Informal Institute for National Security Thinkers and Practitioners

(Note: I will be traveling to Warsaw, Poland and Clark Air Base in the Philippines over the next 10 days so my emails will be at different times. I will be spending a bit of time in the air so I may not have the connectivity to provide my daily news distro but I will catch up.)

Quotes of the Day:

"The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie — deliberate, contrived, and dishonest — but the myth — persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Too often, we hold fast to the cliches of our forebears. We subject all facts to a prefabricated set of interpretations. We enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought."

- John F. Kennedy

"Life is occupied in both perpetuating itself and in surpassing itself; if all it does is maintain itself, then living is only not dying."

- Simone de Beauvoir

"All wars are fought twice, the first time on the battlefield, the second time in memory."

~Viet Thanh Nguyen

1. North Korea’s U.N. Protectors

2. Blame North Korea and China if South Korea Builds Nuclear Weapons

3. Xi says he attaches great importance to China-N. Korea ties in letter to Kim: KCNA

4. USFK to host regional U.S. Space Force command amid rising N. Korean ICBM threats

5. South Korea contemplates joining the Quad

6. North Korea’s Kim Yo Jong Slams Sanctions Measures

7. Rude threat (Kim Yo Jong - North Korea)

8. Would North Korea accept a female successor?

9. Miracle On The Han River: How South Korea Turned From A Backward Country Into An Economic Giant Of Asia

10. South Korea clings to North’s denuclearization, despite dwindling chances

11. Review | ‘Devotion’: Korean War aviator drama is slow to take off

12. Speeding tanks, booming howitzers, shaking bones: This is how South Korea sells weapons

13. South Korea in demographic crisis as many stop having babies

1. North Korea’s U.N. Protectors

Yes we all know this. But we must continue to expose China and Russia's complicity.

North Korea’s U.N. Protectors

China and Russia are enabling Kim Jong Un’s nuclear provocations.

By The Editorial BoardFollow

Nov. 25, 2022 6:31 pm ET

https://www.wsj.com/articles/north-koreas-u-n-protectors-united-nations-security-council-russia-china-missile-japan-kim-jong-un-xi-jinping-11669415467?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1

The United Nations Security Council isn’t good for much these days, and its latest failure proves the point. On Tuesday China and Russia blocked formal Security Council action in response to North Korea’s recent test of an intercontinental ballistic missile that landed about 125 miles off the coast of Japan.

As recently as the Bush and Obama Administrations, the U.N. regularly sanctioned North Korea for its provocations. Between 2006 and 2017, the Security Council adopted nine major sanctions resolutions related to North Korea’s nuclear testing, according to the Arms Control Association. Now China and Russia are blocking even rhetorical censure.

After last week’s missile test, China’s U.N. Ambassador Zhang Jun said the Security Council “should play a constructive role on this issue and should not always condemn or exert pressure” on North Korea. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, taunted the U.S. that “the more hell-bent it gets” challenging North Korea, the more likely it “will face a more fatal security crisis.”

This comes only days after President Biden’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Bali meant to ease tensions between the U.S. and China. Mr. Biden pressed Mr. Xi to dissuade North Korea from nuclear or missile tests and said he was hopeful. Apparently not.

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In her statement to the Security Council, supported by 13 other nations including Britain, Australia, France, Japan and South Korea, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Linda Thomas-Greenfield noted that North Korea has violated Security Council resolutions 63 times this year and “shown an utter disregard for the safety and security of the region, and a complete lack of respect to this Council.”

No wonder, Ms. Thomas-Greenfield said, since last week was the “10th time we have met without significant actions.” Despite the escalation of missile launches and the looming possibility of another nuclear test, “[t]wo veto-wielding members of the Council are enabling and emboldening” North Korea. She means China and Russia, which are also protecting each other at the U.N. In October, China abstained in a vote on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Their protection has emboldened Mr. Kim. North Korea wants to show off long-range missiles it says could hit the U.S. in hopes of spooking U.S. allies like South Korea and Japan about the steadfastness of the U.S. defense commitment. The missile tests are also poking at international resolve before the North does an expected nuclear test.

The United Nations is proving to be useless as a defender of world order, and these days it can’t even condemn a rogue regime brandishing nuclear weapons and threatening its neighbors. It’s time the U.S. stopped putting faith in the U.N. and focused on working through alliances of the free and willing.

WSJ Opinion: America’s Tactical Nuclear Missile Stand-Down

Blame North Korea and China if South Korea Builds Nuclear Weapons

19fortyfive.com · by Robert Kelly · November 25, 2022

The last year has seen a rising debate about whether South Korea should acquire nuclear weapons. The argument for this step is two-fold: First, North Korea acquired the ability to strike the US homeland in 2017 with a nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). This automatically reduces the credibility of the US security guarantee to South Korea. America’s leadership will inevitably be warier about fighting North Korea now that it can range the continental US with nuclear weapons.

Second, the US and South Korea are starting to drift apart on security perceptions. South Korea wants the US alliance mainly focused on North Korea while it continues to trade warily with China.

The US, however, is increasingly moving toward what the Biden administration has called ‘great power competition’ with China. South Korea is ambivalent about lining up openly against China, if only because it must live next to China and, thus, prefers a less antagonistic relationship.

An small independent nuclear deterrent for South Korea is a helpful way to partially seal this alliance rift. But there is anxiety about how the region – North Korea, China, Japan – will respond.

Will Japan and Others in East Asia Nuclearize in Response to South Korea?

A long-standing argument in the nonproliferation literature is that one country’s nuclearization ignites other countries’ nuclearization in a ‘cascade.’ This is possible and seems to have occurred in a few cases. The USSR probably nuclearized in response to the US; China in response to the USSR; India in response to China; Pakistan in response to India. And South Korea may nuclearize in response to North Korea.

But nuclear weapons have not otherwise spread across the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, or Europe as a cascade model implies. This is because nothing is automatic about a step as momentous as developing nuclear weapons. South Korea, for example, has signaled since 1992, that it wants a denuclearized peninsula. It is only drifting toward nukes, because North Korea has adamantly refused to stop testing and building. Pakistan held off going nuclear until it felt it had no choice due to India nuclearization. The choice to build nuclear weapons usually reflects a deeply-felt security need.

In the Japanese case, South Korean nuclear weapons would not meaningfully change its security position. Indeed, South Korea and Japan do not cooperate well. But both are democracies, well-governed, and US allies. Their relations may be a cold peace, but a hot war between them is extremely unlikely. South Korea will not nuke Japan, nor vice versa. If Japan goes nuclear, it will be because of threats from North Korea and China. Similarly, South Korean nuclear weapons do not threaten Taiwan or Southeast Asia, so there is no reason to expect movement there either.

There is no reason to believe that a limited South Korean nuclear arsenal – very obviously designed around deterring North Korea after thirty years of exhaustion with Pyongyang’s nuclear shenanigans – would include sparking a cascade among Asian democracies.

North Korea is Backing South Korea into a Corner on Nuclear Weapons

More important is how North Korea and China will respond.

They will, of course, criticize it and call it destabilizing, aggressive, part of a wider American hegemonic conspiracy, and so on.

But this is crocodile tears and bad faith. If North Korea and China wanted a denuclearized region, there is much they could have done in recent decades to prevent this looming outcome.

The North Korean and Chinese position – that South Korea should remain non-nuclear – is akin to unilateral disarmament. This is a grossly unrealistic expectation, which Chinese elites particularly – because they are better connected to the rest of the world than the paranoid, secluded Kim regime of North Korea – should know. As North Korean nukes drive a wedge between the US and South Korea, it is only natural that South Korea would consider more radical options to defend. South Korea’s president, for example, suggested preemptive strikes on North Korean missile sites in a crisis. If North Korea and China reject this sort of talk, then North Korea could stop testing and give the region a breather to work toward a solution. Instead, it has done the opposite this year.

China had a choice. As North Korea’s patron since that country’s terrible famine in the late 1990s, China had the leverage to push North Korea to negotiate on nuclear weapons. It could have cracked down on North Korean money in Chinese banks, desperately needed energy imports, or sanctions violations. Beijing chooses not to do that. South Korea signaled its non-nuclear preferences again and again for thirty years. Yet still, China chose not to push North Korea very hard. And North Korea chose to gimmick negotiations for decades to buy time to develop its nukes.

In short, North Korea almost certainly played in bad faith – never intending to denuclearize, just flim-flamming negotiations to buy time to keep pushing forward. And China was never willing to really push North Korea, to really take sides against it to compel it to negotiate seriously.

So now, with South Korean cities extremely vulnerable to North Korean nuclear attacks, is it any wonder the South Koreans are thinking of counter-nuking?

So yes, the immediate decision to nuke up will be Seoul’s, and it will be criticized if it makes this choice. But the real reason, as in so many South Korean defense decisions, is North Korea and its relentless march toward nuclear weapons and missiles. Blame Kim Jong Un and his Chinese enablers.

Expert Biography: Dr. Robert E. Kelly (@Robert_E_Kelly; RoberEdwinKelly.com) is a professor of international relations in the Department of Political Science at Pusan National University and 19FortyFive Contributing Editor.

Want more 19FortyFive military, defense, and national security, as well as politics and economics analysis from the best experts on Earth? Follow us on Google News, Flipboard, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin. Also, sign up for our newsletter here. You can also find our code of publishing ethics and standards here. Want to contact us? Email: [email protected].

19fortyfive.com · by Robert Kelly · November 25, 2022

3. Xi says he attaches great importance to China-N. Korea ties in letter to Kim: KCNA

Yes, closer than lips and teeth.

Who still thinks China will help us denuclearize north Korea?

Xi says he attaches great importance to China-N. Korea ties in letter to Kim: KCNA | Yonhap News Agency

en.yna.co.kr · by 박보람 · November 26, 2022

SEOUL, Nov. 26 (Yonhap) -- Chinese President Xi Jinping has said he attaches great importance to his country's relations with North Korea in a letter recently sent to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, the North's official news agency reported Saturday.

Xi made the remarks in a letter sent on Tuesday in reply to Kim's congratulatory message dispatched last month after the Chinese president secured his third term.

"Through several rounds of meetings, I and my comrade, General Secretary (Kim), established important common understandings and progress in China-North Korea relations ... to drive political resolutions to the (Korean) peninsula issues and safeguard the common interests of the two countries," the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) quoted Xi as saying.

The Chinese president said that the world is facing unprecedented changes, adding he is willing to greatly reinforce bilateral ties with North Korea and make new, active contributions to promote peace and stability in the world under the shifting landscape, according to the KCNA report published in Korean.

Xi said Kim's congratulatory message shows "Comrade, the general secretary, and the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea hold friendship toward me, the Chinese party and the people and attach great importance to the development of the Chinese-North Korea relationship."

pbr@yna.co.kr

(END)

en.yna.co.kr · by 박보람 · November 26, 2022

4.USFK to host regional U.S. Space Force command amid rising N. Korean ICBM threats

USFK to host regional U.S. Space Force command amid rising N. Korean ICBM threats | Yonhap News Agency

en.yna.co.kr · by 박보람 · November 26, 2022

SEOUL, Nov. 26 (Yonhap) -- The U.S. Forces Korea (USFK) will host a component command of the U.S. Space Force (USSF), likely the second regional space command to be established by the United States outside of its mainland, amid growing missile threats from North Korea, sources here said Saturday.

The U.S. Department of Defense plans to open a component command of the Space Force under the wing of the USFK, and the USSF is scheduled to integrate the body into its organizational structure by the end of this year, according to multiple high-level government sources.

The envisioned component command in South Korea is expected to be the second U.S. space command headquarters to be launched outside the U.S. mainland after the first one established under the Indo-Pacific Command based in Hawaii earlier this month.

The launch is expected to enable the USFK to detect and trace aerial vehicles flying into the exosphere at a time when North Korea is believed to possess the capacity to launch nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missiles into the U.S. mainland.

The sources predicted that the new USFK body will be smaller than the space component command in Hawaii, which has about 20 personnel.

Once installed, the new component command will link up with the U.S. Space Force and the U.S. Space Forces Indo-Pacific through the military networking system, known as C4i, to share real-time information concerning North Korea's nuclear and missile activities.

The U.S. is also said to be on course to establish an additional space component command under the Central Command in charge of the Middle East by the end of 2022.

pbr@yna.co.kr

(END)

en.yna.co.kr · by 박보람 · November 26, 2022

5. South Korea contemplates joining the Quad

Will Japan allow an offer to be extended?

Imagine China's response.

South Korea contemplates joining the Quad

donga.com

Posted November. 26, 2022 07:22,

Updated November. 26, 2022 07:22

South Korea contemplates joining the Quad. November. 26, 2022 07:22. by Kyu-Jin Shin newjin@donga.com.

The U.S. has been strengthening its siege against China through multilateral security consultative bodies such as the Quad, Five Eyes, and AUKUS since the Biden administration launched in January last year.

The Quad consists of four nations: the U.S., Japan, Australia, and India. It was founded to repair and restore the aftermath of a large-scale tsunami that hit Indonesia in 2004. But it started to lean more towards keeping China in balance during the Trump administration. Five Eyes, in which five English-speaking countries, including the U.S., the U.K., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, are participating, started with the UK-USA Security Agreement (UKUSA) made between the U.S. and the U.K. in 1946 to cooperate against the Communist bloc in the Cold War. They have shared confidential military information collected worldwide through a communication surveillance network called 'Echelon.'

The U.S. launched the AUKUS, a security consultative body, with the U.K. and Australia last year. The U.S. provided nuclear-powered submarine-building technology to Australia after it was founded. Recently, the country unveiled plans to deploy its B-52 strategic bombers capable of carrying nuclear weapons to Australia. It is continuing active military cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region to hold China in check.

The Yoon Suk-yeol administration, since the very beginning, has shown its will to place the Korea-U.S. alliance at the center of diplomacy, unlike the previous administration. Unlike the former Moon Jae-in administration, which maintained an ambiguous attitude toward joining the Quad because of its relations with China despite repeated requests from the U.S., President Yoon stated in his presidential election pledge that he would seek ways to “formally join the Quad in the future.” However, to minimize friction with China, it still intends to promote cooperation first in various fields, such as infrastructure construction and vaccines. China has openly criticized the U.S.-led security consultative bodies, which was seen by its Foreign Minister Wang Yi's condemnation that the U.S. “incites arms races by spreading the Cold War thinking.”

한국어

donga.com

6. North Korea’s Kim Yo Jong Slams Sanctions Measures

The evil bad cop for Kim Jong Un makes a "discourteous statement" about President Yoon.

Excerpts;

After Kim’s statement belittling Yoon and his policy initiative in August, this was her second discourteous statement on Yoon, showing Pyongyang’s firm stance that it will not engage in any cooperation with the Yoon administration. In Kim’s previous statement in August, she compared Yoon with a “knave” and explicitly derided him by saying that “we don’t like Yoon Suk-yeol himself.”

With Pyongyang’s continued denigration of Yoon, Kim also implied that Seoul is now Pyongyang’s target and warned that “the desperate sanctions and pressure of the U.S. and its South Korean stooges against the DPRK will add fuel to the latter’s hostility and anger and they will serve as a noose for them.”

As Pyongyang has signaled more provocative measures toward Seoul and Washington, the tensions on the Korean Peninsula will likely keep escalating with no room for renewing the stalled inter-Korean dialogue and North Korea-U.S. nuclear talks.

North Korea’s Kim Yo Jong Slams Sanctions Measures

After Kim’s statement belittling Yoon in August, this was her second discourteous statement toward the South Korean president.

thediplomat.com · by Mitch Shin · November 25, 2022

Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of the North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and main voice on inter-Korean relations, criticized the South Korean Foreign Ministry’s announcement that it would examine its “independent measures” on Thursday.

“As soon as the U.S. talked about its ‘independent sanctions’ against the DPRK, South Korea parroted what the former said. This disgusting act shows more clearly that the South Korean group is a ‘faithful dog’ and stooge of the U.S.,” Kim said in her statement published in Korea Central News Agency (KCNA), one of the North’s main state-controlled media. (DRPK is an acronym of the North’s official name: Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.)

This statement came two days after KCNA published another Kim statement criticizing the U.N. Security Council to hold a meeting to discuss her country’s Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) test.

In the past few weeks, North Korea has launched dozens of ballistic missiles including its newest Hwasong-17 intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and hundreds of artillery shells to respond to joint military drills between the South and the U.S.

After the North launched a Hwasong-17 ICBM on November 18, a meeting of the U.N. Security Council was held upon the request of the United States on November 21. However, as China and Russia, also permanent members of the Security Council, have pointed fingers at U.S. military engagement in the drills with the South and Japan as the main cause for escalating tensions on the Korean Peninsula, no additional sanctions were discussed in the meeting, leading the North to secure room to increase its leverage in the region with the backing of China and Russia.

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“If the master and the servant still attach themselves to the useless ‘sanctions,’ we will let them do that one hundred or thousand times,” Kim said. The master and the servant were references to the U.S. and the South, respectively.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said the U.S. will be proposing “a presidential statement.” The Chinese and Russian vetoes in the Security Council diminish the scale of the international response, diminishing also the deterrent value of international censure.

As the North’s seventh nuclear test looms, South Korea has warned that it may impose “independent sanctions” against the North. The South’s spy agency previously speculated the North’s nuclear test could take place sometime between October 16 to November 7, but it did not. Instead, the North has focused on launching dozens of ballistic missiles and hundreds of artillery shells in the past few weeks. Now, the expected timeline for the North’s next nuclear test has shifted to March 2023 but it is still unclear when exactly Kim Jong Un will order the test.

As the U.N. Security Council is not united enough to punish the North for its missile launches, South Korea has shown its will to work shoulder-to-shoulder with the U.S. to tackle North Korea issues. At this stage, imposing independent sanctions targeting the North’s illicit cyber activities involving its cryptocurrency theft is currently on the table. However, as North Korea has already been the target of the devastating economic sanctions imposed by the U.S. and the U.N., it is questionable how the South’s “independent sanctions” could be effective enough to induce the North to shift from nuclear development to denuclearization.

“If they think that they can escape from the present dangerous situation through ‘sanctions,’ they must be really idiots as they do not know how to live in peace and comfort,” Kim said.

Days after South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol proposed his “audacious initiative,” an economic package aimed to induce the North toward denuclearization, Kim Yo Jong denounced his plan by saying that it is just “a replica” of former President Lee Myung-bak’s “Vision 3000: Denuclearization and Openness.” Such criticism was made by experts, too, as Yoon’s plan can only be carried out once the North shows its “will” or takes steps toward denuclearization – which had already been verified as “mission impossible” over the past decades.

“I wonder why the South Korean people still remain a passive onlooker to such acts of the ‘government’ of Yoon Suk-yeol and other idiots who continue creating the dangerous situation,” Kim said. Unlike the rough English-version of her statement, Kim did not use the term “government” in the Korean-version of the statement. “Idiots” directly referred to Yoon, rather unnaturally, in her statement in Korean. Seoul’s Unification Ministry expressed strong regrets and condemned the North’s attempt to instigate an antigovernment campaign in the South.

After Kim’s statement belittling Yoon and his policy initiative in August, this was her second discourteous statement on Yoon, showing Pyongyang’s firm stance that it will not engage in any cooperation with the Yoon administration. In Kim’s previous statement in August, she compared Yoon with a “knave” and explicitly derided him by saying that “we don’t like Yoon Suk-yeol himself.”

With Pyongyang’s continued denigration of Yoon, Kim also implied that Seoul is now Pyongyang’s target and warned that “the desperate sanctions and pressure of the U.S. and its South Korean stooges against the DPRK will add fuel to the latter’s hostility and anger and they will serve as a noose for them.”

As Pyongyang has signaled more provocative measures toward Seoul and Washington, the tensions on the Korean Peninsula will likely keep escalating with no room for renewing the stalled inter-Korean dialogue and North Korea-U.S. nuclear talks.

CONTRIBUTING AUTHOR

Mitch Shin

Mitch Shin is Chief Koreas Correspondent for The Diplomat and a non-resident Research Fellow of the Institute for Security & Development Policy (ISDP), Stockholm Korea Center.

thediplomat.com · by Mitch Shin · November 25, 2022

7. Rude threat (Kim Yo Jong - North Korea)

Just another example that north Korea chooses not to be a responsible member of the international community.

Rude threat

The Korea Times · November 25, 2022

North Korea criticized for trying to incite unrest in South

Kim Yo-jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, attacked President Yoon Suk-yeol and his government Thursday, calling them "idiots" and "faithful dogs" of the United States. She also threatened Seoul saying that it has become a "target" of the North's possible military offensives.

"I do not know why the (South Korean) people remain onlookers to their 'regime' in which Yoon Suk-yeol and his idiots continue to create a perilous situation," she said in a statement carried by North Korea's state media.

Kim deserves strong criticism for using such disrespectful language against President Yoon despite the North's notorious reputation as an oppressor of human rights under its three generations of hereditary dictatorial rule.

Worse still, Kim apparently tried to incite anti-government activities by saying "When (former President) Moon Jae-in was in office, Seoul was at least not our target." Her remarks came in response to the South Korean foreign ministry's move to consider additional sanctions against the North over its recent missile launches.

The South Korean ministry's decision for increasing sanctions comes, in large part, due to the United Nations Security Council's (UNSC) failure to take any action against North Korea's recent launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), due to opposition by China and Russia. Yet, it is not entirely accurate for the North to attempt to denounce the South for heightening tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

Kim also revealed an intention to divide and foment unrest in the South by criticizing the current administration by comparing it with the previous one. Notwithstanding any opposition to the Yoon administration, such an issue is internal to South Korea. The North should not meddle in domestic politics as it can be regarded as an improper intervention in South Korean affairs.

What is more serious is Kim's "Seoul target," comment, given the North's recent move in September to build up its nuclear prowess including the institutionalization of the use of nuclear weapons. It can be taken to mean a "direct nuclear menace," that carries more significant implications than the North's threat of turning "Seoul into a sea of fire" in 1994.

The North has conducted a barrage of ballistic missile tests by blaming it on the joint military exercises between South Korea and the U.S. It can make further provocations in defiance of possible additional punitive measures. The Yoon administration should take diverse preemptive steps, in close cooperation with the U.S., in preparation for the North's military acts.

The tension regarding security on the peninsula has been escalating, prompted by the North's active nuclear ambitions coupled with a volatile global order, such as the ongoing war in Ukraine and the intensifying hegemony rivalry between the U.S. and China. The Yoon government should come up with well-conceived devices to help promote a peaceful solution to stalled inter-Korean relations.

While maintaining a resolute stance over the North's seemingly reckless actions, the government should consider feasible measures to entice North Korea back to the dialogue table. The North should also refrain from adopting the hardline stance of threatening the South with nuclear weapons, given its dire need for economic development after the lifting of international sanctions.

The Korea Times · November 25, 2022

8. Would North Korea accept a female successor?

I still think the speculation about dynastic succession based on the daughter's appearance is premature.

Would North Korea accept a female successor?

Dictatorial leader of misogynistic regime reveals daughter at missile launch. Could she best the next Yingluck Shinawatra?

Mitchell Blatt

17 hr ago

uskoreapolicy.substack.com · by Mitchell Blatt

Kim Jong-un’s daughter, Kim Ju-ae, was seen holding Kim Jong-un’s hand at a missile launch on November 19 in a photo published by the DPRK’s state-run news agency KCNA.

This is not the first time the rest of the world has known of Kim Ju-ae, who is the second child of Jong-un. Dennis Rodman held the then-newborn when he visited the Hermit Kingdom in 2013. South Korea’s National Intelligence Agency believes Kim has three children with his wife Ri Sol-Ju. Kim’s first child, born around 2010, is believed to be a boy but has never been publicized in a photograph.

Thanks for reading US-Korea Policy Project! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

North Korea is a traditional country beset by fundamentalist Confucian-style misogyny. The Kim regime is a sexist organ that keeps a harem of comfort women, and the Workers’ Party condones and engages in the sexual abuse of women, including female market vendors and prisoners. Could the regime and the country accept a female dear leader?

Kim Jong-un’s sister Kim Yo-jong has been appointed to a high-profile role in the Workers’ Party’s Political Bureau and on the State Affairs Commission of North Korea, a policy-making committee that ranks above the cabinet. She would not be there if it were not for her father, grandfather, and brother. There are no other women on the commission, and there have only been half a dozen female cabinet members in the entire history of North Korea.

In this way, Kim Yo-jong is similar to other Asian political leaders like Benazir Bhutto, daughter of Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto; Indira Gandhi, daughter of India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru; Corazon Aquino, wife of Senator Benigno Aquino, who was assassinated by Philippines President Marco’s regime; and even Park Geun-hye, daughter of South Korea’s developmental dictator Park Chung-hee. They all rose to power on the legacies of their fathers and husbands.

They were seen, in various degrees, as non-threatening replacements for popular male figures of power. Some of them and many other female leaders in the same mold carried on the programs of the patriarch to whom they were beholden. Others challenged the patriarchal culture and blazed their own trails. When they stepped out of line, male figures tried to put them in their place.

Mark R. Thompson, a professor of Asian studies and international studies at the City University of Hong Kong, wrote of the challenges Aquino faced during her rule:

In the Philippines, after toppling dictator Ferdinand Marcos to become president in 1986, Aquino faced two deeply antagonistic male rivals in her own cabinet, including her vice president, Salvador Laurel who demanded Aquino make him “virtual head of state”. Defense minister Juan Ponce Enrile launched a series of military coup attempts, with Laurel openly supporting one revealingly called “God Save the Queen”. This would have returned Aquino to her “proper” role as a woman, as a mere symbol, not the real holder of political power, which, as the ideology of patriarchy made clear, was a man’s job.

This being North Korea, obviously, family ties are a prerequisite for men to rise up to the status of supreme leader, too—and a helpful factor for other positions. But there are many more men who rose to power for reasons other than family. And, within prominent families, it is much more likely for men to be chosen.

New DPRK cabinet leaders appointed in 2021 (via Yonhap/Korea Times).

Linda K. Richter wrote in a 1990-91 issue of Pacific Affairs,

Though such factors may also explain the emergence of some male leadership in these regions, men seem to have a wider choice of routes to power, while for the top women these variables seem to be the dominant patterns to power.

The few women in power are raised by defenders the patriarchal administration to oppose reforms aimed at increasing equality. “What we have sadly seen is, though not always, that women also become foot soldiers of patriarchy because they have to survive within that system and defend the values [that brought them to power] but discriminate against them,” Ambika Satkunanathan, a Sri Lankan human rights lawyer, said in a 2021 discussion.

It is far too soon to say when North Korea will transition to a new illegitimate leader or who that leader will be. But there are questions.

Why has Kim’s daughter been publicly-revealed now, at a significant political event? Was Kim’s other daughter inadvertently revealed on a music video in September? Why hasn’t his eldest son been revealed? Is there something preventing him from being installed as leader down the line?

Thanks for reading US-Korea Policy Project! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.

uskoreapolicy.substack.com · by Mitchell Blatt

9. Miracle On The Han River: How South Korea Turned From A Backward Country Into An Economic Giant Of Asia

We should not forget the Miracle on the Taedonggang (the Taedong river that is in Pyongyang). That is the fact that after 7 decades the Korean people in the north continue to survive despite the worst human rights abuses and crimes against humanity since World War II .

And the ROK is the only country to go from a major aid recipient to a major donor nation. We should think about that when we consider a free and unified Korea.

Miracle On The Han River: How South Korea Turned From A Backward Country Into An Economic Giant Of Asia – OpEd

eurasiareview.com · by Matija Šerić · November 26, 2022

The Miracle on the Han River is a term used for the fantastic economic development of South Korea in the second half of the 20th century and can be extended to the period of the beginning of the 21st century. It is a phenomenon that deserves the recognition that economic experts rightly give it. The development of the South Korean economy, and at the same time the progress of the political and social order, is undoubtedly impressive. In the middle of the 20th century, South Korea was a war-torn, poor and backward, mostly agrarian country, which belonged to the group of countries that formed the “Third World” and depended on foreign aid. In the following decades, rapid transformation followed. Economic and social development transformed the country from a poor one to one of the richest countries in the world.

Despite the lack of natural resources, the country developed rapidly, and based its development on international trade while using all the advantages of globalization, integrating into the world economy through export-oriented industrialization. In a few decades, South Korea has become a leader in manufacturing and technological innovation, with globally recognizable brands such as Samsung, LG, Hyundai, KIA.

The brilliant development has ushered South Korea into the elite group of Asian tigers and enabled it to join prestigious multilateral organizations such as the OECD, the G-20, the Paris Club and the Indo-Pacific Economic Prosperity Framework (IPEF). Also, the country is included in the group of N-11 countries (Next 11) – these are the countries that Goldman Sachs listed as 11 potential countries that, together with the BRICS members, will be the world’s largest economies by the middle of the 21st century. Currently, South Korean economy is 11th in the world in terms of nominal GDP, and the country is the world’s seventh largest exporter. It has one of the largest foreign exchange reserves in the world.

After the end of authoritarian rule in 1987, the Republic of Korea is considered a nation with a highly developed democracy that enjoys the highest level of media freedom in Asia. According to the Human Development Index, it’s ranked 19th in the world and 5th in the Asia-Oceania region. According to the life expectancy of its inhabitants, it ranks enviably 3rd in the world (80.5 years for men and 86.5 years for women). Korea’s progress was internationally recognized by holding the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, the 2002 FIFA World Cup in South Korea (and Japan) and the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang.

However, the path to a developed country with a stable democracy was thorny and arduous. From the very establishment of the Republic of Korea on August 15, 1948, exciting and not at all pleasant political processes followed. The Korean War between 1950 and 1953 was a fratricidal war between two Koreas with two different political and social arrangements with about three million dead Korean civilians. It was one of the bloodiest wars of the 20th century. In the war, China intervened on the side of North Korea, while the UN coalition led by the USA intervened on the side of South Korea. Seoul changed hands several times, and eventually the communist forces were pushed to positions around the 38th parallel, close to the initial positions. After that, the front stabilized, and the last two years of the war were a war of attrition without significant changes. In July 1953, an armistice agreement was signed. In the following decades, the two Koreas took different paths.

Since the establishment of the modern Republic of Korea in 1948, a total of six republics have changed. From 1948 to 1960, the country was ruled by the authoritarian leader Syngman Rhee. At that time, the economy was dominated by agriculture. In 1950, land reform began to be implemented, whereby the American military authorities distributed lands previously owned by the Japanese to ordinary peasants. During the Second Republic, which lasted from 1960-1961 Prime Minister Chang Myon also implemented the policy of state capitalism but also cooperated with Japan, which was very significant because of Japan’s economic power.

In 1961, a military junta headed by General Park Chung-hee came to power. In those moments, the foundation was laid for the miracle on the Han River. The first national 5-year plan was implemented. It was based on the improvement of agriculture, mining, electricity production, development of chemical fertilizers, oil industry, ironworks, steelworks, construction of roads and ports. The South Korean authorities realized that something needed to change because their country was overcrowded, so the solution was to export products and services. Park’s motto was to treat workers like family members, which proved to be a hit as South Korean workers were 2.5 times more productive than American workers. Although Park led a military dictatorship that stifled civil liberties and other rights of citizens, economic progress was taking place. During the Third Republic between 1963 and 1972, the country received millions of dollars from Japan due to property rights claims and from the US, which, due to involvement in the Vietnam War, sought to support democratic South Korea as a counterweight to communist North Korea. The government used foreign revenues to achieve a self-sustaining economy and launched the saemaeul initiative to develop rural areas. Strongman rule and cheap labor were catalysts for the growth of the South Korean economy.

During the Fourth Republic between 1972 and 1981, South Koreans invested in the chemical industry relying on the strategy of replacing imported products with domestic products. The authorities have improved workers’ rights and wages. The government invested in heavy industry which resulted in the growth of the electronics and steel industries. Heavy industries were located in the south of the country. Factories in Seoul accounted for 25% of factory output in 1978. During the 1970s, income inequality between the industrial and agricultural sectors was a problem. President Park was assassinated in 1979. The Fourth Republic entered a period of political instability under Park’s successor, Choi Kyu-ha. There was a tense situation in the country. Choi was unofficially deposed by Park’s associate Chun Doo-hwan in a December 1979 coup.

The Fifth Republic (1981-1987) will be led by Chun who staged a coup in 1980, established a military dictatorship and adopted a new constitution. During the 1980s, the government adopted a conservative monetary policy and tight fiscal measures to control inflation. The money supply was cut in half. Seoul even froze the budget for a short time. Government interventions in the economy have decreased, as have restrictions on imports and foreign investments. It was a real hit as the economy became more competitive. To reduce disparities between the rural and urban sectors, Seoul has expanded investment in public projects such as roads and other thoroughfares while improving farm mechanization. These measures were enacted in the early 1980s and, together with improvements in the world economy, contributed to the South Korean economy thriving again in the late 1980s. The country achieved economic growth of 9.2% between 1982 and 1987 and 12.5% between 1986 and 1988. GDP growth was around 10% between 1963 and 1990.

During the years of rapid catch-up with the developed world, South Korea used at least 19 of the most important forms of intervention aimed at promoting an export-oriented economy: currency devaluation, preferential access to imported semi-finished products needed to produce export goods with strict controls that prevented abuses, targeted protection of industries, price incentives, tax exemptions for domestic producers, internal exemptions from indirect taxes for successful exporters, lower direct tax on income generated from exports, accelerated depreciation for exporters, certificates of right to import, direct subsidies for exports of selected industries, monopoly rights granted to companies that first achieve exports in target industries, subsidized interest, export credit insurance and guarantee system, creation of free trade zones, establishment of public enterprises to serve as leaders in establishing new industries, promotion of South Korean exports worldwide, un improvement of the technological level, coordination of foreign technology licensing agreements by the government, setting export goals for companies.

Chaebols or large business (often family) conglomerates played an important role in the country’s industrialization. Chaebols were carefully selected from among successful exporters, and granted subsidies and privileges to stimulate economic development. Every conglomerate was started by a family. 10 family chaebols were responsible for 60% of the growth of the South Korean economy during the period of rapid growth in the second half of the 20th century. The most important chaebols are Samsung, Hyundai and LG.

Thanks to democratization and the establishment of the Sixth Republic in 1987, in the first half of the nineties, the South Korean economy continued to grow steadily and develop in the private and state sectors. However, in 1997, the Asian financial crisis broke out. After several Asian currencies suffered a major decline, the South Korean won experienced a sharp drop in value. By the end of the year, the IMF has approved USD 21 billion that will be part of a USD 58.4 billion aid package. The moves of the government and foreign creditors curbed the financial problems. Adaptation to the labor market and alternative sources of financing helped significantly. At the end of 1999, GDP grew by 10.5%, prompting President Kim Dae-jung to declare an end to the won crisis.

The economic reforms introduced by Kim were based on the reorientation from state capitalism to the market model and enabled economic growth that was 9.2% in 2000 and 3.3% in 2001 due to the slowdown of the world economy. Growth continued in the following years until the outbreak of the World Financial Crisis in 2008. Factory production, consumption, exports of cars and semiconductors fell. But still a bigger crisis was avoided. The government’s stimulus measures and the consumption of goods that were more consumed due to the drop in exports helped. Already in 2010, GDP growth amounted to a superb 6.1%.

In 1960, North and South Korea were similar in their poverty, ranking among the poorest countries in Asia and Africa. It is assumed that today, after more than half a century, South Korea has a per capita income about 20 times higher than that of North Korea. South Korea’s GDP at purchasing power parity (PPP) is about US$53,000 per year, which is higher than Italy’s or Spain’s. South Koreans have moved from 10% of Americans’ income in 1970 to about 70% today.

The most important sectors of the South Korean economy are the electronic and telecommunications industry, shipbuilding, the automotive industry, construction, the production of weapons and military equipment, tourism, and mining. GDP consists of service activities with a share of 58%, industry 39% and agriculture 2%. According to this year’s estimates, the nominal GDP is 1.8 trillion USD, which places the Republic of Korea 10th in the world and 4th in Asia. South Korean GDP PKM is 2.765 trillion dollars which is the 14th place in the world and the 6th place in Asia.

In 2021, nominal GDP grew by 4.02%. Inflation this fall is 5.67%, and unemployment is around 3%, which are impressive results in times of the corona crisis. About 14% of the population lives below the poverty line, and public debt amounts to about 47% of GDP. In 2021, exports amounted to 644.5 billion USD and imports to 615.1 billion USD. The main export partners are: China (25.8%), ASEAN countries (17.3%), USA (14.4%), EU (9.3%) and Hong Kong (5.9%). On the other hand, the main import partners are: China (23.2%), USA (12.2%), EU (11.8%), ASEAN countries (11.7%) and Japan (9.8%). ).

South Korean society underwent as rapid a transformation after the Korean War as the economy. The population more than doubled between 1955 (21 million inhabitants) and the beginning of the 21st century. It currently has more than 51 million inhabitants. At the same time, modern education was developing rapidly, with considerable government involvement, due to the revival of the Korean people’s traditional commitment to education after decades of repression during the Japanese occupation period. The growth of educational institutions and commercial and industrial enterprises in and around large cities attracted an increasing number of rural people to urban areas. In particular, Seoul grew about 10 times to about 10 million people between 1945 and the beginning of the 21st century.

The capital Seoul is today the city with the fourth largest nominal GDP (926 billion USD) in the world after Tokyo, New York and Los Angeles. Seoul is a very old city with a history of more than two thousand years, but it is also a new city. During the Korean War, the city changed hands several times and was largely devastated. Today, Seoul is dominated by business districts and tall skyscrapers with glass facades, hotels, restaurants, cultural landmarks, and the city with its metropolitan area is home to more than 25 million people. The quality of life is among the highest in the world.

Communication media also recorded a significant rise in the last century, especially the publication of newspapers and magazines, while in recent times digital media dominate. The status of the most media-free country in Asia shows the extent of media freedom. An ambitious program of expanding and modernizing the country’s transport infrastructure was also undertaken. However, the most noticeable social change in South Korea has been the emergence of a middle class. The previously mentioned land reform carried out in the 1950s, together with the expansion of modern education and the expansion of the economy, caused the disappearance of the once privileged yangban (land-owning) class, and a new elite emerged from the ranks of the former commoners.

Another significant social change was the reduction of the family. Rural-to-urban migration disrupted the traditional family structure as urban dwellers tended to live in apartments as nuclear families and have fewer children. In addition, women fiercely fought for complete equality before the law and fought for greater rights. They were given the right to register as family heads in the new family household registration system that came into effect in 2008. In the old system, only men could register as family heads. The new system increased women’s rights in cases of divorce and custody of children and equated the rights of adopted children with those of biological children.

The armed forces of the Republic of Korea are among the strongest armed forces in the world, more precisely, according to the Global Firepower portal, they rank 6th in the world. The army has 555,000 active military personnel and 2.7 million reservists, making it one of the largest standing armies in the world. It is equipped with the most modern Western weapons as a faithful American partner in the Far East. Few people know that South Korea possessed a nuclear program that fell victim to the détente between the US and the USSR during the 1970s when Seoul gave up possession of the most destructive weapons. Still, with a nuclear-armed northern neighbor, there are growing calls for Washington to arm Seoul with nuclear weapons to contain the threat posed by Pyongyang. It is interesting that South Korea is the country where Christianity is the most represented religion with 29% of believers (dominated by Protestants) and exceeds the number of Buddhists with 23%.

Lately, starting from the 1990s, the cultural influence of South Korea in the world is becoming more and more present. In other words, it is a demonstration of soft power. It is enough to highlight the mega-popular Netflix TV series Squid Game, the Oscar-winning film Parasite, the colorful singer PSY and his Gangnam Style, the female K-pop band Blackpink that conquers the music charts. Korean popular culture is breaking through and conquering international audiences. K-pop, K-dramas and cinematic productions have become a phenomenon called the Korean wave. Korean cultural influence has spread to India, a nation of 1.4 billion people where Korean is the fastest-growing foreign language and is taught in high schools. In most of the world, the mention of South Korea evokes positive comments.

Despite the successes, the aforementioned film and musical works show protests against social inequalities and injustices in South Korean society are expressed. Research from 2015 to 2022 has shown that many young people want to emigrate; they compare the present to the feudal class system of the Joseon period. An entire generation in the 20s and 30s was ironically labeled as the sampo generation of the “three abandoned” because they gave up on courtship, marriage and children they could not afford. Now they are called the N-po generation, which despairs because of numerous difficulties in life, from the impossibility of finding permanent employment to not owning their own home.

South Korea currently has the lowest fertility rate in the world and an aging population. The total population is also expected to decrease in the future. The government is concerned that fewer children and an aging society will slow down economic growth and destabilize the social and pension system. The annual number of newborns has reached a record low of 272,000 in 2021, compared to one million a year in the 1970s. In contrast to the optimism and hopes of previous generations, research shows that since 1990, the number of Koreans who believe they have “freedom of choice and control over their lives” has been declining.

It is not yet clear how the authorities will respond to this social crisis, although the dissatisfaction of young people requires a fairly quick response. Perhaps the authorities will try to preserve the status quo and avoid social change until the situation becomes pre-revolutionary as it was in the world in 1968. It would be desirable if the government decided on some proactive solution. The future of the nation depends on how it responds to this existential challenge, whether it finds a path to shared prosperity for the next generation or tragically fails to overcome social divisions. Current president Yoon Suk-yeol has yet to initiate concrete changes.

After a series of decades with a spectacular GDP growth rate of 6 to 9 percent, South Korea’s GDP has been growing at 2-3 percent per year since 2012. While slower growth is common in developed economies, South Korea also has structural weaknesses: it is overly based on its main export product (semiconductors), produced by one or two large companies (e.g. Samsung), depends on one large market (China) and relies on the raw materials of the country with which it is currently waging a trade war (Japan). Low growth rates also reflect demographic problems, for which there are few good solutions without major demographic changes. The way to overcome the crisis lies in new dynamic areas of the economy and the ideas of young Koreans. Particularly promising is the liveliness of Seongsu-dong, the so-called “Seoul’s Brooklyn” and Pangjo Valley, home of Korean high-tech start-ups and modern entrepreneurs. These locations radiate innovation and creativity and show that they are part of the most advanced Korea. They break stereotypes that Koreans, due to Confucian social norms, are most successful in hierarchical corporate structures such as chaebol.

Based on innovation, the start-up economy could be a source of growth that will stimulate wider social development. South Korea needs more creative companies like Naver, Korea’s Google, which made it into the country’s top 10 companies for the first time in 2020. The government should stop with policies that bring poor results, such as issuing state subsidies to large companies that create negative conditions for the growth of smaller companies. Ultimately, common practices of large companies, such as extracting short-term profits from smaller suppliers at the expense of long-term investments in supply chains, create significant barriers to SME development. There are currently some important initiatives to address this challenge, such as promoting reciprocity in Korean and Asian supply chains, but more needs to be done, especially by large Korean entrepreneurs. If the obstacles are removed, South Korea could become a premier start-up and investment destination, attracting a new generation of entrepreneurial talent while building on its growing image as a global cultural powerhouse.

eurasiareview.com · by Matija Šerić · November 26, 2022

10. South Korea clings to North’s denuclearization, despite dwindling chances

Denuclearization is stuck between a ROK and a hard place. No political leader can make the statement that we no longer seek denuclearization.

But they could say that they are now executing a new political warfare strategy that rests on a foundation of deterrence and defense. That is a human rights upfront approach, a sophisticated influence campaign, and the pursuit of a free and unified Korea.

South Korea clings to North’s denuclearization, despite dwindling chances

The Washington Post · by Michelle Ye Hee Lee · November 26, 2022

SEOUL — On one side of the border, North Korea is testing new and more powerful missiles, some designed to carry nuclear warheads capable of reaching the continental United States. On the other side, South Korea is again promising economic aid to persuade its neighbor to give up those arms.

The split screen — evident in a flurry of test launches and announcements during the past 10 days — underscores the intractability of the increasingly dangerous issue.

Negotiations over denuclearization of the peninsula have been stalemated since talks collapsed at a 2019 summit. And North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has only become more resolute about advancing his country’s program, which he views as critical leverage with the world. This month alone has seen Pyongyang fire intercontinental ballistic missiles twice.

Yet what South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol is offering — with details released Monday in a self-proclaimed “audacious plan” — is much like the carrot dangled 15 years ago, when Seoul promised to bring North Korea’s per capita income up to $3,000 if its leaders abandoned their nuclear arsenal. Neither happened.

Intelligence officials expect North Korea to soon carry out its first nuclear test since 2017. Prospects of denuclearization talks seem to be fading fast. Previous nuclear tests drew condemnation from the U.N. Security Council, but the same appears improbable now given geopolitical dynamics.

“It’s getting more difficult to get the international community together on North Korea and denuclearization,” said Chun Yung-woo, a former South Korean national security adviser and chief negotiator for talks from 2003-2009 that involved six nations. “The geopolitics is working against the goal of denuclearization.”

Shifting regional relations

There are signs that Pyongyang’s decades-long position on relations with Washington, Beijing and Moscow is fundamentally shifting. According to Rachel Minyoung Lee, a fellow at the Washington-based think tank 38 North, Kim now appears to view engagement with the United States as futile and his country’s interests as best guaranteed through alignment with China and Russia. Kim noted in a September speech that “the change from a unipolar world advocated by the U.S. into a multipolar world is being accelerated significantly.”

In recent months, both China and Russia have drawn North Korea closer than ever. The two countries have consistently rejected efforts at the U.N. Security Council to punish North Korea for its ballistic missile tests, which has allowed Kim to aggressively improve its weapons capabilities with near impunity.

Pyongyang had a complicated relationship with Beijing and Moscow for many years. But after boosting diplomacy with Pyongyang, China now accounts for more than 90 percent of North Korea’s external trade activity. Chinese President Xi Jinping sees a convenient ally in North Korea given tensions in his nation’s dealings with the United States.

Pyongyang also has become a vocal supporter of Moscow despite its war in Ukraine. North Korea was one of five countries that in March declined to call for an end to Russia’s invasion at the U.N. General Assembly. This summer, it heralded a new level of “strategic and tactical cooperation” with Russia.

“These are very dangerous geopolitical changes that will make denuclearization of North Korea more difficult than it already is. It is already close to impossible,” Chun said. “The North Korean support for Russia and its invasion of Ukraine, the U.S.-China strategic competition, all of these are conducive to North Korea’s [weapons] advancement and give indemnity in the way of missile tests or nuclear tests.”

Indeed, Kim announced in September that there would be “absolutely no denuclearization, no negotiation and no bargaining chip to trade.” North Korea has rejected overtures to resume talks unless Washington reverses what Pyongyang considers “hostile policies” and provides sanctions relief and security guarantees. North Korea vehemently objects to joint military drills by the United States and its allies as well as the presence of U.S. nuclear-armed bombers and submarines in the region.

These dynamics have many experts in Seoul and Washington questioning whether to ditch efforts to convince North Korea to relinquish its nuclear ambitions and recognize it as a nuclear state — a politically controversial move but one that some experts say the United States and South Korea have already made in tacit ways.

The U.S. State Department and South Korean Defense Ministry officially reject the idea.

South Korea’s strategy

The United States has said repeatedly that it will meet with North Korea “anywhere, anytime, without preconditions.” But past U.S. negotiators say Kim will not take that offer seriously without more specificity. The Biden administration has not revealed an explicit North Korea strategy.

South Korea’s president took office in May vowing a stronger stance toward the North. The policy brief that Yoon’s conservative administration released Monday includes medical aid, infrastructure support and other economic assistance in exchange for Pyongyang initiating some denuclearization.

Its chance of success are slim. “However impoverished North Korea is, economic aid has failed to move Kim Jong Un and boosting the amount is still not the solution,” said Kim Dong-yub, a former South Korean navy officer who teaches at University of North Korean Studies in Seoul.

The brief lays out a three-pronged approach: deterrence against North Korean military threats, dissuasion of the regime’s nuclear pursuits through sanctions and pressure, and diplomacy to re-engage Pyongyang in disarmament talks. South Korea calls it the “3D” plan.

Seoul would prefer a comprehensive approach involving all three pursuits, “but if it does not work out, we will keep pushing for ‘deterrence’ and ‘dissuasion’ until ‘diplomacy’ can be reached,” explained Deputy National Security Adviser Kim Tae-hyo.

Yoon’s policy signals that “it will not merely wait for Pyongyang to engage in a dialogue while letting the regime keep up illicit weapons activity without consequences,” said Lee Ho-ryung, a researcher at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses in Seoul. That’s a change from Yoon’s predecessor, Moon Jae-in, whose repeated attempts to resume the stalled talks were rebuffed even as North Korea continued to bolster its nuclear arsenal.

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry said Tuesday that it is reviewing new unilateral sanctions against North Korea over its “continued provocations” with missile launches. A further provocation like a nuclear test, it added, could prompt steps to curb the North’s cyberattacks — a source of financing for the regime’s nuclear program.

A broader question is whether the White House has the political will to tackle the situation. South Korea’s plan does not address North Korea’s security concerns and demands for sanctions relief. Both are largely in U.S. hands, experts note.

“For now, it doesn’t look like the Biden administration is paying any attention to North Korea,” Chun said. Given other issues that the administration believes are more urgent, “it looks like President Biden has forgotten about North Korea.”

Kim Yo Jong, the influential sister of the North Korean leader, just berated Yoon and his government’s “idiots” for their sanctions push and warned that it could spark further hostility.

“The desperate sanctions and pressure of the U.S. and its South Korean stooges” will add to the North’s “hostility and anger,” she said in a statement noted by state media on Thursday.

“I wonder what ‘sanctions’ the South Korean group, no more than a running wild dog gnawing on a bone given by the U.S., imprudently impose on the DPRK,” she said, referring to her country by its official acronym. “What a spectacle sight!”

The Washington Post · by Michelle Ye Hee Lee · November 26, 2022

11. Review | ‘Devotion’: Korean War aviator drama is slow to take off

Review | ‘Devotion’: Korean War aviator drama is slow to take off

Jonathan Majors and Glen Powell star in fact-based tale of flyboy friendship

Review by Mark Jenkins

November 21, 2022 at 6:00 a.m. EST

The Washington Post · by Mark Jenkins · November 21, 2022

(2.5 stars)

The final act of “Devotion,” set during the first months of the Korean War, is unexpectedly moving. The poignancy comes as a surprise because most of the preceding scenes are slack and prosaic. This is a fighter-pilot drama that takes more than 90 minutes to get up to emotional speed.

Inspired by a true story, according to the opening credits, “Devotion” charts the slow-developing bond between Jesse Brown (Jonathan Majors), the first Black aviator to complete U.S. Navy training, and his White cohort Tom Hudner (Glen Powell, who’s one of the movie’s executive producers). According to Jake Crane and Jonathan A.H. Stewart’s script, which is based on Adam Makos’s 2017 book of the same name, Hudner is the colleague who’s most accepting of Brown. Ultimately, the two are inextricably linked when one of them crashes and the other attempts a rescue that must be accomplished quickly, or not at all.

The other airmen (including one played by pop star Joe Jonas) aren’t especially inhospitable, or even distinguishable. Most of the racial animosity comes from outside the unit — or from Jesse himself. In one of this stodgy movie’s few quirky touches, the aviator winds himself up to fly by staring into a mirror while reciting insults directed at him in the past. These motivation sessions provide Majors with the most intense moments of his generally underwritten role.

Director J.D. Dillard, whose father was the second Black pilot to join the Navy’s Blue Angels, wisely decided to employ real planes for as much of the action as possible. “Devotion” does include computer effects but makes compelling use of vintage aircraft, including the Vought F4U Corsair flown by Jesse and Tom. (The plane was notorious as a “widow maker” for having a large engine that impeded the pilot’s vision.) The aerial action was expertly choreographed by Kevin LaRosa, who did the same for “Top Gun: Maverick” (which co-starred Powell).

The filmmakers show less finesse with the real-life scenario, which resists being molded into a shapely narrative. The Korean War doesn’t even start until the movie’s halfway mark, and the conflict provides only two major action sequences. The other scene that’s meant to thrill is a fatal mishap for a minor character; it’s an incident that, like much of the movie, is sapped by predictability.

The story begins at a Rhode Island base, where it dawdles through the introduction of Jesse’s wife, Daisy Brown (Christina Jackson), and toddler daughter. Then the fliers ship out on an aircraft carrier to the Mediterranean, where the incongruous highlight is a shore-leave encounter with actress Elizabeth Taylor (Serinda Swan). Tom is a Naval Academy graduate, but on the French Riviera, Jesse proves, improbably, the more worldly of the two.

Jesse speaks just a few sentences of French, but it’s a nice break from the rest of the dialogue, which tends to be stilted and sometimes foreshadows with a sledgehammer. When an American soldier on the ground exclaims, “Dear God, send us some angels,” it’s a sure bet that U.S. planes will arrive the next instant. The aircraft chase the GI’s informal prayer as reliably as the violins tail the piano in Chanda Dancy’s treacly score.

The movie’s climactic sequence is less expected, and a bit messier than the other episodes. It’s powerful because it effectively evokes the chaos and cost of war. Most of the rest of “Devotion” just apes clunky old war movies.

PG-13. At area theaters. Contains strong language, some bloodless war violence, racial slurs and smoking. In English and some French and Korean with subtitles. 138 minutes.

The Washington Post · by Mark Jenkins · November 21, 2022

12. Speeding tanks, booming howitzers, shaking bones: This is how South Korea sells weapons

I know I am beating the dead horse but more on the newest psrtner of the Arsenal of Democracy.

Videos at the link. https://edition.cnn.com/2022/11/25/asia/south-korea-defense-industry-weapons-intl-hnk-dst-ml/index.html

Speeding tanks, booming howitzers, shaking bones: This is how South Korea sells weapons | CNN

CNN · by Brad Lendon,Gawon Bae,Paula Hancocks · November 26, 2022

Video Ad Feedback

Tanks, Apaches, and drones. See South Korea's state-of-the-art weapons

03:29 - Source: CNN

Changwon, South Korea CNN —

With a blinding yellow flash and a concussion that shakes bones, K9 self-propelled howitzers launch artillery shells onto a hill that’s just been hit by rockets fired from helicopters. Then K2 tanks roar in, speeding up roads and firing as they go.

This is part of DX Korea, a four-day South Korean defense expo held in September at a firing range in Pocheon, about 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) from the North Korean border.

The display – presented to a crowd of 2,000 people including military officials from more than two dozen countries – is one way South Korea sells weapons.

And President Yoon Suk Yeol wants to sell more of them – enough for Seoul to jump four places up the ranks to become the world’s fourth-biggest arms exporter.

“By entering the world’s top four defense exporters after the United States, Russia and France, the (South Korean) defense industry will become a strategic industrialization and a defense powerhouse,” Yoon said.

To do that, South Korea will have to outsell – in ascending order – the United Kingdom, Italy, Germany and finally China, which held 4.6% of the export market in the 2017-2021 period, according to the authoritative Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI).

That’s no easy task, yet Seoul is already well on its way. From 2012 to 2016, it had just 1% of the global market. It more than doubled that in the following five-year period, capturing 2.8% – by far the largest increase among any of the world’s top 25 arms exporters.

In 2021, it sold $7 billion worth of weapons overseas, according to the Export-Import Bank of Korea.

And the South Korean defense industry believes it has the arsenal to grab an even bigger slice of the pie.

The push for self-reliance

South Korea’s weapons exports have ballooned in recent years, but the country has been building its arms industry for decades, spurred on by its troubled relationship with its northern neighbor.

As of 2020, military expenditures represented 2.8% of South Korea’s gross domestic product, according to SIPRI, well above the 2% threshold considered a minimum by many US allies.

“The North Korean threat has given us a good reason, a motivation to make sure that our weapons are very good,” says Chun In-bum, a former lieutenant general in the South Korean Army.

Technically, the Korean War never ended, because the document that stopped the combat in 1953 was an armistice, not a peace treaty.

In the first decades after the fighting ended, South Korea’s defense was heavily dependent on American troops and weaponry.

Things began to change in the 1970s, when the US was distracted by the war in Vietnam and the Cold War with the Soviet Union.

South Korea began to take more responsibility for its own defense and invested $42 million in US military aid in factories to produce M-16 rifles, according to the Korea Development Institute (KDI).

By the end of the decade, Korean researchers under the direction of the country’s National Defense Science Institute had succeeded in making all basic weaponry, according to a 2014 KDI report.

With the ever-present threats from the North, Seoul initiated a National Defense Tax to pay for the development of a modern military, including the armored systems and other military equipment that Korean defense companies are marketing today.

Weapons and Ukraine

Back on the hillside after the live-fire demonstration, prospective customers listened intently to the pitches of the South Korean representatives.

Delegations had arrived from as far afield as Mexico, Thailand, Nigeria and the Philippines. An Indian general asked for the ranges of a weapon on display. Qatari officers inspected a K2 up close.

Conspicuously, none of the potential customers were from Ukraine.

But that doesn’t mean South Korea’s arms industry isn’t seeing a role in Ukraine’s war with Russia.

A US defense official told CNN this month that Washington intends to buy 100,000 rounds of artillery ammunition from South Korean arms manufacturers to provide to Ukraine.

The rounds will be transferred to Ukraine via the US, allowing Seoul to stick to its public pledge that it would not send lethal aid to the war-torn country.

In a statement issued after the planned purchase was first revealed in The Wall Street Journal, the South Korean Defense Ministry said it had not changed its position on shipping weapons to Ukraine, and that it believed the “end user” of the ammunition was the US.

Russian President Vladimir Putin had said late last month that South Korea had decided to send “arms and ammunition” to Kyiv, which would “ruin our relations” with them – a claim denied a day later by President Yoon.

A South Korean presidential decree that enforces the country’s Foreign Trade Act says its exports can only be used for “peaceful purposes” and “shall not affect international peace, safety maintenance, and national security.”

South Korea is also a signatory to the United Nations’ Arms Trade Treaty, ratified in 2014 with the intention of keeping close control on who gets weapons and under what conditions they can be used. Ukraine is a signatory but hasn’t ratified it.

But the planned US ammunition transfer isn’t the only way the influence of South Korea’s arms industry will be felt in Ukraine.

In September, South Korea signed a deal with Poland for its biggest arms sale ever, in which it will supply Warsaw with almost 1,000 of Hyundai Rotem’s K2 tanks, more than 600 of Hanwha’s K9s, and dozens of fighter jets from Korean Aerospace Industries.

The deal will enable Poland to replace many of the weapons that Warsaw has sent to Kyiv.

“Poland needed weapons to defend themselves, and that’s exactly what we’re providing,” Chun says. “We Koreans understand that without weapons to defend yourself, the end result is a tragedy.”

A city designed with defense in mind

The constant threat of a North Korean attack is one reason military production lines were established in the southern port city of Changwon, the cradle of South Korea’s modern arms industry.

The city is in a natural basin, surrounded by mountains on all sides, making it easier to defend. The city’s main road, Changwon-daero, has a 14.9-kilometer (9.25-mile) stretch that can double as a runway in times of national emergency.

At its southern end is the Changwon National Industrial Complex, established in the 1970s and home to the Hanwha Defense and Hyundai Rotem factories, where artillery pieces and tanks trundle off the assembly lines.

Overseas orders are rolling in this year, notably the landmark deal with Poland which the Korea Defense Industry Association estimates to be worth $15.3 billion.

Hanwha puts its share of that agreement at $2.4 billion, its largest contract for the K9.

Poland is one of nine countries – alongside South Korea, Turkey, Finland, India, Norway, Estonia, Australia and Egypt – to buy the howitzer from Hanwha.

South Korea wants to become one of the world's top four suppliers of armaments.

CNN

Lee Boo-hwan, an executive vice president of Hanwha Defense’s overseas business division, says the company wants to be a long-term partner to countries that buy its weapons. To that end, it is setting up new manufacturing facilities in Australia, Egypt and Poland.

“My workers are very happy to share our technology,” Lee says. “It is our main strategic focus to enter (new) markets.”

It’s also about continuously updating and improving the product, he says, and that’s happening inside South Korea.

The company has already prototyped the K9A2 tank, which situates the crew outside the turret to make them less vulnerable to attack, and is developing “a more futuristic, next generation version,” Lee says.

“It is fully automated operation, unmanned platform,” with artificial intelligence to let it learn on the battlefield, he says.

Rise of the robots

At a sprawling, modern complex in Changwon, Hanwha’s robots churn out the artillery pieces for K9s at the rate of one unit every three to five days.

A combination of robots and humans combine on a seven-station assembly line to put together what will eventually be 47 metric tons of steel, machinery and electronics.

One robot, more than two stories high, welds the turrets, the brightness of the white-hot procedure lighting up the cavernous assembly building.

Further down the line, another robot bores holes in the green-painted steel, switching bits automatically as it goes about its work with an accuracy of 1/100th of a millimeter, thinner than a human hair, according to a Hanwha Defense official.

Once the robots are done, it is the turn of Hanwha’s workers. Each hull as it goes along the line bears the pictures of 11 of them.

“We provide excellence by name,” says Lee, the Hanwha executive vice president.

At each assembly station, there’s a “tollgate,” with green, yellow and red lights. Any worker can stop the line with a red light and summon engineers if they spot a problem.

At the final stop is the bore sighting, where the accuracy of the K9’s gun is tested on a target at the far end of the workspace.

The completed units then go outside for performance testing, causing the ground to vibrate as they roar along a paved road near their top speed of 67 kilometers per hour (42 mph).

Test drivers spin the tracked howitzer one way then the other, the rubber pads on the tracks leaving donuts on the concrete.

As the drivers put the units through their paces, Lee explains how Hanwha customizes K9s for its overseas customers: those bound for northern climates like Norway get extra heat sources for the crew; those made for hotter places like India or Egypt get more air conditioning. Some of the factory’s K9s are headed for Poland this year.

Jack Watling, senior research fellow for land warfare at the Royal United Services Institute in London, says South Korea is the perfect testing ground.

Its seasons range from deep-freeze winters to monsoons and summer heat of 30 degrees Celsius or higher – and it has both flat and mountainous terrain.

“That is a pretty unique set of complex variables in terms of having a vehicle that’s reliable across climatic conditions,” Watling says.

And that’s attracted foreign buyers, he says.

Just a few miles from where the K9 artillery pieces are being tested, the K2 tanks at the Hyundai Rotem factory are being put through their paces.

Again, the latest customer is Poland.

“This is our first time directly exporting our (K2),” says Kim, the Hyundai Rotem VP.

Orders from South Korea’s military keep the K2 assembly line busy enough – but the Polish order means Hyundai Rotem can add capacity.

This is essentially like buying a new car off the lot. In the tank world, you can’t quite drive your new K2 home that day, but you get the idea.

“The most important thing is that it is currently being produced,” Kim says.

The important US market

Hanwha Defense has its eyes on one market in particular – the United States, the world’s largest defense market.

“We want to enter the US market with support from a US local company and also, we want to contribute to the US Army and the US local defense industry,” says Lee, the Hanwha VP.

In 2021, US military spending was $801 billion. But South Korean weapons and ammunition exports to the US accounted for only $95 million, according to the US Commerce Department.

Overall, US military spending was more than the next nine countries combined, according to SIPRI. South Korea ranked 10th.

(Taiwan Ministry of Defense) MS 18573886

Taiwan Ministry of Defense

A new threat from China faces Taiwan's military: Trolls with drones

But the South Korean defense industry should be seen as a partner that complements its American counterpart, rather than competes with it, Chun says.

That massive US military budget includes huge expenditure on top-shelf items. That’s not what Seoul is selling, he points out.

“There are portions of a spectrum of weapons that the United States does not make, because they feel they don’t need to. It doesn’t make a profit for their industry. That’s what we’re targeting. The systems that we have sold to Poland are exactly those kind of systems,” he says.

“I’m hoping that the United States understands that this is a partnership,” Chun adds.

“The United States makes the greatest and best weapons in the world,” he says, “but they don’t make all of them.”

CNN’s Oren Liebermann contributed to this report.

CNN · by Brad Lendon,Gawon Bae,Paula Hancocks · November 26, 2022

13. South Korea in demographic crisis as many stop having babies

A capable and strong reserve force and not technology alone is required to mitigate this.

South Korea in demographic crisis as many stop having babies

AP · by HYUNG-JIN KIM · November 24, 2022

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — Yoo Young Yi’s grandmother gave birth to six children. Her mother birthed two. Yoo doesn’t want any.

“My husband and I like babies so much … but there are things that we’d have to sacrifice if we raised kids,” said Yoo, a 30-year-old Seoul financial company employee. “So it’s become a matter of choice between two things, and we’ve agreed to focus more on ourselves.”

There are many like Yoo in South Korea who have chosen either not to have children or not to marry. Other advanced countries have similar trends, but South Korea’s demographic crisis is much worse.

South Korea’s statistics agency announced in September that the total fertility rate — the average number of babies born to each woman in their reproductive years — was 0.81 last year. That’s the world’s lowest for the third consecutive year.

The population shrank for the first time in 2021, stoking worry that a declining population could severely damage the economy — the world’s 10th largest — because of labor shortages and greater welfare spending as the number of older people increases and the number of taxpayers shrinks.

President Yoon Suk Yeol has ordered policymakers to find more effective steps to deal with the problem. The fertility rate, he said, is plunging even though South Korea spent 280 trillion won ($210 billion) over the past 16 years to try to turn the tide.

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Many young South Koreans say that, unlike their parents and grandparents, they don’t feel an obligation to have a family. They cite the uncertainty of a bleak job market, expensive housing, gender and social inequality, low levels of social mobility and the huge expense of raising children in a brutally competitive society. Women also complain of a persistent patriarchal culture that forces them to do much of the childcare while enduring discrimination at work.

“In a nutshell, people think our country isn’t an easy place to live,” said Lee So-Young, a population policy expert at the Korea Institute for Health and Social Affairs. “They believe their children can’t have better lives than them, and so question why they should bother to have babies.”

Many people who fail to enter good schools and land decent jobs feel they’ve become “dropouts” who “cannot be happy” even if they marry and have kids because South Korea lacks advanced social safety nets, said Choi Yoon Kyung, an expert at the Korea Institute of Child Care and Education. She said South Korea failed to establish such welfare programs during its explosive economic growth in the 1960 to ’80s.

Yoo, the Seoul financial worker, said that until she went to college, she strongly wanted a baby. But she changed her mind when she saw female office colleagues calling their kids from the company toilet to check on them or leaving early when their children were sick. She said her male coworkers didn’t have to do this.

“After seeing this, I realized my concentration at work would be greatly diminished if I had babies,” Yoo said.

Her 34-year-old husband, Jo Jun Hwi, said he doesn’t think having kids is necessary. An interpreter at an information technology company, Jo said he wants to enjoy his life after years of exhaustive job-hunting that made him “feel like I was standing on the edge of a cliff.”

There are no official figures on how many South Koreans have chosen not to marry or have kids. But records from the national statistics agency show there were about 193,000 marriages in South Korea last year, down from a peak of 430,000 in 1996. The agency data also show about 260,600 babies were born in South Korea last year, down from 691,200 in 1996, and a peak of 1 million in 1971. The recent figures were the lowest since the statistics agency began compiling such data in 1970.

Kang Han Byeol, a 33-year-old graphic designer who’s decided to remain single, believes South Korea isn’t a sound place to raise children. She cited frustration with gender inequalities, widespread digital sex crimes targeting women such as spy cams hidden in public restrooms, and a culture that ignores those pushing for social justice.

“I can consider marriage when our society becomes healthier and gives more equal status to both women and men,” Kang said.

Kang’s 26-year-old roommate Ha Hyunji also decided to stay single after her married female friends advised her not to marry because most of the housework and child care falls to them. Ha worries about the huge amount of money she would spend for any future children’s private tutoring to prevent them from falling behind in an education-obsessed nation.

“I can have a fun life without marriage and enjoy my life with my friends,” said Ha, who runs a cocktail bar in Seoul.

Until the mid-1990s, South Korea maintained birth control programs, which were initially launched to slow the country’s post-war population explosion. The nation distributed contraceptive pills and condoms for free at public medical centers and offered exemptions on military reserve training for men if they had a vasectomy.

United Nations figures show a South Korean woman on average gave birth to about four to six children in the 1950s and ’60s, three to four in the 1970s, and less than two in the mid-1980s.

South Korea has been offering a variety of incentives and other support programs for those who give birth to many children. But Choi, the expert, said the fertility rate has been falling too fast to see any tangible effects. During a government task force meeting last month, officials said they would soon formulate comprehensive measures to cope with demographic challenges.

South Korean society still frowns on those who remain childfree or single.

In 2021 when Yoo and Jo posted their decision to live without children on their YouTube channel, “You Young You Young,” some posted messages calling them “selfish” and asking them to pay more taxes. The messages also called Jo “sterile” and accused Yoo of “gaslighting” her husband.

Lee Sung-jai, a 75-year-old Seoul resident, said it’s “the order of nature” for humankind to marry and give birth to children.

“These days, I see some (unmarried) young women walking with dogs in strollers and saying they are their moms. Did they give birth to those dogs? They are really crazy,” he said.

Seo Ji Seong, 38, said that she’s often called a patriot by older people for having many babies, though she didn’t give birth to them for the national interest. She’s expecting a fifth baby in January.

Seo’s family recently moved to a rent-free apartment in the city of Anyang, which was jointly provided by the state-run Korea Land and Housing Corporation and the city for families with at least four children. Seo and her husband, Kim Dong Uk, 33, receive other state support, though it’s still tough economically to raise four kids.

Kim said he enjoys seeing each of his children growing up with different personalities and talents, while Seo feels their kids’ social skills are helped while playing and competing with one another at home.

“They are all so cute. That’s why I’ve kept giving birth to babies even though it’s difficult,” Seo said.

AP · by HYUNG-JIN KIM · November 24, 2022

De Oppresso Liber,

David Maxwell

Senior Fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Senior Fellow, Global Peace Foundation

Senior Advisor, Center for Asia Pacific Strategy

Editor, Small Wars Journal

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Phone: 202-573-8647

email: david.maxwell161@gmail.com

V/R

David Maxwell

Senior Fellow

Foundation for Defense of Democracies

Phone: 202-573-8647

Personal Email: d avid.maxwell161@gmail.com

Web Site: www.fdd.org

Twitter: @davidmaxwell161

Subscribe to FDD’s new podcast, Foreign Podicy

FDD is a Washington-based nonpartisan research institute focusing on national security and foreign policy.

If you do not read anything else in the 2017 National Security Strategy read this on page 14:

"A democracy is only as resilient as its people. An informed and engaged citizenry is the fundamental requirement for a free and resilient nation. For generations, our society has protected free press, free speech, and free thought. Today, actors such as Russia are using information tools in an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of democracies. Adversaries target media, political processes, financial networks, and personal data. The American public and private sectors must recognize this and work together to defend our way of life. No external threat can be allowed to shake our shared commitment to our values, undermine our system of government, or divide our Nation."

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