[FOUNTAIN]Animal Farm is just across the DMZ

Under the dark cloud of a 3-kilometer radius was North Korea’s Yanggang Province. Even the satellite could not capture the ground under the shadow. But not just the geography of Yanggang Province was in shadow.
North Korea is an opaque republic under a system of concealment. It is not much different from George Orwell’s “Animal Farm,” an allegory of the Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin. We can find the origin and structure of the concealment from the cautionary tale.
Pigs, horses, sheep and chickens overthrew the farm owner and created an animal world of liberty and liberation, free from the exploitation of the human. The pigs, the ruling class, started as a good authority, and animals did not doubt their good intension at first.
Problems rose when the pig insiders began arguments over how to improve the productivity of the farm. The frequent collisions over policy developed into a contest for leadership. A pig that dominated the means of violence defeated a pig with a propaganda maneuver and ousted him.
The methods for No. 1 to maintain power were brainwashing and fear. Those who were skeptical about it were met with fear as the authority unleashed fierce dogs.
At the times of natural disasters or accidents, the authority shamelessly lied that humans and the traitor pig were responsible. The antagonism brought the minds of animals together. The animals were given only one kind of liberty, to believe that harsh labor and the present were happiness.
Concealing the truth was an inevitable choice for the No. 1. When he had to protect himself from threat, he retreated to the house of the former farm owner. The strongman enjoyed the liquor and the bed of the human and even made deals with humans under the table. The animal farm became a dark, dreary society of concealment. Lies and violence produced power of concealment, and power produced the system of concealment.
When President Kim Dae-jung visited Pyeongyang four years ago, North Korea’s National Defense Commission chairman Kim Jong-il jokingly said that the South Korean president brought him out of his seclusion. However. Chairman Kim still remains a hermit. The concealment of the North Korean system originates from his seclusion.

by Chun Young-gi

The writer is a deputy political news editor of the JoongAng Ilbo.