Seeking Pyongyang’s train of thought
Published: 04 Feb. 2010, 21:16
A competition between military leaders to show the most loyalty toward North Korean leader Kim Jong-il may have been behind the North’s firing artillery shells near the inter-Korean maritime border in the Yellow Sea last week.
But that may not have been the only motive. Kim Jong-il reportedly gave the go-ahead for the North’s military to fire shells and it’s possible the move was meant as a saber-rattling display intended to gain leverage with the United States. “It is highly likely that the reclusive nation’s excessive devotion to its leader led to the shooting,” a high-ranking South Korean defense official in a position of receiving intelligence about North Korea said yesterday on condition of anonymity. “But I also believe that Pyongyang is taking advantage of these military provocations to both strengthen the solidarity of its military and gain the upper hand in future negotiations with the United States.”
The official also noted that Kim does not seem to be working at top capacity, and that gives the military a chance to demonstrate its own power. “The North’s military gets louder when Kim can’t keep up with his duties,” he said. “The North’s leader has been relying heavily on the military under the military-first policy. Once he offered full support to the military, he could not ignore its needs.”
Another defense official who asked not to be named attributed the action to a fierce power struggle between hard-liners and those in the North’s military leadership who believe more inter-Korean talks are necessary.
“Since last year, Kim has listened closely to what the military wanted. But when officials in favor of inter-Korean talks made themselves heard, Kim concentrated on them,” the official said. “From the outside, it may look as though the leader seems to be mediating the conflicting ideas and requirements of the leadership,” but the situation is complicated and there still is no consensus among the military leadership, he said.
South Korea’s Defense Ministry is pointing at Gen. Ri Yong-ho, chief of the North’s Korean People’s Army General Staff, as the man at the center of the recent military provocations. Baek Seung-joo, head of the Center for Security and Strategy at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses in Seoul, said, “Ri is obsessed with field artillery because he has been on the fast track in his career since he was highly praised for modernizing field artillery.”
By Kim Min-seok, Lee Min-yong [[email protected]]
But that may not have been the only motive. Kim Jong-il reportedly gave the go-ahead for the North’s military to fire shells and it’s possible the move was meant as a saber-rattling display intended to gain leverage with the United States. “It is highly likely that the reclusive nation’s excessive devotion to its leader led to the shooting,” a high-ranking South Korean defense official in a position of receiving intelligence about North Korea said yesterday on condition of anonymity. “But I also believe that Pyongyang is taking advantage of these military provocations to both strengthen the solidarity of its military and gain the upper hand in future negotiations with the United States.”
The official also noted that Kim does not seem to be working at top capacity, and that gives the military a chance to demonstrate its own power. “The North’s military gets louder when Kim can’t keep up with his duties,” he said. “The North’s leader has been relying heavily on the military under the military-first policy. Once he offered full support to the military, he could not ignore its needs.”
Another defense official who asked not to be named attributed the action to a fierce power struggle between hard-liners and those in the North’s military leadership who believe more inter-Korean talks are necessary.
“Since last year, Kim has listened closely to what the military wanted. But when officials in favor of inter-Korean talks made themselves heard, Kim concentrated on them,” the official said. “From the outside, it may look as though the leader seems to be mediating the conflicting ideas and requirements of the leadership,” but the situation is complicated and there still is no consensus among the military leadership, he said.
South Korea’s Defense Ministry is pointing at Gen. Ri Yong-ho, chief of the North’s Korean People’s Army General Staff, as the man at the center of the recent military provocations. Baek Seung-joo, head of the Center for Security and Strategy at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses in Seoul, said, “Ri is obsessed with field artillery because he has been on the fast track in his career since he was highly praised for modernizing field artillery.”
By Kim Min-seok, Lee Min-yong [[email protected]]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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