The pantomime of Korean politics over the past two weeks has quickly put smiles on the lips of Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin. For Mr. Kim in particular, this is the perfect gift and proves the strategic choice made in his previous New Year’s address. The Southern Army may outnumber the Union Army by more than 10 times, but the fiasco of intermittent martial law declarations only exposed the lack of discipline, disobedience, and confusion of the Southern military leadership and the erratic behavior of Seoul’s ruling party. It was. It was worse. What do you dislike about Pyongyang? North Korea’s much-praised secret weapon, “dedicated unity,” seemed stronger than ever in the face of South Korea’s indecision and incompetence.
This didn’t happen overnight. Recent reports have revealed that the early stages of the plan have been in the works for several months, as Mr. Yun seeks to hide his domestic woes by escalating tensions on the peninsula. This includes the provocative use of South Korean drones to spray propaganda leaflets at Kim Il Sung Square. Since it did not provoke a military response, Mr. Yun ordered the South Korean military to open fire on the North Korean “garbage” balloon launch site, an order that was apparently rejected.
The term “leaderless resistance” is usually applied to the tactics of terrorist groups that fear state infiltration. In Seoul, this word stands on its head because the state structure is incomplete and incompetent. The National Assembly has now voted in favor of impeachment on the second question, and South Korea’s decision-making has been stalled for up to 180 days as the Constitutional Court considers the legitimacy of the vote. All of this adds up to a day that confirms Mr. Kim’s strategic pivot, completely sidelining South Korea in his upcoming meeting with President Trump.
back story
After a car accident in Hanoi in 2019, Kim Jong Un abandoned his family’s 40-year effort to normalize relations with the United States. In the four decades since the collapse of the Soviet Union, American presidents have proven immune to any agreements, but in 2017 President Trump seemed different. Mr. Kim, gently appeased by North Korean diplomatic officials Ri Soo-young of the Party’s International Affairs Department and Ri Yong-ho of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, agreed that mutual recognition would be granted under the protective cover that progress between the two countries was suspended. I was confident that an agreement could be reached. For more than a decade, North Korea’s nuclear program has been slowly phased out, with an initial freeze and a gradual rollback.
But 2017 was a false dawn. Kim attributed the failure of the 2019 Hanoi summit to the Republican establishment surrounding President Trump, sabotaging the process and preventing any deal from being reached. Concluding that Washington’s will was incapable of effecting meaningful change, Kim purged the dovish factions in his administration in favor of hawks and began to change the course of the country’s external affairs.
Subsequent global events reinforced Kim’s changing worldview and power relations. The disorderly US withdrawal from Afghanistan demonstrated the vulnerability of US military forces to the wrong war, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine exposed callous decision-makers among Ukraine’s partners, and Israel’s devastation of Gaza has now proven that U.S. allies can slip the strings.
Various messages to Kim
No longer the only game in town, Kim sees the United States losing control and reacting to China’s challenge as the beginning of a second Cold War, and now Kim Jong-un is the lens through which he views the world. It has become. President Yoon’s crude and chaotic coup attempt in Seoul confirmed his analysis and strengthened his hand. Still, the sun has spots. First, Mr. Kim must inform and inform Rodong Sinmun’s readers about the events in Seoul. North Korea was never keen on promoting color revolutions around the world. North Koreans are also wary of being infected by similar flashy ideas. Now, the situation may be even worse. Earlier this year, Kim designated South Korea as the “most hostile nation.” It replaced previous depictions of South Koreans as blackmailed, misguided, and intimidated under the thumb of Washington and domestic suckers with a black-and-white depiction of malevolence. But the fierce resistance to martial law and the overwhelming protests calling for impeachment over the past two weeks clearly contradict Mr. Kim’s propaganda designed to sell reasons why reunification should be abandoned.
The second challenge is the expulsion of President Assad from Syria. The Assad regime was a Russian proxy supported by Moscow and Tehran. The collapse of the House in the Sand shows Moscow’s inability or unwillingness to fight on two fronts, even in the fragility of its support and in the long shadow of a Trump-inspired ceasefire threat in Ukraine. Suggests. As in 1950, mutual provocations on the peninsula that turned into skirmishes and threatened to escalate to war are bound to hit Mr. Kim. Russia’s involvement could lead to it directing from the sidelines the heavy lifting of mutual aid that Beijing has subcontracted. Assistance for survival is likely to be minimal and far short of resources for victory.
conclusion
Despite domestic turmoil, semi-riots, and coups in South Korea, North Korea has never taken advantage of these opportunities to reignite civil war. Nevertheless, Mr. Yun’s failed attempt to consolidate power is a sign that decades ago President Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski announced that the U.S. would have a nightmare coalition of China, Russia, and Iran. It will give Kim the confidence to continue on the path he has chosen to join what he is called to do. Chilled relations between North Korea and China are likely to grow even colder, while North Korea, Moscow, and China all seek further integration of South Korea into NATO, Quad+, or any type of East Asian security framework. We welcome and appreciate the postponement and cancellation of Early prospects for a progressive presidency in the South.
