How will the North provoke the South this time?

Chang Se-jeong
The author is an editorial writer for the JoongAng Ilbo.

“Prepare a plan to cause big repercussions in South Korea in early 2024,” North Korean leader Kim Jong-un reportedly told his aides. In response, President Yoon Suk-yeol told his staff to “retaliate first and report me later if the North stages a provocation.”

According to the National Intelligence Service (NIS), the North Korean leader instructed his aides to carry out a series of provocations, ahead of the South’s April 10 parliamentary elections, after launching an intercontinental ballistic missile last month. His remarks are apparently intended to pressure the Yoon administration, which repeatedly stressed “peace through strength” and “a stern response to the North’s nuclear and missile provocations.”

Kim’s aggressive ambitions and Yoon’s strong determination to punish the North are on a collision course. Rep. Yun Jae-ok, floor leader of the governing People Power Party (PPP), urged the opposition Democratic Party (DP) not to send the wrong signal to the North with frivolous words and actions, since it has blatantly expressed its intention to intervene in the South’s general election.

North Korea’s provocation is nothing new. But if the top spy agency’s information is true, why did Kim target the beginning of 2024 for provocation. Obviously, it is linked to the need to maximize his gains by creating a stir ahead of the April elections in the South and November’s U.S. presidential election.

“Before the 80th anniversary of the founding of the Workers’ Party in October 2025 and the Ninth Congress expected in January 2026, North Korea will likely engage in the brinkmanship of military provocations in 2024 and 2025 similar to those of 2017,” said Han Ki-beom, chair research fellow at the North Korea Research Institute, who once served as the first deputy director of the NIS. He also said the North will likely focus its provocations between March and August when South-U.S. joint military exercises take place — and in autumn will send signals that could help Donald Trump win the presidency in the United States.

In fact, Kim vowed to soon launch three more reconnaissance satellites at the full meeting of the Workers’ Party Central Committee, which ended on Dec. 31. “We need to swiftly respond to a possible nuclear crisis and mobilize all physical means, including nuclear force, to accelerate preparations for the great event of putting the entire territory of South Korea under our control,” he said.

North Korea carried out a series of provocations ahead of the South’s parliamentary election in 2016, including the fourth nuclear test, drone infiltration, the launch of a Taepodong missile and jamming the GPS of Incheon International Airport with electromagnetic waves. Ahead of the parliamentary election in April 2020, North Korea launched four short-range ballistic missiles in March.

The North has already appointed the “Three Provocateurs” — who masterminded the sinking of the Cheonan warship, the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island and the planting of wooden box landmines on the border — to top posts. Kim Yong-chol returned to the United Front Department, while Ri Yong-gil was named the chief of the military’s general staff and Pak Jong-chon the director of the military committee of the Workers’ Party.

What kind of provocation is the North planning this year?

Will it be similar to the Cheonan sinking in 2010? Will it be akin to the planting of the landmines in the demilitarized zone? Or will it be a covert cyberattack? North Korea may conduct its seventh nuclear test or come up with an extraordinary idea, according to military analysts.

Two retired four-star generals shared their insights about what the North may do this year. Lee Hong-ki, former commander of the Third Army, predicted that the North will continue to take actions to affect the South, the United States and Japan while advancing its nuclear capabilities. He sees the launching of additional satellites as a definite possibility and believes it has other provocation plans including the development of a nuclear submarine and a seventh nuclear test.

Lee said, “We must urgently restore the readiness to respond quickly to the North’s provocations, because the field training exercises designed to respond to each type of provocation shrank remarkably during the Moon Jae-in administration.”

Park Jung-yi, former commander of the First Army, who headed the joint investigation into the Cheonan sinking, said there is a high possibility of cyberattacks by the numerous units created under the rule of the late Kim Jong-il. “They can attack transportation networks such as the subway and KTX as well as power grids, nuclear power systems and financial and communication networks,” he said. “We need to quickly enact a law to effectively respond to such possibilities and allow the Cyber Command to control both the civilian and government sectors, just like in the U.S.”

There is a high possibility that inter-Korean relations and the situation on the Korean Peninsula will be unstable in the new year, just like the uncertainties of the South’s April general election and the U.S. presidential election. But the North will not dare to stage a provocation if the political parties in the South unite for the sake of national security. Most of all, the North’s malicious intentions and attacks to interfere in elections — the very foundation of democracy — must be defeated.