One reader was kind enough to type out a recent piece in the WSJ looking at South Korean aid to North Korea and the political and economic interests that are behind Seoul’s decision to do what it takes to keep Kim Jong-il’s regime afloat. Great piece and a must read. I have posted it below for your viewing convenience.
(US Print edition, WSJ, 11 Mar 05, Front page, far left hand column)
Main Headline: Fine Line: South Korean Aid to North Increases Tensions with US
sub headlines: — Seoul, Fearing Collapse, Tries to Keep Neighbor Afloat: Nuclear Situation Heats Up
— Pyongyang Cheerleaders Weepby Gordon Fairclough
Ma Jeong, South Korea — Near the barbed wire fences of the demilitarized zone that slices across this divided peninsula, a widening split between Washington and Seoul over how best to deal with North Korea’s nuclear threat is on vivid display.
Trucks — laden with tons of construction supplies and machinery from the South — start lining up here early most mornings. They are bound for a giant industrial park under construction across the border, designed to help the North shore up its tottering economy.
One snowy day last month, a South Korean soldier in greeen camouflage waved the convoy through a military checkpoint The trucks then snaked under an archway marked “Unification Gate,” headed north.
The US, focused on preventing nuclear proliferation and disarming North Korea, is looking for ways to ratchet up the economic pressure on Pyongyang. But the South Korean government is busy working to help keep its former enemy afloat with aid and economic cooperation projects.
After a fratricidal war in the early 1950’s, followed by decades of Cold War hostility, South Korea made a sharp turn in the late 1990’s, moving to subsidize its erstwhile rival. Now, landmines have been pulled from two parts of the demilitarized zone to allow the reconnection of roads to move goods and even tourists to the North.
Behind Seoul’s decision is a basic calculation: A collapse of North Korea, highly militarized and deeply impoverished after nearly 50 years of Stalinist rule, would be simply too expensive, in both economic and political terms. So officials here largely oppose steps that could destabilize Kim Jong Il’s regime, which many US policymakers would just as soon see disappear.
“Some people seem to look for the North to collapse,” said South Korea’s president, Roh Moo Hyun, in an apparent reference to US hard-liners during a pointed speech in Los Angeles late last year. But, he said, that “would cause an enormous disaster for the people of the South.”
The rift between Washington and Seoul has been in the spotlight in the wake of two developments last month. Pyongyang declared that it has nuclear weapons and is withdrawing “indefinitely” from multilateral disarmament talks. And the US made a case to allies that North Korea shipped sensitive nuclear materal to Libya several years ago.
After the announcement, Vice President Dick Cheney met South Korea’s foreign minister Ban Ki Moon, and asked him whether, given the North’s actions, Seoul should reconsider moving forward with aid plans, say US officials.
South Korean leaders later said it is too soon to know whether North Korea really has nuclear weapons, and that
to page A12 column 3
Continued from 1st Page:
…they see no reaon to scale back cooperation. Seoul’s new ambassador to Washington suggested “carrots” or “a cube of sugar” be used to entince Pyongyang back to the bargaining table and persuade it to abandon its atomic ambitions.
For some American officials, convinced that Pyongyang will need to be pressured to come back to the six-nation talks, that stance is frustrating. Seoul “is providing a lifeline to the government in the North,” says one senior administration official. “As long as they see that lifeline, their incentive to deal on nuclear issues is way down.” The talks, which involve China, Russia, and Japan in addition to the US and the two Koreas, have been stalled since June.
Experts in the US and South Korea thought the collapse of North korea was imminent in the mid-1990’s, after the demise of the Soviet Union and the death of the country’s founder, Kim Il Sung. But the regime proved surprisingly resilient, surviving even a massive famine.
Meanwhile, the situation in South Korea was changing. The economy was walloped by the late-’90s Asian financial crisis, and some officials had grown wary after studying the impact of unification on Germany. In 1998, then-President Kim Dae Jung embarked on a policy of reconciliation and cooperation with the North.
The policy found favor with the Clinton administration, but the Bush administration has been skeptical. US and South Korean diplomats play down the differences. They say they are committed to resolving the nuclear standoff through negotiations. US officials have said that they can accept the cooperation projects already under way. But in light of North Korea’s continued intransigence, they oppose any significant expansion by South Korea before Pyongyang abandons its nuclear programs.
Seoul’s devotion to engagement — promoting joint projects and exchanges with the North — limits Washington’s maneuvering room. There are no practical military options. South Korea and China, North Korea’s two main economic benefactors, fear a collapse there and are very reluctant to consider economic sanctions.
For Seoul, conflict or a sudden demise of the North poses too great a threat to its 50 million people and its economy, the world’s 10th-largest. Government planners say that if order breaks down in the North, more than two million people could flood south, overwhelming social services. The fall could also prompt further turmoil in financial and currency markets, inflation, and bank runs, government analysts predict.
Initial crisis-management costs alone will be at least $6.5 billion, according to South Korean government estimates. The longer-range costs of reunification would likely be much higher. Marcus Noland, a Korea expert at the Institute for International Economics in Washington — who calls the North “the world’s largest contingent liability” — estimates a price tag of about $600 billion in the first 10 years after a collapse.
But it’s not only a question of money. A regime collapse in Pyongyang could touch off civil war in the North or lead to armed intervention by China. If North Korean hard-liners lash out in a last-gasp effort to survive, it could spark conflict between the North and the allied forces of the US and South Korea. Even without war, it won’t be easy for the South to absorb 22.5 million people from one of the world’s most regimented, totalitarian societies, experts say.
“If people want to talk about regime change, they need to think about what will come after,” says Chae Su Chan, a member of the National Assembly and a former economics professor at Rice University in Houston. “That’s why there’s a difference between those sitting in Washington and those of us sitting on the edge in South Korea.”
The engagement policy has widespread support across the political spectrum in the South. A 2004 poll conducted for the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations found that 81% of South Koreans wanted to stick with the current level of engagement or increase it. Only 19% supported a harder line toward the North. The pollsters surveyed 1,000 South Korean adults. The poll had a margin of error of 3%.
South Koreans view the North as less of a threat now that contacts between the two countries have increased. More than 900,000 Southerners have traveled to a tourist area on North Korea’s east coast since late 1998. “North Koreans look so poor. It’s like South Korea in the 1960s,” says 56-year-old Paek Jae Hyun, the chief executive of a chemical company in the South, returning from a recent visit. “We have to help them a lot.”
But the Northerners are also seen as alien. In 2003, a group of visiting North Korean cheerleaders caused a stir when they leapt from their bus to rescue pictures of Kim Jong Il getting soaked in the rain. They were teary eyed that images of the country’s “great leader” should be subjected to such treatment. North Koreans are taught to revere likenesses of Mr. Kim and his father, and can be punished for disrespecting their pictures. The cheerleaders’ devotion appeared so outlandish that it prompted one weekly magazine in Seoul to ask on its cover: “Are we really one people?”
Park Dae Hee has been traveling back and forth to the North several times a month, delivering supplies and supervising construction of a shoe factory at the industrial park being built on the outskirts of the North Korean city of Kaesong. Leaning out his truck window in the snow, Mr. Park says that at first he was scared to go. Now he sees the northerners more as rather prickly little brothers.
“They’re proud. They don’t want to feel inferior,” says Mr. Park. “But it takes three North Koreans to do the work of one South Korean. They’re not very efficient.” That is one reason, Mr Park says, that he doesn’t think North and South Korea should be rejoined any time soon. “Unification would be very hard. There’s such a huge economic gap between the two countries and big differences in political views.”
The project Mr. Park is working on is South Korea’s most ambitious effort to gradually narrow those disparities. The industrial park is being developed by the South’s government-owned Korea Land Corp. and the private Hyundai Asan Corp. Construction began in earnest last year. Two factories are already operating, one of which makes cookware that is on sale in Seoul department stores. An additional 13 are soon to come on line in the pilot phase of the project.
Hyundai Asan originally acquired the land-use rights from North Korea in 2002. It sold some of the rights to Korea Land, which plans to sell more factory plots by June. The first phase of the development is expected to include 300 factories and employ 75,000 North Koreans. Later stages will add many more plants, a golf course and apartments. About 1,800 South Korean companies have applied for spots.
During the project’s first nine years, it will inject $9.6 billion into the North’s economy, estimates Hong Soon Jick, an economist at the Hyundai Research Institute in Seoul. Coupled with international trade and aid, that could significantly ease the economic pressure on Kim Jong Il’s regime. Mr. Noland of the Institute for International Economics figures that $1 billion to $2 billion a year is enough to keep the North on “survival rations.”
The park also has invigorated a vocal business lobby pushing for reconciliation as well. Hyundai Asan says it is determined to see its investments in the project pay off. And small- and medium-size companies aer eager to build factories there to get acess to cheap North Korean labor to keep them competitive with rivals in China.
North Korea complains the South isn’t moving fast enough on the project. But at the same time, Pyongyang is still fighting Seoul’s influence. North Korean cadres hold nightly meetings with workers at the site, apparently to reinforce ideological teachings, according to a unification ministry official. The unification ministry is the South Korean government agency charged with managing the country’s relations with the North.
South Korean officials say the project shows the strategic benefits of economic cooperation. Construction has forced the relocation of some North Korean military forces away from the border. The project also sits astride one of the main invasion routes troops would have to traverse to get to South Korea, a point Unification Minister Chung Dong Young made to Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld during a meeting last August, people familiar with the meeting say.
In the eyes of South Korean policy makers, this is just the beginning. They see engagement as a way of opening the North to the outside world and encouraging it to follow the same reform path as China and Vietnam. This, Seoul hopes, will also lead, eventually, to a political transformation.
Critics of the South Korean approach, however, argue that a single-minded focus on engagement blinds the government to the potential benefits of an abrupt end to the dictatorship in Pyongyang. Some experts argue that the costs of a collapse wouldn’t be as high as South Korea fears. Private companies would shoulder much of the investment burden, and other countries and international lenders would also pitch in, they say.
The critics also say South Korea isn’t doing enough to prepare itself in case Kim Jong Il’s regime does fall. Their concern: The very openness and economic change that South Korea is trying to foster could weaken Mr. Kim’s grip on power. South Korean officials say they see no signs of significant instability in the North, but they continue to update plans to cope with a sudden collapse.
Responding to recent reports of these contingency plans, the North Korean official press blasted Seoul last week, saying that the South has been waiting for an opportunity to take advantage of the North “with daggers hidden in their belts.” The commentary in the party newspaper concluded: “To expect a ’sudden change’ in the north is as foolish an act as trying to beat the air.”
End of article
36 Comments
Welcome to ??????!
Will North Korea be able to ‘pay their bills?’
http://english.donga.com/srv/s.....5031563628
Disgusting…
If they are so concerned about the cost of unification on the economy and cultural differences/differences in thinking now, won’t more time just make the differences more immense and harder to overcome later? I seriously wonder if they ever want to unify. Which is fine- it is their country but lets stop the unification charade.
Wouldn’t Roh and others just cr*p their pants if Kim Jung Il called their bluff and actually asked for unification under a democratic market economy.
amd after they crap, they’ll get down to business.
the longer the wait, the more time to lay the foundation.
don’t think for a moment that the koreans of the southern part of the korean peninsula will not do what is expected of them when the time comes.
noolji has described most of the motives of the sk government in previous posts, so your reading of the article means you are reading it twice.
I’ve been writing this same stuff for so long, I’m sick of myself. I just wish some people in the government circles would come out and admit the truth.
It is good to see all it it layed out well in an influencial newspaper, but I’d like to hear some of it from people like Rep Hyde. Pointing to the defense white paper is a missed opportunity. Point to things like this author did.
The difference in SK thinking about the speed and need for unification changed very rapidly (virtually overnight) in 1998 when the Korean Won collapsed. I was surprised at how rapid the message changed among my all adult classes I was teaching at the time.
And SK’s policy is the typical short term, short sighted approach governments tend to take. It doesn’t matter to them that they can’t build NK back into a stable nation. It doesn’t matter that they will have to keep applying this approach decade after decade to keep the North afloat. It doesn’t matter that it is a non-solution answer to a problem. All that matters is it seems to put collapse off until tomorrow.
I would recommend SK try to get Japan and the US and China to sit down and make concrete promises on mega reconstruction aid if NK collapses. Let SK make that their price for moving toward the US position of tougher sanctions to get the nuke crisis and other issues settled.
SK’s best bet is to seek committments by the Int. community if collapse occurs, not proping up a hopeless regime.
If SK fails in its current approach…..if NK collapses despite the South’s efforts to be the North’s champion in the int. community, it could very well lower the amount of important flows of aid after collapse.
(I would list the Iraq no-fly zones as a perfect example of a non-answer to a problem by the US.)
In the meantime, as many as 200,000 people are suffering in North Korean gulags, which does not seem to figure into South Korea’s economic calculations. North Koreans suffer while South Korean companies get cheap labor.
Well, very good article, a nice summary of the well-founded worries. The problem is that unification might happen anyway, and the SK money infusions will probably bring it nearer by bringing more information about South Korean prosperity. The only thing I would disagree with USinkorea is that, from my memory, the change in thinking happenned well before 1998 - at least, among those who are somehow interested in the NK issues (I’d say, 1994). But the final question nobody really can answer now: is it a good idea to postpone the unavoidable? Is it going to help or hurt? No idea.
Anybody think that Kim Jong Il will close up the border after all the factories have been built, say that it wasn’t working, there was espionage, or some other damn thing, keep some of the South Korean people there to help run the factories (NK likes to kidnap, because they know SK won’t even complain about it), and give the big ‘ol finger to this side of the border?
Isn’t that what’s he’s done so far with all the aid that’s been dumped in his lap? Take it all, prop up his regime hand out some goodies to the boys and step on the necks of those grovelling for a scrap of anything? Why would this be different? Because it’s too big? I thought the 1994 deal was pretty big, but he found ways around that. The half a BILLION dollars Kim DJ gave him for a couple of hours of face-to-face was pretty big, but that hasn’t acheived much of anything other than a very expensive Nobel prize for DJ. What about the hundreds of thousands of tons of food he gets every year. “Thanks, and by the way, we have nuclear bombs.”
Maybe it’s not unique to Korea, but I’ve yet to see a people cry so long and so fervently about brotherhood and family, about protecting their people from outside influences, and then turn around and screw these selfsame “brothers” just to make a buck. And it’s not the speed at which they do it that’s so surprising, it’s the eagerness they do it with.
$600 billion in the first 10 years- Marcus Noland-Wow that is a hefty price tag, but I looked at how he figured it out and he seems to be a little simplistic in his formula. I would not be surprised if it was double that.
This brings me to a gem of a question. How will SK pay for all this? Have they been saving their little Sunshin Yi 100 won coins for the great unification. Nope. They will do what they plan to do all along. Korea will have the island stealing Japanese and the Korea dividing Yankees loan and give them the money.
Hopefully, at that time, Japan will suggest Korea return Takeshima island. Naturally, this will lead to another 50 years of weeping about how unfair the Japanese and Yankees were. How they should not have to pay back the money because of what _____________ did, or because ________ happened.
On the positive side, they will be united and as many of you already know all the plotting of the Americans will have failed and a united Korea will be strong. In fact, I have heard that it will easily be one of the strongest nations in the world. If you don’t believe me then please consider exhibit #1 Yomasan. Also, what about, exhibit #2 “the lion king” - that guy sure can swing. Seong Yup Lee is the Asian home run king after all. I could go on but, why bother, we know the score.
USFK allows Rok to spend less money on defense. That extra room in the ROK budget allows ROK to give more aid to NK.
Malpaso. Yes I think it is very likely after all the factories are built and after a period of training, the North will simply take over all the factories and say thank you very much South Korea. What would the South do? Nothing. I would not want to be an investor in the project.
I’m all for war to end the North Korean problem, but let’s not forget that very few Koreans are and it is, of course, their country. usinkorea seems to overlook the fact that if it became known that South Korea were plotting the end-game in North Korea with concrete reconstruction aid commitments from regional partners (and it would become known, since there are no secrets here), North Korea’s “leadership” very well could deem that to be an act of war and give the order to commence the destruction of Seoul. They may think it’s safe to go ahead with that: With U.S. troops off the frontline, and possibly by that time out of Seoul altogether, it’s not necessarily certain that American defense of Korea would be automatic (or even welcomed, given the Roh clique’s propensities).
“But,” you say, “Surely the North Korean army commanders would refuse such a potentially foolish and suicidal order. Wouldn’t they?”
After the turd-licking incident in the ROK Army, one has to question such logic.
Yes it’s disgusting to see S.Korea propping up N.Korea, I agree. But I want to ask, what is Bush administration’s plan if S.Korea goes along Washington’s plan to make N.Korea collapse? What is the US plan when 2million refugees flood S.Korea? OF course someone will ask why should the US bail out S.Korea again. Well, if S.Korea goes along with the US plan of sanctions, isn’t it reasonable to expect the US involvement after the collapse? You possibly can’t force a collapse then sit back and watch. I do not agree with S.Korea’s policies but I also understand why they’re doing what they’re doing. Any immediate effects of a sudden collapse of the North or a war with the North makes the stakes much higher for the Koreans. Plus the fact that there is no plan by the Bush administration (just like no plans for the Iraqi war aftermath) for the reconstruction of N.Korea, makes S.Korea skeptical of going along with what the US want.
As for this comment:
” This brings me to a gem of a question. How will SK pay for all this? Have they been saving their little Sunshin Yi 100 won coins for the great unification.”
Actually, they have been - to the tune of $200+ billion and counting foreign reserves - world’s 4th highest. In the event of a collapse of North, some of that money will need to be cashed in. If I was S.Korea, I would continue to purchase more US dollars. They’ll need it soon.
I’m looking forward to the collapse, I can’t wait for some humble North Korean chicks hanging about who might actually think my crappy apartment is “cool”
isn’t china also ‘propping up’ north korea? if the south were to stop investing altogether, wouldn’t the chinese money still be enough for the regime there to keep going and going?
and with their ‘food aid,’ aren’t the usa and japan also ‘propping up’ north korea as well?
if south korean money were the only thing keeping kim jong-il around, then i’d be a lot more upset about this. but it seems they’d be around even without it.
fifty years of staring each other down hasn’t helped matters. maybe, just maybe, investing in the other side will pyongyang choose bills (as in money) over bullets, reducing tension and perhaps even reducing a bit of the ideological chasm that exists between northerners and southerners. at the very least, it might ease things a little when/if reunification does occur.
this is the german model, and while it doesn’t fit exactly in the korean situation, it’s a lot better than nothing. because that’s what else there is.
it sure beats letting the whole freakin’ thing collapse and hope we don’t get cut up by flying shards of glass.
Malpaso: “I??ve yet to see a people cry so long and so fervently about brotherhood and family, about protecting their people from outside influences, and then turn around and screw these selfsame ?橫brothers?? just to make a buck.”
Long time foreign investors/business people in Korea have a saying: They treat us badly, but they treat one another worse.
“this is the german model, and while it doesn??t fit exactly in the korean situation, it??s a lot better than nothing. because that??s what else there is”
East Germany did collapse noraPark. Yes the USA gives food aid. That is what good nations do. South Korea does lend food aid. A subtle difference, but hey.. goreans are all one blood.. one family.
So is the US “propping up” NK. maybe. Are you suggesting that the USA stop feeding your family? I can picture the protests now. What is really shocking is that the South feels so little responcabilty. NK starve, go to gulags, sell their kids to chinese pimps, and the south gorean reaction is usually. Yawn. However, those that do give a shit, say “what will america do about it?”
Somthing to think about Norapark. THe east germans fled to the west at a tune of about 20,000 a year for decades. And yes they too were being shot and jailed for attempting to flee. Not so in the Goreas. My point is that most of your bros in the north dont really want to come over. Unification sure will be grand.
Another interesting article, from the NY Times, is worth mentioning, since it just came out:
http://nytimes.com/2005/03/15/.....north.html
Entitled: “How Electronics Are Penetrating North Korea’s Isolation”
Norapark, I really don’t think giving North Korea’s Kim Jong Il whatever he asks for is the way to buying peace. It’s naivity if not at worst, negligence towards millions who are under oppression. Having said that, I think it’s useless responding to “Dude”. Yeah, most of what he says about the role S.Korea plays propping up the North, I agree with. But something about his diatrabes full of hatred turns me off completely. As if he really cares about those “NK’s who starve, go to gulags, sell their kids to chinese pimps” (wink). I’d say it’s more of a tool of convenience and opportunity for him to bash the “goreans”, as he puts it. It’s useless responding to him until he settles down.
I sum it all up to Ego. KJI just wants to keep a death grip on his leadership. In fact when KIS died it was suppose to go to the next in line but through some hard lining he was able to guarantee his son succession. Well it won??t be so lucky with KJI, granted he was a bit of a nutter in the past, Rangoon and KAL flight 858. Right now he is planning both sides of the coin in order to insure that A. he isn??t invaded and B. no one gets the impression that he is going to give up his leadership in a gallant sacrifice for reunification.
Now I am of the opinion that through their years of successful propaganda and indoctrination that they have secured a powerful regime for years to come. I see no collapse on the horizon, but I would think that the limited economic zones will be quite helpful for the nutter to continue. And it is not KJI that is the one to worry about, but the seemingly right hand of the leader that flies of the handle and sends mixed messages and warnings of doom, while the left hand graciously accepts what is being given. But that could also be the whole idea.
This brings me to a question. Who is being groomed to gain succession or is his ego so great he doesn’t want to run the risk of being assassination out of greed? Also what is happening with the light water nuclear reactors?
kimbob,
no real disagreement about ‘dude.’ as for giving kim jong-il whatever he asks, i don’t think that’s what the south is doing.
anyway, for those who think that south koreans are doing nothing, here’s a link to a story of seoul easing humanitarian aid: http://au.news.yahoo.com/050314/3/thft.html
You know, if South Korea could secure ANY concessions from the North in exchange for all this money they’re giving them, America would be more open to the Sunshine Policy. Why doesn’t South Korea ask for North Korea to remove just SOME of the artillery they aim at Seoul, free a HANDFUL of political prisoners, get North Korea to stop demonizing South Korea in their media, or even improve conditions SLIGHTLY in their awful Washington-DC-sized prison camps. How come South Korea can’t get even these tiny things from the North, after all the things the South does for the North?
The driving force of the German unification process were the East Germans. My fellow Westerners were rather passive or even sceptical. Maybe not comparable to the Korean situation.
While most people continue their enragement over SK’s “support” of the KJI regime, I’m wondering why no one really addresses this sentence in the article:
The very openness and economic change that South Korea is trying to foster could weaken Mr. Kim??s grip on power.
So norapark, are you telling me that those 300,00o goreans in china are somehow kept from joining their brothers in the south. I think u r on crack. you really are a silly girl. 300,000 are kept out. Hmm.. i suspect you will make a new comment to clairify that crap.
Nope nope.. even though you ask all your gyopo friend it wont change the truth. Those goreans only go to south gorea for economic reasons. (yes there are execptions, but not the rule).
Norapark, there is no doubt that you are American and all your relatives are American. America will gladly take you and all of your relatives. America will accept hatred. Many people are free to hate usa. Contrast that with when anybody says one bad word about Gorea. THe answer is “get the fuck out”. I am a child of an immigrant. I love Gorea and i just want Gorea to be the best Norapark.
Kimbob, perhaps I am abrasive. for that I am sorry. I use “gorea” because of the new korean govement rules for tranlating hangul to romanized characters. Kwangju=Gwangju. Korea=Gorea.
I am not supreised that you are offended by that becaue perhaps you think that I am a foreigner that has no place to make any comments about Gorea.
I read what you have to say and like I said b4 we have much to agree on. It is a dissapointment that you and norepark fill in what I say with what you wish i would say.
please keep writing, dude.
I would agree that South Korean policy regarding North Korea should improve, particularly with respect to speaking out on humanitarian issues.
But at the same time, I have a certain amount of sympathy for it, too. Trying to stave off collapse may not work, and the North Korean regime is threatening and odious, but it is an odious threat that South Koreans have been living with for a long time.
If (When?) it does collapse, there could very well be 1,000,000 very hungry, mean, and angry North Koreans living in Seoul.
The first week will be, “I love you. You are my brother.” And the world will be touched by the heartfelt sentiments of two peoples artificially separated brought back together.
Two weeks later, when dirty, unfed people are camped out living in cardboard shacks in parking lots in Kangnam, it will be a different story.
“Dirty scoundrel, get a job or go home.”
“Rich capitalist, give me 10,000 won or I will kill you.”
I live in Seoul. I really like it here. I wish the Koreans all the luck in the world.
But they don’t really have any good choices.
Dude,
I do not know if someone has already told you this, but, as you mentioned, the new romanization system is used to romanize “hangul,” not English. Therefore, though your “Gwangju” example is correct, your “Gorea” example is not. “Korea” is an English translation for “Dae Han Min Kuk” or “Hankuk” and needs no romanization.
To answer’s wooj’s inquiry about “The very openness and economic change that South Korea is trying to foster could weaken Mr. Kim??s grip on power. ”
Obviously, Kim Jong Il knows this fact better than anyone, and it’s why he will continue to accept the South Korean (and Chinese and Japanese) handouts while refusing to implement any real changes or open his country enough to endanger his power.
The challenge for KJI and the North Koreans is to give the appearance of change and step-by-step opening in order to stoke the hopes of their blind brothers in the South, while in reality keeping the country isolated enough to keep its death grip on power.
South Korea is the mouse who gets a jolt of electricity 9 times out of 10 while trying to reach a bread crumb. That one time it gets the bread though, puts enough faith into the rodent to keep on trying and getting the shit shocked out of it.
North Korea knows that they’re dealing with sympathetic “brothers,” and that even the smallest, irrelevant gestures on their part will be seen as giant steps by the blind mice to the South so eager to love their wayward family, regardless of the reality that the rest of the world can see.
Somebody slap me - Bluejeans, I agreed with everything you said - I think this is one of the first times. Great to see you are still here on the blog…..(obviously I have been away).
Dude, the “Gorean” part has to go (unless you are doing it just for style - points) - this is the left over from the earlier debates on the new Romanization
Brendon,
There is no way at all USFK and the US would not be engaged in a fight even if it is off the DMZ and below the Han. That is a canard sometimes spoken by South Koreans against the changes and for limited purposes by people like Rep. Hyde. North Korea can hit US forces anywhere in the country in any general attack. And it is inconceivable that having USFK in Korea, the USFK assests would sit back and do nothing as missiles rained on Seoul. It just isn’t realistic.
And perhaps North Korea would get pissed off to hear South Korea was making plans with nations to deal with its collapse, but I believe the chance they will decide to hasten a collapse through war is tiny.
A plan for how to handle reconstruction IF collapse occurs is not a plan on how to hasten such a collapse. With North Korea as weak as it is, not having plans for what to do if it collapses is more dangerous than fearing a war if they do it.
that’s right: nora’s a crack baby.
300,000 koreans hiding out in china because the prc has a deal with the dprk that they will repatriate any dprk citizens they find.
are they economic refugees or are they political refugees? i think the argument is a bit legalistic and glosses over the fact that these are people whose lives, not just livelihoods, are dramatically affected.
sure, many or most of them are in china to search for more money to get more food or more stuff to care for their families. that might make them economic refugees.
but why do they need to do this? because the pyongyang regime has created a political system where staying in north korea may mean perishing, either through starvation or through oppression. that makes them political refugees.
it’s a murky matter, of course, but i believe if there were far less oppression in north korea, there would be far, far, far fewer north koreans in china.
but these are just the rantings of a crack babe.
When the collapse of North Korea happens, South Korea is SCREWED. South Koreans are going to have to support 20,000,000 starving relatives with none of the skills necessary to survive in the modern/real world. Not gonna be cheap.
Get an educated Korean with a job in “corporate Korea” to talk honestly about re-unification (tough to do - soju helps) and most of them are real frickin scared. They’d rather keep giving relatively small amounts of money to North Korean in the desperate hope that one day they’ll adopt Chinese style reforms. Otherwise, hello a doubling of the income tax rate and millions of vagrant (violent?) homeless N. Koreans wandering Seoul. Koreans pay lip service to supporting their Northern brothers cause it ain’t polite to say what they really think. They ‘d rather prop up KIJ and let North Koreans starve in the North rather than have to deal with the consequences of N. Koreans coming south after re-unification. It’s a pretty shameful attitude but I can’t say I blame them. How far out of their way would most people go to financially and otherwise support even a close relative that was in individual-Western terms as screwed up as most North Koreans (homeless, no education, brainwashed by some crazy cult)?
Course Koreans will almost never admit this in mixed company so they continue to spout BS about hanminjok in public.
I don’t know Roh’s administration has thought of it in this way, but it kind of makes sense for South Korea to keep North Korea going as a buffer state between China and itself, assuming it can prevent itself from being swallowed up by North Korea via nuclear threats. This way, it doesn’t have to worry about the additional security expense of having to secure a larger territory and a land border with China, as well as the direct reconstruction expenses involved in rebuilding North Korea. Of course, this strategy depends on Uncle Sam sticking around with his nuclear umbrella to stop Kim Jong Il from getting any ideas about wielding his nuclear stick.
The problem for Roh is that Uncle Sam may well depart the peninsula because of the badwill that is accumulating over South Korea’s rabid anti-Americanism. This is why Roh has despatched South Korean troops to a playpen in Iraqi Kurdistan - to avoid an open breach with Uncle Sam. I don’t think that open breach will come to a head, yet, unless China invades Taiwan and Roh denies the US the use of USFK facilities for resupply operations. Then it will all hit the fan.