through diplomacy, and I look forward to hearing back from the DPRK," Kim added.
The U.S. envoy has repeatedly offered to meet with North Korean officials "anywhere, anytime" and without preconditions.
North Korea has largely remained unresponsive to overtures made by the Joe Biden administration since its inauguration in January.
(END)
2. White House still waiting to engage Pyongyang
I know it gets old but the ball is in Kim Jong-un's court.
We cannot force him to negotiate. And if we think that we need to provide the carrots of sanctions relief to entice him we should know that that will cause him to assess his political warfare strategy a success and he will double down on blackmail diplomacy.
He wants us to become impatient or to believe we must have a foreign policy "win" and that we will think that giving him concessions will lead to such a "win." Nothing could be more wrong. Appeasing Kim Jong-un will only make thie security, political, and economic situation worse.
It is up to Kim Jong-un.
Tuesday
August 31, 2021
White House still waiting to engage Pyongyang
U.S. nuclear envoy Sung Kim, right, and his South Korean counterpart, Noh Kyu-duk, left, speak to the press after their meeting in Washington D.C. on Monday. [YONHAP]
The United States is committed to dialogue and diplomacy with North Korea, said the White House, despite a recent report of the North restarting its nuclear facilities.
“We are, of course, aware of this report and closely coordinating with our allies and partners on developments regarding North Korea,” said Jen Psaki, press secretary of the White House on Monday, referring to a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) last week.
“This report underscores the urgent need for dialogue and diplomacy so we can achieve the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
“We continue to seek dialogue with the DPRK so we can address this reported activity and the full range of issues related to denuclearization,” she added, using the acronym for the official name of North Korea, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
The IAEA reported on Friday that Pyongyang may have restarted its Yongbyon nuclear complex in July after leaving it dormant for about two and a half years. The complex is able to produce weapons-grade plutonium from spent fuel rods.
The report was likely part of Seoul-Washington nuclear talks in Washington on Monday.
"The South Korean government, in close cooperation with the United States, has continued to closely monitor North Korea's weapons of mass destruction-related activities," said South Korea's chief nuclear envoy, Noh Kyu-duk, who traveled to Washington on Sunday to meet with his counterpart Sung Kim.
"At today's meeting, South Korea and the United States shared views that the North Korean nuclear issue is an urgent issue that needs to be resolved through diplomacy and dialogue, while maintaining stability on the Korean Peninsula.”
This was Noh and Kim’s second meeting in the same month -- the two met in Seoul on Aug. 23. They spoke with the press jointly following their meeting on Monday.
"We exchanged views on the situation on the ground, as well as some ideas and initiatives for engagement, including possible humanitarian assistance,” said Kim, the U.S. special representative for North Korea. “We also, of course, reaffirmed our shared commitment to pursuing the complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula through diplomacy, and I look forward to hearing back from the DPRK.”
Washington and Seoul have been calling for the North to engage in dialogue for months.
The Biden administration has proposed dialogue with Pyongyang on several occasions since February through the North Korean mission to the United States, or the so-called New York channel.
On visits to Seoul in July and again on Aug. 23, Kim offered Pyongyang dialogue, “anytime, anywhere,” without conditions and also discussed possible humanitarian support to the North with his South Korean counterpart.
Pyongyang has remained unresponsive.
According to the IAEA report, there have been indications such as discharges of cooling water at the 5-megawatt reactor at the Yongbyon complex in North Pyongan Province since July.
The report also found that a steam plant serving the radiochemical laboratory, a spent fuel reprocessing plant, operated for approximately five months this year, from mid-February to early July.
The five-month time-frame, it added, “is consistent with the time required to reprocess a complete core of irradiated fuel” from the 5-megawatt reactor.
The report’s findings were supported by the U.S.-based monitoring group 38 North.
“Consistent with a recent report by the International Atomic Energy Agency, a discharge of cooling water into a new outflow channel leading into the Kuryong River is visible in satellite imagery from August 25,” said the group in a report on Monday. “This has historically been one of the key indicators of reactor operations.”
Satellite imagery released by the website 38 North shows the 5-megawatt reactor at the Yongbyon complex in North Pyongan Provinceon Aug. 25. [38 NORTH]
Yongbyon began operation in 1986. North Korea agreed to shut down the Yongbyon reactor in 2007 and allow UN nuclear inspectors back into country in exchange for aid amid six-party talks with South Korea, China, Japan, Russia and the United States. It blew up the reactor’s cooling tower in 2008 to show its commitment. However, Pyongyang eventually walked away from the negotiating table in 2009.
In the second summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong-un and former U.S. President Donald Trump in Hanoi, Vietnam, in February 2019, Pyongyang offered to “permanently and completely” dismantle all its nuclear material production facilities in the Yongbyon area, in the presence of U.S. experts, on condition that the Washington lifted some sanctions. The Hanoi summit collapsed after the United States insisted on additional measures. Denuclearization negotiations have been at a standstill since.
3. Online Shopping for Nukes? Tune Into a North Korean Military Parade.
I wonder if the regime produces fancy videos to show their client states and groups to highlight their equipment.
But what if the most modern equipment put on display last October and January are only mock-ups or are not in production? I guess the regime probably uses the bait and switch method. Show them all the cool new stuff but only sell them the SOS -(same old stuff/sh*t)
Attempts at sarcasm aside this is the key point:
While most concerns around Pyongyang developing lethal weapons center on a potential armed conflict between North Korea and the United States or South Korea, less discussion is spent on whether Pyongyang is selling these weapons to other rogue states or violent extremist groups already engaged in armed conflict with the United States and its allies abroad. North Korea has a well-documented track record of providing weapons technology to U.S. adversaries such as Iran and Syria. In 2020, the U.S. Department of the Treasury released a statement highlighting concerns regarding joint long-range missile development projects between Pyongyang and Tehran, which the United Nations later echoed in its March 2021 Panel of Experts report on North Korea. The U.N. report also mentioned its ongoing investigation following claims of North Korea offering arms deals and military training programs to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, Iran, Venezuela, Yemen, and other countries. Another manifestation of this threat to international security was North Korea providing Syria with the technology, resources, and manpower to develop a nuclear reactor in 2007, as well as allegedly providing the Assad regime with necessary materials to create chemical weapons.
Online Shopping for Nukes? Tune Into a North Korean Military Parade.
North Korean broadcasts of military parades offer a veritable weapons catalog for U.S. adversaries.
North Korean broadcasts of military parades offer a veritable weapons catalog for U.S. adversaries.
People watch a TV screen showing a file image of a North Korean missile in a military parade during a news program at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Monday, August 30, 2021.
Credit: AP Photo/Ahn Young-joonAdvertisement
North Korea’s broadcasting of national military parades is about more than just flaunting its evasion of U.S. and U.N. sanctions aimed at stifling the development of its nuclear weapons program. While analyses of the sociopolitical implications of these parades often cite the correlation between nuclear power and the survival of the Kim regime, the ostentatious display of lethal weapons in massive military parades serves both a political and financial purpose: to demonstrate military might to enemies and entice potential buyers overseas.
Given the highly sensitive nature of its nuclear program, Pyongyang may refrain from strutting its most novel lethal weapons technology on a televised stage, but it does not shy away from dropping hints at its progress. For example, North Korea showcased a massive intercontinental ballistic missile and a new submarine-launched ballistic missile during a national military parade in Pyongyang days before U.S. President Joe Biden’s inauguration in January 2021.
While most concerns around Pyongyang developing lethal weapons center on a potential armed conflict between North Korea and the United States or South Korea, less discussion is spent on whether Pyongyang is selling these weapons to other rogue states or violent extremist groups already engaged in armed conflict with the United States and its allies abroad. North Korea has a well-documented track record of providing weapons technology to U.S. adversaries such as Iran and Syria. In 2020, the U.S. Department of the Treasury released a statement highlighting concerns regarding joint long-range missile development projects between Pyongyang and Tehran, which the United Nations later echoed in its March 2021 Panel of Experts report on North Korea. The U.N. report also mentioned its ongoing investigation following claims of North Korea offering arms deals and military training programs to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, Iran, Venezuela, Yemen, and other countries. Another manifestation of this threat to international security was North Korea providing Syria with the technology, resources, and manpower to develop a nuclear reactor in 2007, as well as allegedly providing the Assad regime with necessary materials to create chemical weapons.
Although not as well-defined as its relationship with Iran or Syria, Pyongyang may see financial value in selling weapons to terrorist groups as it continues to pursue unconventional ways to skirt the impacts of economic sanctions. North Korea hasn’t yet issued any public statements regarding the Taliban’s recent seizure of the Afghan government and bad blood between Pyongyang and radical Islamic terrorist groups like Boko Haram may prevent any immediate overtures of military support. However, the combination of a self-imposed national blockade due to COVID-19 along with unyielding economic sanctions and widespread agricultural damage from severe flooding could push Pyongyang to pursue secret arms deals with other pariah states and extremist groups for financial gain.
As Pyongyang will likely continue to publicly broadcast its national military parades, North Korea watchers, national security advisers, and military experts should pay close attention to these events to identify similarities between the showcased weapons and growing military capabilities of hostile countries and extremist groups abroad. For example, drawing comparisons in size and technology between North Korea’s Yongbyon reactor and Syria’s nuclear reactor in 2007 was key in attributing assistance to Pyongyang. Two specific dates to remember for future military parades would be Party Foundation Day on October 10 and the 110th birthday of Eternal Leader Kim Il Sung on April 15, 2022. According to unidentified sources inside the country, North Korea has already begun preparations for the latter to “show the entire world the accomplishments of the Supreme Leader,” which will likely feature lethal weapons technology of interest to U.S. adversaries and foreign extremist groups.
Authors
Contributing Author
Jason Bartlett
Jason Bartlett is a contributing author to The Diplomat and a research assistant in the Energy, Economics, and Security Program at CNAS. He tweets @jasonabartlett.
4. Old Enemies, New Friends: Repairing Japanese-Korean Relations and Moving to a Networked Approach Towards America’s Alliance
There are a lot of distractions at the moment but we must not neglect the fact that the Korea-Japan relationship is important to our national security (and to both of those countries).
Conclusion:
President Biden has made it clear that he is interested in making better use of America’s unique system of alliances to defend the current liberal international order. Nowhere is this order under greater threat than in East Asia, where China has made the greatest strides in carving out a sphere of influence. This theoretical strategy would aim to repair the strained relations between Japan and South Korea, ideally to the point where they are willing to work bilaterally on security concerns of their own volition and thereby create a network out of America’s traditional hub-and-spoke approach to regional alliances. To repair and even enhance this relationship, this strategy proposes two distinct lines of effort: developing a new narrative on the need to defend against Chinese revisionism and addressing historical grievances. There is no guarantee that this strategy would be fully successful in restoring relations because it deals with domestic politics within two vibrant democracies. But even a partial success in fostering enhanced coordination between Japan and South Korea would be a benefit to the U.S. It would create an opportunity to move away from a hub-and-spoke model of allied relations to a more networked approach, where self-driven initiatives from Tokyo and Seoul amplify Washington’s efforts and even free up diplomatic bandwidth to engage with other regional partners. At the very least, it would lessen the costs of maintaining regional security at a time when America is increasingly constrained in its pursuit of grand strategies.
Old Enemies, New Friends: Repairing Japanese-Korean Relations and Moving to a Networked Approach Towards America’s Alliance
Earlier this year, The Strategy Bridge asked university and professional military education students to participate in our fifth annual writing contest by sending us their thoughts on strategy.
Now, we are pleased to present the second-place winner, from Jonathan Dixon, a recent graduate of the U.S. National War College in Washington, D.C.
Constraints in Strategic Planning
As the great power competition heats up, the United States finds itself more constrained in its ability to pursue grand strategies than at any other point this century. Domestically, America will face an extended economic fallout from the COVID pandemic, renewed concerns over its rising budget deficits, and an audience tired of foreign adventures.[1] Abroad, its unique system of security alliances faces challenges as Washington attempts to shift the burden of maintaining the liberal international order onto its partners. These trends are most acute in East Asia, where the U.S. is at risk of losing the region to a Chinese sphere of influence. Expectations that Japan and the Republic of Korea (ROK) could work together to develop their own strategic partnership have been dashed, with the two countries drifting apart over the past few decades and allowing tensions in their bilateral relationship to hamper any cooperation on security issues.[2]
This breakdown in Japanese-Korean relations is limiting the ability of the U.S. to fully utilize its regional alliances to defend the status quo in East Asia. It is in the interest of American peace and prosperity to prevent any foreign power from dominating the region, which is home to multiple security partners and critical markets for American goods. Additionally, East Asia sits atop a number of trade routes vital to the broader economy that underpins the broader liberal international order. This article proposes a potential strategy through which Washington can foster relations between its allies and better push back against Beijing’s efforts to become a regional hegemon. As such, this strategy would aim to improve relations between Japan and South Korea to the point where they are willing to work bilaterally on security concerns under their own initiative, creating a network out of America’s regional alliances that would in turn amplify the strategic advantages of the U.S. within the region while also accounting for its new domestic constraints.
The Strategic Context of East Asia
U.S. Leadership
As the historical guarantor of East Asian security, America has traditionally found itself as the hub connecting its regional partners. While this model held up during the Cold War, in recent years it has strained to deal with the rise of a revisionist China. A combination of budgetary constraints and domestic challenges have compelled America to seek to shift the burden of maintaining regional stability onto its allies.[3] Although President Biden is far more interested than his predecessor in bolstering these relationships, he faces a delicate balancing act of emphasizing the need for alliances, while also insisting these same partners take more active roles in providing for their own defense.[4] This approach necessitates mending relations between Japan and South Korea, something previous administrations have attempted to accomplish through realpolitik. While this has resulted in progress in some areas—like improving interoperability between all three militaries—it has not addressed the systemic drivers that have left America’s closest allies at odds with one another for the past few decades.[5]
South Korean President Moon Jae-in and U.S. President Joe Biden (AFP)
Japanese-Korean Relations
The tensions that have come to define relations between Japan and the Republic of Korea are largely a result of diverging views on history, economics, and security. Both countries have found themselves at odds with one another on a variety of issues and have created a self-sustaining cycle that drives them increasingly apart.
The lasting scars created during Japan’s colonization of the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to the end of World War II in 1945 are the most obvious challenge to the bilateral relationship. When the two countries normalized ties under the 1965 Treaty on Basic Relations, Japan felt its provision of war reparations through a series of financial grants and low-interest loans was sufficient to make amends and shift towards a more future-facing relationship.[6] The Republic of Korea, under the military dictatorship of Park Chung-hee, was willing to accept such a deal, as the country was focused on redeveloping an economy devastated by the Korean War. But with the return of civilian control, this policy came under reconsideration. At the same time, Korean nationalism based on anti-Japanese sentiments became a powerful tool for politicians to bolster their influence and credibility.[7]
Two issues in particular have provoked strong emotions on behalf of South Koreans; the use of forced labor in Japan’s wartime economy and the coercion of women into military brothels as so-called comfort women.[8] These grievances have become a source of Korean identity, particularly amongst younger generations who otherwise have no memory of or direct ties to the colonial period.[9] As a result, even those policymakers who want to see a closer relationship are pressured to chastise Japan for failing to fully atone for its wartime atrocities. Perhaps most alarming for the prospect of enhanced bilateral ties, there is now a trend of South Korean politicians internationalizing their criticism of Japan. In addition to raising the issue of comfort women at the United Nations, the current Moon administration has joined China in mourning the Nanjing Massacre and Russia in celebrating the role of the Soviet Union in the Korean independence movement. Both of these events featured strong anti-Japanese narratives.[10]
Japan, for its part, takes a seemingly schizophrenic approach to whether or not it has fully accounted for its past. On the one hand, it has almost become a ritual for Japanese Prime Ministers to admit to war crimes and apologize to surviving victims.[11] These apologies have grown so frequent that many opinion polls have begun to register apology fatigue, where respondents feel Japan is constantly being attacked on the global stage even after making good-faith efforts to address past wrongs. At the same time, a number of conservative politicians actively undermine these efforts by calling into question the severity of Japan’s crimes and the extent to which Japan needs to continue to make amends to its neighbors.[12] These political figures have erased whatever goodwill was generated by official apologies in their efforts to whitewash history, including recent efforts to reframe the colonization of the Korean Peninsula as Japanese efforts to help modernize the Korean people.[13] These actions, and the corresponding mistrust they engender on behalf of South Koreans, have pushed both sides further apart in reckoning with the past.
Former President Park Chung-hee, left, shakes hands with then Japanese Foreign Minister Shiina Etsusaburo during his visit to Cheong Wa Dae on May 18, 1965. (Korea Times)
These historical tensions have spilled over into economic ties and shape how both Japan and the Republic of Korea view trade with one another. As mentioned, the 1965 Treaty on Basic Relations provided a series of loans and grants to help South Korea rebuild its economy. This purposefully meshed with Japan’s larger regional strategy of using checkbook diplomacy to atone for its actions during World War II, while also fostering new markets for its exports.[14] This approach served both Japan and South Korea well for decades, and Japan’s foreign trade policy eventually helped South Korea develop into an economic powerhouse in its own right.[15] However, as the South Korean market has matured, the power dynamic between the Republic of Korea and Japan has shifted. South Korean goods can now compete globally with Japan’s, in both price and quality. China has become the biggest market for these goods and is currently South Korea’s largest trade partner. Further weakening Japan’s influence, China has also become the largest source of foreign direct investment into the Republic of Korea.[16]
China’s centrality to the South Korean economy has pushed Seoul to take a number of steps that, in the eyes of Tokyo, are meant to undermine either Japan or the broader international liberal order. This includes a free trade agreement between China and South Korea, even as a similar agreement with Japan has languished for years. The Republic of Korea has also joined China’s Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, an initiative that many countries view as a direct competitor to the U.S.-backed World Bank, and one that both Washington and Tokyo have urged partner countries to avoid.[17] In a move particularly galling to Japan, President Moon has suggested that South Korea could partner with North Korea in developing a “peace economy” that would erase Japan’s economic advantages over the Korean Peninsula.[18] In many ways, this is a product of the Republic of Korea’s perception of Japan as a declining economic power and the need to find new, if unconventional, partners to further bolster its own growth. But it also serves to further undermine a key element of the bilateral relation that had benefited both sides for decades.
Even as South Korea and Japan have grown farther apart over historical and economic issues, security threats have served to somewhat stabilize relations. This is in large part due to the role of the U.S. and its desire to see a trilateral relationship between itself and its two regional partners form a hedge against China and backstop peace in East Asia. A constellation of agreements like the Trilateral Information Sharing Arrangement, General Security of Military Information Agreement, and Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement (ACSA) have ensured all three governments consistently consult one another on security issues.[19] But even these are coming under pressure as Japan and South Korea are increasingly at odds over their two primary security challenges.[20]
The Democratic Peoples’ Republic of Korea (DPRK) should serve as a unifying factor for Japan and South Korea, as it poses an existential threat to both countries with its conventional weapons and ballistic arsenal. This logic held during the Cold War, as the U.S. united its allies in countering the Communist bloc, but the two countries have very different long-term objectives with regards to what has become the region’s greatest tactical threat. South Korea ultimately hopes to peacefully reunite with North Korea, and to that end has taken great efforts to engage the Kim regime through economic and diplomatic initiatives.[21] This approach is an anathema to the Japanese public, which overwhelmingly backs punitive sanctions as the best method to counter Pyongyang’s aggressive policies and deter efforts to build up its nuclear arsenal. Japan has recently eschewed multilateral engagement with North Korea, as it feels its concerns over the abduction of Japanese civilians by North Korean spies during the 1970s and 1980s were largely ignored by other countries during the Six Party Talks.[22] Further hampering diplomatic overtures is Japan’s unease over the prospect of a united Korean Peninsula, which may embrace an anti-Japanese stance in order to further a sense of pan-Korean nationalism.[23]
While both South Korea and Japan agree that North Korea is a tactical threat, they are at odds as to what degree China is a strategic one. South Korea has purposefully taken a sanguine approach to China, with Seoul viewing it as a potential partner even as it expresses alarm at some of China’s more assertive actions.[24] South Korea accepts Beijing’s role as the North’s key patron and acknowledges that, even as it has had limited success in reining in the Kim regime, it has spared the Peninsula the chaos of a North Korean collapse.[25] Seoul also realizes the importance of Chinese markets to its economy and is concerned that any efforts to challenge Beijing will lead to economic retaliation.[26] All of this means that South Korea is unwilling to embrace the hardline tactics increasingly favored by the U.S. and Japan.
Flags of the Republic of Korea, People’s Republics of China, and Japan (Observer Research Foundation)
In direct contrast, Tokyo has come to see China as both a tactical and strategic threat to its interests. In the immediate term, China has begun to militarize the territorial dispute over the Senkaku Islands, threatening a grey zone kinetic conflict in which Japan is not convinced the U.S. would come to its defense. [27,28] Moreover, China has proven capable of mobilizing anti-Japanese sentiments amongst its citizens and wielding its own economic clout to counter Japan’s efforts to limit its influence throughout the region.[29] This, in turn, has formed the basis for Japan’s view of China as a strategic threat that is actively working to undermine the U.S.-led liberal international order that underpins Japan’s security and prosperity. Even as the U.S. becomes more insular, Japan is attempting to further enmesh it within the region through initiatives like the Free and Open Indo-Pacific and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership.[30] Unfortunately, it has had limited success in securing involvement of the Republic of Korea.
China’s Revisionism
It is against this backdrop of a constrained America and squabbling allies that a rising China is trying to establish itself as a hegemon in East Asia.[31] Beijing has already supplanted the U.S. as the largest trading partner for many of the region’s countries, and its attempts to foster economic dependency threaten to drag some of Washington’s security partners into its own orbit. China’s Communist Party has also proved adept at manipulating existing tensions between these partners, as evidenced by its recent efforts in encouraging South Korean boycotts of Japanese goods and backing non-governmental organizations that demand reparations for comfort women and forced labor victims.[32] Most alarming, the techniques China is using to enhance its regional influence are part of a broader attack on the liberal international order. From propping up rogue regimes like North Korea to flouting international law in pursuit of territorial claims and even establishing parallel international organizations designed to circumvent U.S.-dominated bodies, China is attempting to reshape the international environment into something that more closely embodies its own values and interests.[33] Now more than ever, Beijing is demonstrating that it believes it can achieve this due to America’s turn inwards. Such a brazen assault on multilateralism demands a coordinated response, ideally by the U.S. and its allies.
Desired Ends and Key Assumptions
This strategy would aim to improve Japanese-Korean relations to the point where they are able and willing to join the U.S. in this multilateral response to an increasingly assertive China. More importantly, these mended ties should shift the regional security structure away from a model that is driven by the U.S. with Japan and the Republic of Korea as reluctant followers to a more networked approach where their own cooperation and initiatives can augment America’s efforts. The U.S. cannot force this rapprochement but instead must work obliquely to shape domestic considerations within both Tokyo and Seoul. While previous administrations focused on the military instrument to encourage at least tactical coordination, the theory of this approach’s success lies in using the diplomatic and information instruments to tackle the drivers pushing Japan and South Korea apart.
This strategy rests upon five key assumptions. The first is that China is actively attempting to become a regional hegemon, and its efforts are an inherent challenge to the U.S.-led international order. This is important, as it is also assumed that both Japan and the ROK support the liberal order that has largely underwritten their own peace and prosperity, and therefore they are willing to take actions to protect it. Next, this approach assumes South Korea is unwilling to join any trilateral alliance with the U.S. and Japan, meaning cooperation needs to be driven by a shared understanding of common goals rather than formal coordination mechanisms. Finally, this strategy assumes the current makeup of Congress leaves little opportunity for significant foreign policy legislation to pass during the Biden administration and instead focuses on the executive branch’s abilities to improve inter-allied relations.
Lines of Effort
To enhance Japanese-Korean relations to the point where they are willing to coordinate on security issues under their own volition, Washington will need to deftly use its diplomatic and information tools to shape the outlook of its counterparts as well as to enable and persuade both to pursue closer cooperation.
Develop a New Narrative
As the first line of effort designed to shape the perceptions of Washington’s allies in East Asia, this strategy starts with developing a new narrative as to what kind of challenge China poses to the region. This is critical for getting all three governments on the same page regarding the nature of the issue. Japan and the U.S. are currently in agreement as to what kind of risk China poses to their interests and have enshrined these concerns within their respective national security strategies.[34,35] South Korea, however, has been hesitant to label its largest trading partner as a security threat. Like many other Asian countries, South Korea is not yet willing to take sides in the great-power competition.[36] Public opinion polls have shown that the average Korean citizen does not see China as a military threat, leading policymakers to ignore America’s efforts to paint it as such. In fact, many younger South Koreans view China as a more natural partner for both economic and security purposes than the U.S. When it comes to Japan, a large percentage of the public sees its historical adversary as an even greater threat than North Korea.[37] As a result, there is a counter narrative that China is not the strategic concern that America and Japan make it out to be, and therefore there is no reason for South Korea to work more closely with Japan to contain it.
If the U.S. is to convince South Korea of the need to further cooperate with Japan, it will need to create a new narrative that, instead of focusing on security threats, highlights how China is undermining the international order that has underwritten the stability and prosperity of East Asia for decades. Even if there is not a sense that China poses a military threat, regional polls show little faith in Beijing’s ability to be a positive actor in the international arena.[38] South Korea in particular has also expressed unease with Beijing’s approach to human rights issues, due to its own history of colonial and dictatorial rule.[39] A narrative that highlights China as undermining the international rule of law draws upon these sentiments and creates an environment where Tokyo and Seoul can find common ground.[40] In developing this narrative, the U.S. should focus on areas where China has acted against global norms and which resonate with both Japanese and South Korean publics. This could include actions in the South China Sea, the Belt and Road Initiative, or even human rights violations in Xinjiang.
The USS Bunker Hill moves into position while conducting a joint training exercise with HMAS Parramatta during a transit of the South China Sea on April 14, 2020. (Australia Department of Defence/Reuters)
The State Department should lead an information campaign designed to highlight these developments, demonstrating that Washington is not asking its partners to choose sides in a great-power competition but to defend the current international order. This campaign would target both ordinary citizens as well as governing elites in Japan and South Korea, who are aware of these issues but have not yet experienced sufficient political pressure to take action. Traditional outreach efforts like television interviews and newspaper articles should be coupled with a presence on popular social media platforms like LINE and Twitter in order to reach the broadest audience possible.
Because Beijing already has significant clout in many of the international fora it is attempting to manipulate, this campaign will require Washington to increase its own engagement. In addition to making sure all multilateral missions are fully staffed, the Biden administration should appoint a special envoy for multilateral integrity—a position in the Bureau of International Organizations proposed by the previous administration.[41] This envoy would catalogue Beijing’s efforts to undermine international organizations, as well as remind member states of their own organizational obligations and the need to respect institutional norms. This role would require that the U.S. itself respect the parliamentary rules of the organizations it is a part of, but this approach would also go a long way in both signaling a return of America’s international leadership and a renewed commitment to multilateralism.
Of course, China does not limit its efforts to undermine the current rules-based order to international settings; it frequently resorts to bullying tactics in its bilateral relationships to cow weaker partners into obeying unreasonable demands.[42] Therefore the U.S. should also release information gathered by its intelligence community on examples where China has attempted to diplomatically coerce other nations, which could diminish this tactic’s appeal. The intelligence community should coordinate with its Japanese and South Korean counterparts in the Cabinet Intelligence and Research Office and National Intelligence Service, respectively. The National Intelligence Service, in particular, has experience collecting information in China that could prove useful.[43] More importantly, including both countries’ services would give them a stake in the new narrative as well as potentially foster information sharing outside traditional military settings.
This first line of effort is particularly cost-effective; beyond naming a special envoy, it does not require any new offices or investments. The true cost will come in the form of time, as it takes years for a new narrative to firmly take hold. There is some risk to this course of action if South Korean politicians become so concerned about the preponderance of China’s power within the region that they are afraid to protest against even the most egregious of its behaviors. This in turn means that the U.S. needs to embark sooner rather than later on this option, even more so as it primes the environment for the next line of effort.
Address Historical Issues
While the U.S. works to ensure its allies agree as to what kind of challenge China presents, it needs to improve how the Japanese and South Koreans view each other. Public opinion surveys in both countries show less than 25% of respondents have a positive impression of their counterparts. This drops even further when specifically mentioning current relations between Japan and South Korea, with less than ten percent viewing the state of relations positively and the majority of participants in both countries rating them as relatively or even extremely bad.[44] It is apparent that negative perceptions of their neighbors coincide with how Japanese and South Koreans feel about the state of relations between their two countries. As mentioned in the strategic context, many of these negative perceptions emanate from historical animosities.
Rather than paper over these differences as elements of the past or sideline them in the hopes of addressing current strategic concerns as previous administrations attempted, this line of effort LOE attempts to enable a full accounting of the past. Collecting narratives of suffering and hardship on both sides, as opposed to asking one country to accept all accountability, will move beyond the black-and-white approach each country has taken towards grievances of the World War II era. Furthermore, showing that South Korea does not have a monopoly on suffering and signaling that Japan is truly committed to rectifying its past actions will then set the stage for the subsequent efforts designed to actively strengthen ties.
The U.S. is in a unique place to jump-start this reconciliation process due to its own actions in World War II. To better highlight how all of the belligerents waged brutal campaigns throughout the war, President Biden should issue an apology for America’s use of atomic weapons to end the war, ideally on the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima. There is precedent for such a statement, most notably in President Clinton’s 1999 apology for America’s support of the Guatemalan military during the country’s brutal civil war. This has been cited by many of the civil war’s victims as a critical element of the search for justice.[45] To be most effective, this apology must be an unconditional acceptance of responsibility, as opposed to the those made by previous Japanese Prime Ministers who carefully worded their statements to avoid enraging hardcore nationalists. More than simply creating an example that Japan could follow, America’s acceptance of guilt for some of the events in World War II could help assuage the conservative Japanese belief that the country has tortured itself by accepting the blame for everything that took place during the war.[46]
The Eternal Flame at Hiroshima’s Peace Park (Japan Visitor)
With a presidential apology issued, the U.S. should immediately continue this momentum by helping Japan and South Korea set up a truth and reconciliation council through the U.S. Institute of Peace. The U.S. Institute of Peace is well positioned to run such a council, as it has conducted extensive research into more than 40 similar truth and inquiry commissions conducted over the past 50 years.[47] In particular, the Japan and South Korea Truth and Reconciliation Council should be modeled after the 1995 South African Commission of Truth and Reconciliation. This commission has been heralded as one of the most successful, as it addressed a broad scope of abuses dating back decades despite the widespread destruction of official documents.[48] Similar constraints would face any council involving Japan and South Korea, although many of the individually named perpetrators would no longer be alive to stand trial.[49]
As mentioned, the purpose of this council would be to fully explore and document human rights abuses that occurred throughout the Asia-Pacific Theater during World War II. This could build upon South Korea’s own truth-finding commissions, which focused on the Korean colonial government’s collaboration with the Japanese empire.[50] So as to move away from the current black-and-white narrative of South Korean victimhood and Japanese guilt, the council should also incorporate testimonies from the new right, South Korean academics who have begun to question some of the prevailing views on comfort women and attribute many of the era’s transgressions to a complacent and corrupt political elite.[51] Japanese voices should also be heard, including survivors of America’s domestic internment camps and prisoners of war.
To be fully successful, both governments in Japan and South Korea must acknowledge the suffering of civilians during World War II, while accepting blame or at least some of the liability for how the war was waged.[52] Additionally, Japan must make some form of compensation available to victims and their families, possibly by reviving the now-defunct Asian Women’s Fund and expanding qualified recipients to include victims of forced labor. Any reconciliatory or restorative measures that come out of the council should be binding, which will require the Institute of Peace—and most likely the Department of State, through the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor—to engage with political leadership in both countries to ensure the council has legal authorities and professional staffing.[53]
This would be a second low-cost option with no need for Congressional approval. Once again, the greatest cost comes from the amount of time needed to fully carry out a truth and reconciliation council. The South African model lasted some seven years, but a full decade may be necessary to address the deep, historical grievances that mar ties between Japan and South Korea. The biggest risk to this effort is that hawks in all three countries—Japan, the U.S., and South Korea—refuse to engage in a council that shines a negative light on their respective militaries. There is also a risk from this approach that newly uncovered abuses might worsen relations, although this damage would be limited to the short-term and could be repaired by the reparation portion of the council. Both of these risks can be mitigated through expansive community engagement to ensure widespread support for the council and its findings.
Costs and Risks
Both of these proposed lines of effort carry costs and risks. On the whole, they are designed to be relatively inexpensive options that take into account a number of political realities, including the ongoing legislative gridlock within Congress and an increasingly protectionist electorate wary of foreign adventurism. But their long timeline leads to the greatest risk to this overarching strategy, which is the inability of the U.S. to muster the political will to undertake an effort that may not fully bear fruit within a single administration. This risk is compounded by the fact that China will almost certainly seek to take advantage of America’s short-term political cycles, particularly if it perceives this strategy as a prelude to diplomatic isolation. The risk from this strategy would then be that Beijing enhances its efforts at driving a wedge between Washington and its allies, a risk that is at is greatest during the initial phase of this strategy when South Korea has yet to accept the new narrative on China’s threat to the liberal international order and remains at odds with Japan.
Mitigating this risk means undertaking these lines of efforts as soon as possible, as well as conducting extensive diplomatic engagement to both counter China’s efforts and track progress on improving ties. Because both Japan and South Korea are open societies, this progress will at least initially be measured in how much this campaign has been able to positively change public opinion. A fully successful strategy would eventually see Japan and South Korea develop their own economic and security initiatives independent of the United States, indicating a healthy bilateral relationship has developed that can stand on its own.
Flags of the U.S., Japan, and the Republic of Korea (CSIS)
Conclusion
President Biden has made it clear that he is interested in making better use of America’s unique system of alliances to defend the current liberal international order. Nowhere is this order under greater threat than in East Asia, where China has made the greatest strides in carving out a sphere of influence. This theoretical strategy would aim to repair the strained relations between Japan and South Korea, ideally to the point where they are willing to work bilaterally on security concerns of their own volition and thereby create a network out of America’s traditional hub-and-spoke approach to regional alliances. To repair and even enhance this relationship, this strategy proposes two distinct lines of effort: developing a new narrative on the need to defend against Chinese revisionism and addressing historical grievances. There is no guarantee that this strategy would be fully successful in restoring relations because it deals with domestic politics within two vibrant democracies. But even a partial success in fostering enhanced coordination between Japan and South Korea would be a benefit to the U.S. It would create an opportunity to move away from a hub-and-spoke model of allied relations to a more networked approach, where self-driven initiatives from Tokyo and Seoul amplify Washington’s efforts and even free up diplomatic bandwidth to engage with other regional partners. At the very least, it would lessen the costs of maintaining regional security at a time when America is increasingly constrained in its pursuit of grand strategies.
Jonathan Dixon has just completed a Master of Science in National Security Strategy at the National War College. He has written on Chinese irredentism, online nationalism, and digital authoritarianism. He holds a Master of Art in International Relations from American University and a Bachelor of Arts from Furman University. This essay reflects his own views and not those of the U.S. government or the Department of Defense.
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Header Image: Flags of Japan and the Republic of Korea. (Getty)
Notes:
[5] Chaekwang You and Wonjae Kim, “Loss Aversion and Risk-Seeking in Korea-Japan Relations,” Journal of East Asian Studies 20 (2019), p. 55.
[6] Taku Tamaki, “It Takes Two to Tango: The Difficult Japan – South Korea Relations as Clash of Realities,” Japanese Journal of Political Science 21 (2020), p. 3.
[7] You and Kim, p. 55.
[8] Joe Phillips, Wondong Lee, and Joseph Yi, “Future of South Korea – Japan Relations: Decoupling or Liberal Discourse,” The Political Quarterly 91.2 (April-June 2020), p. 448.
[9] Karina V. Korostelina, “The Normative Function of National Historical Narratives: South Korean Perceptions of Relations with Japan,” National Identities 21.2 (2019), p. 179.
[10] Phillips et. al., pp. 450-451.
[11] Kazuya Fukuoka, “Japanese History Textbook Controversy at a Crossroads: Joint History Research, Politicization of Textbook Adoption Process, and Apology Fatigue in Japan,” Global Change, Peace & Security 30.3 (2018), p. 316.
[12] Ibid., 329.
[13] Indu Pandey, “Tigers on the Prowl: South Korea, Japan, and the Futility of Symbolic Disputes,” Harvard International Review 40.2 (Spring 2019), p. 16.
[14] Lam Peng Er, “Reviewed Work(s): Changing Power Relations in Northeast Asia: Implications for Relations between Japan and South Korea by Marie Soderberg,” The Journal of Japanese Studies 39.1 (Winter 2013), 240.
[15] Alexandra Sakaki and Junya Nishino, “Japan’s South Korea Predicament,” International Affairs 94.4 (2018), p. 749.
[16] Min Xia, Linan Jia, and Jie Chen, “Northeast Asian Perceptions of China’s Rise: To What Extent Does Economic Interdependence Work?” Modern Chinese Studies 21.2 (2014), p. 120.
[17] Sakaki and Nishino, p. 751.
[19] Sakaki and Nishino, p. 738.
[21] Bhubhindar Singh, “Beyond Identity and Domestic Politics: Stability in South Korea – Japan Relations,” The Korean Journal of Defense Analysis 27.1 (March 2015), p. 24.
[22] Shin Kawashima, “Japan-US-China Relations during the Trump Administration and the Outlook for East Asia,” Asia-Pacific Review 24.1 (2017), p. 27.
[23] You and Kim, pp. 53-54.
[24] Audrey Y. Wong, “Comparing Japanese and South Korean Strategies towards China and the United States: All Politics is Local,” Asian Survey 55.6 (November – December 2015), p. 1246.
[25] Jina Kim, “China and Regional Security Dynamics on the Korean Peninsula,” Korea Net Assessment 2020: Politicized Security and Unchanging Strategic Realities (Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2020), p. 56.
[26] Wong, 1266.
[27] China refers to these as the Diaoyu Islands.
[28] Shogo Suzuki and Corey Wallace, “Explaining Japan’s Response to Geopolitical Vulnerabilities,” International Affairs 94.4 (2018), p. 711.
[29] Ibid., p. 716.
[30] Kawashima, p. 27.
[31] Evelyn Goh, “Contesting Hegemonic Order: China in East Asia,” Security Studies 28.3 (2019), p. 614.
[36] David C. Kang, American Grand Strategy and East Asian Security in the Twenty-First Century (New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2017), p. 10.
[37] Jae Ho Chung, Between Ally and Partner: Korea-China Relations and the United States (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2008), p. 97.
[38] David Martin Jones, Nicholas Khoo, and M.L.R. Smith, Asian Security and the Rise of China: International Relations in an Age of Volatility (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publications, 2013), p. 51.
[39] Chung, 101.
[40] Heon Joo Jung and Han Wool Jeong, “South Korean Attitude Towards China: Threat Perception, Economic Interest, and National Identity,” African and Asian Studies 15 (2016), pp. 245-246.
[43] “Risks of Intelligence Pathologies in South Korea,” International Crisis Group, Asia Report No. 259, August 5, 2014, p. 43.
[45] Mark Gibney and David Warner, “What Does It Mean to Say I’m Sorry? President Clinton’s Apology to Guatemala and Its Significance for International and Domestic Law,” Denver Journal of International Law and Policy 28:2 (May 2020), p. 223.
[46] Jennifer M. Dixon, “History Issues in the Postwar Period (1952-1989)” in Dark Pasts: Changing the State’s Story in Turkey and Japan (Cornell: Cornell University Press, 2018), p. 121.
[48] Jay A. Vora and Erika Vora, “The Effectiveness of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission: Perceptions of Xhosa, Afrikaner, and English South Africans,” Journal of Black Studies 34.3 (2004), pp. 303-304.
[49] Tom Phuong Le, “Negotiating in Good Faith: Overcoming Legitimacy Problems in the Japan-South Korea Reconciliation Process,” The Journal of Asian Studies 78.3 (2019), p. 635.
[50] Kim Dong-Choon, “The Long Road toward Truth and Reconciliation: Unwavering Attempts to Achieve Justice in South Korea,” Critical Asian Studies 42.4 (2010), p. 526.
[51] Phillips et. al., p. 448.
[52] Celeste L. Arrington, “Explaining Redress Outcomes,” in Accidental Activists: Victim Movements and Government Accountability in Japan and South Korea (New York: Columbia University Press, 2016), pp. 22-23.
[53] Kim, p. 544.
5. Facing food shortages, Storm Corps pilfer government storage facilities
If this is accurate these are quite the indicators of potential internal stability both among the population and more dangerously among the military.
This bears watching.
Facing food shortages, Storm Corps pilfer government storage facilities - Daily NK
Storm Corps troops complain that they “can’t even get a bowl of water from the people," a source told Daily NK
Faced with miserable food conditions, members of the so-called “Storm Corps” (11th Corps) on long-term deployments to the Sino-North Korean border have gone beyond robbing private homes to pilfer even the food stores of government agencies.
A source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK on Friday that with the Storm Corps deployed to the border for such a long time, the unit was growing “ideologically complacent and lax” and poor food supplies were causing “further problems.”
“They’re not connected to Chinese traders like the border guard, so they rob people,” he said. “And now they’re even robbing the logistics facilities of state agencies.”
The source said the Storm Corps receives food, but the quality of the food has gradually worsened the longer it stays at the border. “If the relationship between the troops and civilians was good, they could get help from locals,” he said. “But even this relationship has been greatly damaged. And they don’t have side jobs, so if food supplies are lacking, they have to make due on their own. Being unable to do anything else, they’ve ultimately turned to robbing state institutions.”
According to the source, three soldiers from the Storm Corps broke into the local branch of the Ministry of State Security in Hoeryong to rob its warehouse earlier this month. However, they were reportedly caught at the scene after being discovered by staff on patrol and ultimately discharged from the military.
Moreover, their battalion commander, political guidance officer and security guidance officer were relieved, and their battalion was withdrawn by the middle of the month and replaced by another, said the source.
The source said the incident was mentioned in lecture materials from the Central Military Commission distributed on Aug. 15. Condemning the robbing of state institutions as a “serious” crime, the Central Committee used the incident to raise the alarm against “irregular” phenomena emerging in border regions.
Accordingly, there are growing calls in North Korea for the urgent withdrawal of the Storm Corps. However, with work to build a concrete fence and high voltage wires along the border running into problems due to insufficient supplies, the special forces unit could be withdrawn even later than initially planned.
The Storm Corps’ commanders reportedly believe the unit should be withdrawn at once. They say the longer the unit remains deployed at the border, the more difficult it becomes for it to train for its main combat mission – namely, sowing “disorder in the enemy’s rear.” They also worry that ideologically lax soldiers could desert and defect.
A sentry post on the Sino-North Korean border in Sakju County, North Pyongan Province. / Image: Daily NK
However, the source said that while electrical transformers have to be installed at all lengths of the border, the state is failing to provide them. Instead, the government is telling provincial party, government and military organizations to provide them “through self-reliance,” so work on the wall and high-voltage wires will apparently be delayed even further.
“The Storm Corps can only withdraw once [the transformers] have been installed, but if these devices aren’t supplied, it won’t be easy for the unit to withdraw,” he said.
North Korea ordered the border wall and wires be completed by Party Foundation Day on Oct. 10. Accordingly, a joint inspection team from the Central Committee, Cabinet and Ministry of State Security plans to visit the four border provinces (North Pyongan Province, Chagang Province, Yanggang Province and North Hamgyong Province) from Oct. 1 to Oct. 10 to evaluate the work done so far. The source said if the inspection team gives the work a failing grade, the withdrawal of the Storm Corps will be delayed.
Meanwhile, local mistreatment of the unit is growing worse, as is the Storm Corps’ turf war with the border patrol.
The source said Storm Corps troops complain that they “can’t even get a bowl of water from the people,” and that border residents treat them like a “posse” with no business being there, despite having come “to do the nation’s work.”
In fact, shop owners along the border either pretend they have no goods or raise their prices when they see Storm Corps troops, and most merchants refuse to sell to unit personnel on credit.
The source added that border residents who made their living from smuggling are “very hostile” to the Storm Corps, blaming them for their current woes, and that troops from the unit will face difficulties adjusting to life in the area going forward as well.
6. North Korean leader urges young ex-convicts to become 'kindling spark' for national development
Ex-convicts? A " kindling spark?"
I think we can read behind the lines here. I doubt their lives are very good. And certainly their Songbun has been re-evaluated based on their "crimes" (watching videos from South Korea)
North Korean leader urges young ex-convicts to become 'kindling spark' for national development
In this photo released by North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un holds a photo session with young ex-convicts, Aug. 30. Yonhap
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un met and held a photo session with young ex-convicts volunteering to work in "difficult and challenging sectors," and urged them to become a "kindling spark" for national development, state media said Tuesday.
Kim "held hands of each of the young people who volunteered to work at difficult and challenging sectors with high awareness and enthusiasm to glorify their youth in the van of the worthwhile era, highly estimating their deeds and mental world," according to the Korean Central News Agency.
"Those young people, who had been lagging behind others, realized the gratitude of the mother party and the socialist system that embraced and brought them up and started with a clean slate by volunteering to work at the most difficult and challenging posts," the KCNA said.
Those "lagging behind others" refer to ex-convicts who are now working for the ruling Workers' Party after repenting for their past.
"He earnestly called on the young people to become a kindling spark and a great fire in the on-going gigantic general advance and to become youth heroes endeavoring to bring about prosperity and progress of the country with gem-like patriotism," the KCNA said.
Since Kim called for more care to be given to such young people in April, North Korean media has urged efforts to turn them into "patriotic youth" working for the country.
North Korea has recently ramped up efforts for ideological education especially among young people amid concerns that they may be overly exposed to foreign cultures.
In December, the North enacted a law that toughens the punishment for possession of videos made in South Korea as part of efforts to prevent the inflow of outside culture that could influence its people's ideology. (Yonhap)
7. N.Korea Sends Young Elite into Internal Exile
Internal exile.
The key problem. Kim Jong-un is more feral of the Korean people in the north that he is of the US. And these Korean people are even more dangerous when they are armed with information from and about the south. We should keep this in the forefront of our minds when developing strategy and policy and when negotiating with the regime. This is why KimYo-jong threatened the South in June 2020 and then destroyed the South Korean liaison building in Kaesong. Information and knowledge from the South is an existential threat to the regime.
Excerpt:
One senior defector said, "One of the biggest problems leader Kim Jong-un faces is young people who have been influenced by South Korean culture and angry about the economic crisis. The aim appears to be to neutralize them so they can't foment internal dissent."
N.Korea Sends Young Elite into Internal Exile
August 30, 2021 12:55
The North Korean regime has been sending elite young Workers Party functionaries into internal exile at remote construction sites to shore up crumbling discipline.
The practice is being presented as "volunteering," but it appears they are not given a choice.
One senior defector said, "One of the biggest problems leader Kim Jong-un faces is young people who have been influenced by South Korean culture and angry about the economic crisis. The aim appears to be to neutralize them so they can't foment internal dissent."
Young North Koreans celebrate Youth Day in Pyongyang on Aug. 28, in this photo from the [North] Korean Central News Agency.
The official Rodong Sinmun daily on Sunday published a statement from Kim to mark Youth Day the previous day. "What makes me especially happy is to see young people who have been left behind make the magnificent decision to sacrifice themselves for their country and start fresh by moving on to difficult and demanding areas," he said.
He attributed the "weakness" of young North Koreans to the "stubborn ideological and cultural infiltration schemes of the imperialists."
The victims gathered in Pyongyang to hold what was billed as a "debate" last week. They included a graduate from Sariwon Teachers College who "volunteered" to teach in a school in a remote outpost, a youth guidance official from Nampo who "chose" to work on a cooperative farm, and a high-end store worker in Pyongyang who "opted" to work on a ranch in Kangwon Province.
The echoes of the massive reeducation efforts of China's Cultural Revolution or Cambodia's Khmer Rouge are unmissable.
One intelligence official here said, "Many young North Koreans are essentially being sent to labor camps."
- Copyright © Chosunilbo & Chosun.com
8. Google, Apple Hit by First Law Threatening Dominance Over App-Store Payments
South Korea is taking the lead here:
The law will be referenced by regulators in other places—such as the European Union and the U.S.—that also are scrutinizing global tech companies, said Yoo Byung-joon, a professor of business at Seoul National University who researches digital commerce.
“Korea’s decision reflects a broader trend to step up regulation of technology-platform businesses, which have been criticized for having too much power,” Mr. Yoo said.
After a committee decision in late August that pushed the bill to a final vote at the National Assembly, Apple said it was concerned that users who purchase digital goods through other payment systems will be at greater risk of fraud and privacy violations.
Google, Apple Hit by First Law Threatening Dominance Over App-Store Payments
South Korea will require the companies to allow competing payment systems, threatening their 30% cut of most in-app digital sales
The law amends South Korea’s Telecommunications Business Act to prevent large app-market operators from requiring the use of their in-app purchasing systems. It also bans operators from unreasonably delaying the approval of apps or deleting them from the marketplace—provisions meant to head off retaliation against app makers.
Companies that fail to comply could be fined up to 3% of their South Korea revenue by the Korea Communications Commission, the country’s media regulator.
The law will be referenced by regulators in other places—such as the European Union and the U.S.—that also are scrutinizing global tech companies, said Yoo Byung-joon, a professor of business at Seoul National University who researches digital commerce.
“Korea’s decision reflects a broader trend to step up regulation of technology-platform businesses, which have been criticized for having too much power,” Mr. Yoo said.
After a committee decision in late August that pushed the bill to a final vote at the National Assembly, Apple said it was concerned that users who purchase digital goods through other payment systems will be at greater risk of fraud and privacy violations.
At Alphabet Inc. GOOG 0.64% unit Google, Wilson White, senior director of public policy, said “the rushed process hasn’t allowed for enough analysis of the negative impact of this legislation on Korean consumers and app developers.”
The bill—which in Korean has been nicknamed the “Google power-abuse-prevention law” by some lawmakers and media—was welcomed by groups representing South Korea’s internet-technology companies and startups, as well as local content developers and app makers.
“This is a significant step forward for the creation of a fairer app ecosystem,” said Kwon Se-hwa, general manager at the Korea Internet Corporations Association.
Google’s Play store accounted for 75% of mobile-app downloads globally in the second quarter. Apple accounted for 65% of app-store consumer spending on in-app purchases and subscriptions during the same quarter, according to App Annie, a mobile-app analytics firm.
The companies don’t break out their own app-store revenue in South Korea, but it is likely a small fraction of the total. Globally, services including the app store generated $53.8 billion of Apple’s $274.5 billion in revenue in its last fiscal year. Google parent Alphabet reported $182.5 billion in revenue last year, of which “Google other” revenue including Google Play store sales accounted for $21.7 billion.
Apple and Google face lawsuits and regulatory probes in multiple countries around their requirements that apps listed on their app marketplaces use in-house payment systems that take cuts of up to 30% of in-app sales in most cases.
Attorneys general from 36 U.S. states and the District of Columbia have filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google alleging its Google Play app store is an illegal monopoly.
And a bipartisan bill recently introduced in the U.S. Senate would restrict how the Apple and Google app stores operate and what rules can be imposed on app developers.
“Fortnite” maker Epic Games Inc. publicly challenged Google and Apple last year by adding a payment system inside the game that prevented the companies from collecting their typical 30% cut. After Google and Apple suspended the combat game from their stores, Epic sued them. Apple and Epic are awaiting a verdict in their suit.
Apple and Google have made some concessions. Last year, Apple reduced the commission it charges on in-app sales to 15% for small developers that generate no more than $1 million in revenue through its app store. Google followed suit this year by reducing its cut to 15% on the first $1 million developers earn from its app store.
In late August, as part of a proposed settlement of a 2019 federal lawsuit, Apple said it would allow developers to use information captured from apps—such as email addresses—to tell customers about alternatives to Apple’s payment system. But developers wouldn’t be able to promote payment systems inside the apps.
The Coalition for App Fairness dismissed the change, saying it doesn’t fundamentally address the “structural, foundational problems facing all developers.”
South Korean lawmakers set their legislation in motion last year after Google announced all apps would have to use the company’s proprietary payment system, expanding a requirement that previously applied to game apps. That drew strong protest from local app makers and content developers.
9. Pyongyang’s gambit over Yongbyon won’t help up the ante
Unless we allow it to.
We should keep in mind that the regime wants us to see this. It is masterful at denial and deception. What are they doing that they are trying to protect from our prying eyes?
Excerpt:
However, North Korea has showed off its intention for nuclear armament. A plutonium program run by operating rectors is more costly and less efficient in terms of production compared to uranium-enrichment programs. Yet, the North unabashedly broadcasted the renewal of operations when it is susceptible to exposure through satellite imagery. It was the communist regime’s typical mild provocation to escalate the level of threats towards Washington and defy the pressure for denuclearization at the same time.
Pyongyang’s gambit over Yongbyon won’t help up the ante
Posted August. 31, 2021 07:30,
Updated August. 31, 2021 07:30
Pyongyang’s gambit over Yongbyon won’t help up the ante. August. 31, 2021 07:30. .
Signs of the operations of the 5MW(e) reactor at North Korea’s Yongbyon nuclear facility have been captured by the International Atomic Energy Agency. In an annual report, the IAEA said the 5MW reactor that remained dormant since late 2018 are showing signs of operation starting from July 2021 such as discharge of cooling water. Reportedly, the North operated the Radiochemical Laboratory for five months to reprocess the spent fuel rods from the reactor into plutonium. Those activities point to the possibility that the North has renewed the production of plutonium, the core material for nuclear weapon.
Pyongyang’s decision to activate the reactor after a three-year hiatus reflects its intention to secure plutonium in addition to uranium. The operation of reactors also paves the way for securing tritium necessary for the fabrication of hydrogen bombs. This may signal the North’s gambit to neutralize the call for denuclearization from the international community by arming itself with ever more threatening weapons and flexing its military muscle as a nuclear state.
However, North Korea has showed off its intention for nuclear armament. A plutonium program run by operating rectors is more costly and less efficient in terms of production compared to uranium-enrichment programs. Yet, the North unabashedly broadcasted the renewal of operations when it is susceptible to exposure through satellite imagery. It was the communist regime’s typical mild provocation to escalate the level of threats towards Washington and defy the pressure for denuclearization at the same time.
The Yongbyon nuclear reactor has long been considered as a radioactive hazard. The Yongbyon facility has been used as a bargaining chip for economic compensation in various nuclear agreements, and Pyongyang even put on a show to bomb the cooling tower at Yongbyon. Back in 2019, the North demanded the lifting of America’s sanctions in exchange for the demolition of the nuclear facilities in Yongbyon, including the reactor in question. Their latest move to reopen the reactor should be interpreted as an attempt to boost Yongbyon’s value as a bargaining chip.
Despite Washington’s repeated calls for dialogue, North Korea is not responding at all in an apparent intention to get concession first such as the alleviation of sanctions. The reactivation of the reactor must be Pyongyang’s strategy to put itself back on the list of Washington’s priorities by awakening the international community back to the need to open dialogues with the North. But there is little chance such gambit would pay off. America is urging the North to get back to the negotiation table unconditionally, making it clear that no empty promise would ever be compensated again. Washington is fed up with Pyongyang’s blusters.
10. South Korean democracy slowly eroding away
Hopefully the National Assembly will reconsider the "fake news" legislation. And it would be great if it rescinded the "anti-leaflet" law. These are harming the ROK reputation and international confidence will continue to erode over these types of actions.
South Korean democracy slowly eroding away
Plans to tighten press, broadcast and online commentary laws are the latest in a series of new free expression restrictions
SEOUL – The head of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea does not beat about the bush.
“They don’t know shit!” was Song Young-gil’s reported response last week to overseas criticism of a revision to the Media Arbitration Law his party plans to ram through the National Assembly in coming days.
Song’s DPK is being buffeted by a storm of criticism from both domestic and overseas media organizations protesting the proposed revision, which was meant to pass the National Assembly last week but faces a series of delays.
On Monday, heads of national media organizations picketed the National Assembly, joining protests by the right-wing main opposition, the People’s Power Party, who have promised a filibuster to prevent voting on the revision.
At the time of writing, the DPK has expressed determination to press ahead. Given the party’s supermajority in the National Assembly, won in the general election of April 2020, the bill looks set to pass, either in the last August session or when a new session opens on September 1.
If, as widely expected, the bill does pass, it will be the latest blow to free expression in South Korea, for it is not only media that is under legal pressure.
Despite the country’s impressive reputation as a vibrant democracy, laws and practices have in recent years been used to silence academics and social media users.
And according to members of the DPK who spoke to foreign reporters on Friday, further legislation – aimed at YouTubers – is in the pipeline. YouTube has, in recent years, emerged as a key channel via which hard right-wing commentators lambast the Moon Jae-in administration.
Stormy mediascape
Though South Korea is already home to powerful defamation laws that allow for seven-year jail terms as well as fines, the proposed revision would increase five-fold the penalties on media outlets that issue “intentional” or “grossly negligent” reports.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in. Photo: AFP / Handout / The Blue House
The revision would also take into consideration the “sales and social influence” of offending media when it comes to awarding damages.
Corrections, to be published in media, would be mandated to be at last half the length of the offending passage. And online media would be required to red-flag any article that receives complaints – even prior to the outcome of related investigations.
The DPK is – perhaps understandably – irked by the state of the national media.
The country’s three major newspapers, the Chosun, Joongang and Dong-A dailies – popularly known as the “ChoJoongDong” – are all right wing, and their widespread influence is a long-term bane of the left. The late leftist President Roh Moo-hyun, the mentor of current President Moon, was particularly resentful of their power.
Broadcast news is less problematic for whoever occupies the presidential Blue House, as the heads of two of the three major broadcasters – which are publicly owned – are appointed by the sitting government.
However, in the multidimensional expansion of the current media space, the three major papers are now broad media groups that also run cable TV channels as well as magazines.
DPK lawmakers, speaking to foreign reporters on Friday, repeatedly referenced the Chosun, the best-selling conservative paper. They particularly expressed anger about reports on a highly sensitive touchstone of the left, the 1980 Gwangju Uprising.
The uprising was a response by pro-democracy protesters in the city of Gwangju to a creeping coup d’etat being undertaken by then-general and later president Chun Do-hwan. Chun deployed airborne rangers to suppress the uprising, which they did with considerable brutality. Over 200 people were killed.
Former South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan leaves the court in Gwangju, South Korea, on November 30, 2020. Picture: AFP
The killings have left a deep scar on the national conscience. But some on the far right continue to insist – despite, to the best of Asia Times’ knowledge, all evidence to the contrary – that North Korea was involved in stoking the incident.
To further buttress their case, the DPK lawmakers cited the findings of polls that find low credibility for mainstream media in the country. They can also count on public support: According on another poll this month, some 56% of respondents said they support the law, while just 35% are opposed.
Against the backdrop of heavy-handed legislation in Hong Kong that alarmed global media in 2020 in what was formerly the regional news hub, South Korea has sought to lure international newsrooms in what it saw as competition with regional democratic rivals Taipei and Tokyo.
After well-staffed Asian news bureaus of leading US newspapers The New York Times and the Washington Post were established in Seoul, South Korean officials have been in chest-thumping mode, citing the local environment’s press freedom.
But DPK members warned that the legal amendment they are proposing would also apply to foreign media in the country.
Opposition mounts
Even by the incendiary standards of South Korea’s ever-contentious politics, opposition has been heated.
“The DP is running this country like a totalitarian state,” Lee Dal-gon, a PPP member told domestic media last week. “The PPP is seriously concerned that the DP will abuse this law in the lead-up to the election to break the media’s pen.”
Criminal libel laws were used to silence critics during the presidency of Park Guen-Hye. Photo: AFP
A presidential election is scheduled next March, and the DPK say that the revisions to the bill will not take effect until next April.
Even so, the DPK lawmakers on Friday warned that though damages in the bill cannot be claimed by high-level government officials and tycoons, that exemption only extends up to the retirements of those people – raising the possibility of retroactive lawsuits.
That could provide useful post-retirement ammunition for President Moon, who is constitutionally limited to a single term.
Media organizations both inside and outside Korea have expressed alarm.
“The proposed amendment could open the door to any arbitrary interpretation and possibly be instrumentalized to put pressure on the media,” said
“No matter the legitimacy of the fight against disinformation, legislators should never create new legal tools without ensuring they include sufficient guarantees, as court decisions can be very subjective on those sensitive issues.”
The NGO called the amendment, “a threat to journalism.”
Separately, a Seoul law firm, Yeomin, has allied with a civic group, the Transitional Justice Working Group, which targets Pyongyang for human rights violations, to submit a petition to the United Nations.
People watch a television screen showing a news report about North Korea’s decision not to participate in the Tokyo Olympics due to the Covid-19 pandemic, at a railway station in Seoul on April 6, 2021. Photo: AFP / Jung Yeon-je
Their petition alleges that the revision violates freedom of expression, freedom of association and the right to fair trial under articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Shin Hee-seok of the TJWG detailed a number of problems with the amendment. One is the requirement by media to signal complaints against an article even before a probe has been undertaken.
“The mandatory flagging of online articles by news providers at the mere request for correction of reports is a presumption of guilt,” he told Asia Times. “If someone reports negatively about Moon Jae-in or Samsung, and people object, the provider has to flag the content, and if you are an average reader, this will make you doubt the veracity of the article.”
It will also require extensive, and likely onerous, management of flagged articles by news providers.
The petitioners urged President Moon to veto the bill. Given that the DPK is Moon’s party, that looks highly unlikely.
One long-term avenue of challenge, which has already been raised by academics, is legal challenge to the amendments in the Constitutional Court.
A wider assault
It is not just mainstream media that faces growing freedom of expression restrictions.
Korea’s powerful libel laws and other mechanisms have been deployed against those who question the conventional wisdom on such sensitive issues as the Gwangju Uprising and the 1910-1945 Japanese colonial period.
Newspapers in Seoul report the summit between former US president Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in June 2018. Photo: AFP / Jung Yeon-je
In an ongoing court case Chun, the aging ex-president who ordered the Gwangju crackdown, has been sued by the family of a deceased, activist priest for questioning the latter’s credibility in his memoir (which has had its publication halted).
The precedent – that a dead persons’ descendants can sue for libel – has obviously worrisome implications for historians.
The current developments around the revision to the Media Arbitration Act are raising red flags even for some non-media professional, who allege political partisanship.
Given that the DPK is dominated by members of the generation who struggled against Seoul’s authoritarian governments of the 1970s and 80s, that is an irony, they say.
“I find it ironic that members of progressive parties, who suffered for years under the arbitrary application of the 1948 National Security Act (which outlawed supposedly pro-communist speech), is now creating similar legislation to punish their opponents,” said Joseph Yi, a founding member of the East Asia chapter of the Heterodox Academy and a South Korea-based educator since 2011.
“South Korea is moving backwards as a free, open, pluralist society and this should concern supporters of liberty everywhere.”
The Heretodox Academy is a non-profit, global advocacy group of academics working to promote diversity of viewpoints on college campuses.
A man watches a television screen showing news footage of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un attending the 8th congress of the ruling Workers’ Party held in Pyongyang, at a railway station in Seoul on January 6, 2021. Photo: AFP / Jung Yeon-je
“The abuses of South Korea’s criminal libel law by opposed political factions gives a foretaste of how this amendment could be used to suppress free speech across the ideological spectrum,” said Shaun O’Dwyer, a political theorist at Kyushu University and a colleague of Yi in the Heterodox Academy.
“During Park Guen-hye’s presidency this law was used to intimidate and silence her media critics, yet it has also been used by progressive political groups to prosecute academics who dissent from both the academic and nationalist consensus on the ‘comfort women,’ such as Park Yu-ha or Lew Seok-choon,” O’Dwyer said.
Conservative president Park Geun-hye, after being impeached, was jailed for corruption and abuse of power. The two South Korean academics cited fell into hot water over their stances on “comfort women,” which dispute the national narrative that all were “sex slaves.”
In cases that have caused some to cry foul on grounds of the breach of academic freedom, Park was sued for libel, fined $9,000 and her book on the subject was heavily redacted. Separately, Lew lost his job just before his retirement, and faces defamation lawsuits.
Rising obstacles on free expression are even extending into the entertainment space.
The deaths by suicide of a number of K-pop stars and celebrities in recent years have been linked to online abuse. In response, a cyber investigative arm of the National Police Agency has been activated to track down hate online.
In this heated atmosphere, even the biggest company in K-pop is flexing its muscles.
K-pop groups like BTS can’t be overly criticized online. Photo: Jung Yeon-je/AFP
“BTS’ management company Hybe [formerly, Big Hit] has said that any ‘ill-intentioned criticism’ will be met with legal ramifications,” noted David Tizzard, a columnist and professor of Korean Studies at Seoul Women’s University. “So, if you criticize BTS, you could be sued.”
Yet Tizzard suggests that the current trend is not restricted to Korea.
“I don’t think these trends should be seen in a vacuum: The idea of controlling and regulating free speech online is a broader political issue,” he told Asia Times.
“There is a broad social trend that words are violence, and a lot of these regulations reflect changing attitudes. There is a move toward policing language.”
11. Int'l Condemnation Mounts of Attempts to Gag Press
This is not the time for South Korea to ignore the international community.
Int'l Condemnation Mounts of Attempts to Gag Press
August 30, 2021 12:18
The government faces mounting international criticism for its attempt to curb media freedom in Korea in the name of cracking down on "fake news."
The proposed media reform bill would make reporting "fake news" punishable by vast punitive damages, and has been widely condemned as a tool to quell criticism of the government ahead of next year's presidential election.
At home, the main opposition People Power Party said it will filibuster the bill tabled by the ruling Minjoo Party, which has a sweeping majority. The filibuster may delay the bill past the August session of the National Assembly, but the MP will simply table it again in September.
Reporters gather as People Power Party floor leader Kim Gi-hyeon protests against a proposed media reform bill in front of the National Assembly in Seoul on Monday. /Yonhap
The Society of Professional Journalists added its voice to the chorus of international condemnation.
In an interview with the Donga Ilbo on Sunday, SPJ co-chair Dan Kubiske said the bill is a rare instance of such media curbs in a democratic country and declared himself "extremely disappointed."
He pointed out that Hong Kong is pursuing similar steps and warned the fact that the definition of "fake news" in the bill are so vague and sweeping "will risk the country's freedom in all aspects of people's lives." Like many other critics, Kubiske added that it would invariably lead to self-censorship among journalists.
Japan's Mainichi Shimbun in an editorial said the ruling party, whose leaders boast that they fought for more democracy in the 1980s, now "employ reckless political tactics that undermine universal values by utilizing the power of majority as a powerful ruling party."
Earlier, Reporters Without Borders, the International Federation of Journalists and the International Press Institute also issued statements condemning the bill.
- Copyright © Chosunilbo & Chosun.com
12. Don’t sugarcoat it: Why candor is the best policy with North Korea
From our good friend the Honorable Roberta Cohen, one our foremost experts on human rights in north Korea.
Don’t sugarcoat it: Why candor is the best policy with North Korea
Ambassador Thomas Schäfer’s book shows the value of speaking truth to power about the unjust system under Kim Jong Un
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Image: Eric Lafforgue | North Korean young men cleaning the road in front of propaganda posters in Pyongyang (Sept. 2008)
While the world watches whether North Korea and the United States can agree on removing nuclear weapons from the Korean Peninsula and normalizing relations, German Ambassador Thomas Schäfer’s new book should be on the table.
Schäfer served as ambassador in Pyongyang from 2007 to 2010 and again from 2013 to 2018, and is one of the very few chiefs of mission to have published a book about his experiences.
Released in March, “From Kim Jong Il to Kim Jong Un: How the Hardliners Prevailed” sets forth in detail the obstacles foreign governments face in engaging with North Korea, and raises the uncomfortable question of whether they can actually achieve results with the current leadership.
His principal finding is that a group of “hardliners” has come to dominate decision-making in the DPRK since Kim Jong Il’s death, and have a vested interest in preserving the current system — namely by holding onto nuclear weapons, preventing a serious opening of the economy and tightly controlling the population.
But what’s most notable about the book is the candor Schäfer exhibits in describing the difficulties governments face in dealing with the Kim Jong Un regime. He not only helps us see the country as it is but puts forward ways of critically engaging with North Korea while avoiding becoming accomplices in its unjust system.
Kim Jong Un gifting symbolic pistols to dozens of top military officials on Jul. 26, 2020. Schäfer’s principal finding is that a group of “hardliners” has come to dominate decision-making in the DPRK since Kim Jong Il’s death. | Image: KCTV
SOMEBODY’S WATCHING ME
One of Schäfer’s first observations is the absence of reliable information in North Korea. The information and ideas brought by foreigners, although welcomed by some officials, are considered a potential threat to the regime.
Foreign residents are thus “isolated,” “monitored,” “spied upon and eavesdropped at will.” With few exceptions, travel outside of Pyongyang must be authorized and accompanied, and foreigners are unable to develop genuine relationships with locals, who “live in constant fear.”
Most conversations with officials, moreover, yield little because everyone has “the same meager talking points.” If anyone goes beyond these, as sometimes they do, they put themselves at risk.
Schäfer cautions that carrying out economic and humanitarian aid projects in such an environment rarely produces “satisfactory results.” Fear of destabilizing the regime has led North Korea to regularly resist far-reaching reforms, whether in agriculture, industry or other fields, and has undermined the most basic conditions for effective foreign aid – access to beneficiaries and to areas of need, free movement, resource control and reliable data.
“Lack of transparency,” Schäfer warns, makes it impossible to believe statements about food security and other issues based on North Korean figures.
Schäfer writes that foreign residents are “isolated,” “monitored,” “spied upon and eavesdropped at will.” | Image: Eric Lafforgue (Pyongyang, Sept. 2008)
ECONOMIC FICTIONS
Fear of “infiltration” from foreign ideas has also been “a fundamental obstacle” to trade and investment.
Take the inter-Korean Kaesong Industrial Complex, which made it possible for tens of thousands of North Korean workers to see a modern factory for the first time. These same workers, Schäfer points out, were barred from learning management methods, production or marketing because interactions with South Koreans were considered “a danger.”
Thus, high hopes for knowledge transfer and inter-cultural exchange remained unfulfilled. Pyongyang took most of the earnings too, which “contributed to the financing of the regime, including its rearmament program, through the income earned from leasing out its population.”
Schäfer finds it impossible to take seriously government promises to develop the economy and raise living standards. While outsiders sometimes tout these promises as auspicious, he calls them “a fiction” since spending on nuclear armament has clearly increased, while spending on the civilian economy has decreased.
North Korea even failed to invest in the special economic zones it set up, leading the ambassador to plead for “realistic investment conditions.” The country, Schäfer found, was prepared to “provide nothing but a plot of land and the workforce,” while German investors were expected to provide the capital, technology, markets and infrastructure.
When Germany sent a group of economists to Pyongyang for a planned seminar on economic issues, Pyongyang pulled out the North Korean participants after the first day, saying they were needed in the countryside.
North Korean children working in a field Pyongan Province in May 2009. Schäfer finds it impossible to take seriously government promises to develop the economy and raise living standards. | Image: Eric Lafforgue
RULING CLIQUE
Although officialdom may blame chronic hunger at home on climate, topography and sanctions, it is clear to Schäfer that government policy, most notably a “lack of incentives” for farmers, is the major problem the country’s leaders must address.
Schäfer argues that to understand the frequent conflicts, contradictions and turnarounds in North Korea’s policies — such as agreeing with the U.S. on a nuclear freeze in 2012 and then launching a rocket, or agreeing with South Korea on family reunions in 2014 and then insulting its leaders — one must recognize that Kim Jong Un “does not govern alone.”
While Schäfer is unable to identify the hardline “leadership collective” that he says has consolidated its position since 2016, he makes a persuasive case that different factions in the Party and the military struggle and undermine each other, and that coordination is weak.
He even shows that sometimes the leadership has sidelined the views of Kim Jong Un and his father, especially on economic reforms and inter-Korean relations. Schäfer concludes from this that Kim may not have been “the driving force” behind the purges of senior officials and the executions of family members when he consolidated his power in the early 2010s.
Here, Schäfer’s views are at odds with the many experts who see Kim Jong Un’s authority in the realm of the absolute. For Schäfer, however, major military and security decisions require the backing of a powerful group, albeit one which lends support to Kim Jong Un and his dynastic rule “for reasons of legitimacy.”
Kim Jong Un at the 5th meeting of company leaders and political instructors of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) in March 2019. Schäfer makes a persuasive case that different factions in the North’s ruling party and the military struggle with and undermine each other, and that coordination is weak. | Image: Rodong Sinmun
TRUTH TO POWER
Governments and other actors that engage with North Korea, Schäfer urges, should not hold back from raising questions and criticism with the host government. Failing to speak out only strengthens Pyongyang’s positions, and in the case of human rights, it conveys the wrong message to the North Korean people.
In fact, foreigners can sometimes hear veiled or even openly cynical criticism of the system from North Koreans. Schäfer observes that “most” North Koreans now know that “people in other countries are far better off” and that “the gap with China and South Korea continues to widen.”
Expecting North Korea to make extensive changes in its economic, social and political system under its current leadership is but wishful thinking, he admonishes. Even the lifting of sanctions would not alter the deep-rooted poverty in the country.
Rather, a better understanding is needed of the political objectives of the current regime and the many ruses and obstructions it puts in the way of denuclearization, humanitarian and development aid, business investment and human rights in furtherance of those goals. Schäfer highlights the objectives of regime survival, the end of the U.S.-South Korean alliance and ultimately reunification under Pyongyang’s dominance.
Having retired from the diplomatic service, Schäfer is no longer under pressure to justify his role in North Korea. Too many foreigners over the years have sought to emphasize the positive, sound encouraging and not reveal the terrible truths that might affect their access or reduce the funding donors provide.
In Schäfer’s view, the people of North Korea, to whom his book is dedicated, “deserve better,” and he succeeds in providing a powerful, sobering and refreshingly frank account of what the country is really like on the ground.
Edited by Bryan Betts
13. S. Korea, U.S. launch joint Korean War remains excavation project near DMZ
One of our many alliance shared values: we recover our fallen no matter how long it takes.
S. Korea, U.S. launch joint Korean War remains excavation project near DMZ | Yonhap News Agency
SEOUL, Aug. 31 (Yonhap) -- South Korea and the United States launched a joint project Tuesday to recover the remains of troops killed during the 1950-53 Korean War at a former battle site near the inter-Korean border, the defense ministry said.
Around 60 South Korean military personnel and 10 from the U.S.' Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) began the joint excavation work on Mount Baekseok in the northeastern county of Yanggu, which will continue through Sept. 16, according to the ministry.
As one of the key strategic points in the eastern region during the war, the area was where a fierce weekslong battle took place in 1951 at the height of the Korean War. So far, more than 580 sets of war remains have been discovered from the site, and 18 have been identified, including two American soldiers.
The retrieved remains will go through a process for identification, the ministry added.
"This joint operation will not only strengthen the relationship between our two organizations but also help us to keep our promise to our fallen heroes: To bring them home," Sgt. Nathaniel Doan from the DPAA said.
The Korean War broke out in June 1950, when North Korea, backed by the Soviet Union, invaded the South. The U.S. and 21 other nations fought alongside the South under the U.N. flag, and around 289,000 South Korean and international soldiers were killed, and about 28,445 others still remain missing.
South Korea and the U.S. have been working closely to repatriate the remains of the victims since 2000, according to the ministry.
graceoh@yna.co.kr
(END)
V/R
David Maxwell
Senior Fellow
Foundation for Defense of Democracies
Phone: 202-573-8647
Twitter: @davidmaxwell161
FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.