ANALYSIS: Barriers to peace
HOW do you know when sabre rattling is just that and not the precursor for something much more sinister?
It is a question that famously got the better of Neville Chamberlain, who will forever be remembered in history as such. The reason to ask this now of course is the events currently playing out on the Korean peninsula, in particular, its northern half.
For weeks now North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has issued far from subtle threats directed squarely at South Korea and its main ally the United States. Pyongyang claim to have nuclear missiles capable of reaching the US mainland, something Western experts have generally dismissed.
What is not up for debate, however, is the fact that the regime in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has stepped up its efforts in achieving the aim of developing intercontinental missiles.
Last Friday, the DPRK began work on reopening the Yongbyon nuclear facility, a move they insisted was primarily to provide weapons grade material for the war effort. It is a key goal of the Kim Jong-un leadership to finally force North Korea’s entry into the nuclear club. This he believes will bring prestige to the country and much more leverage at the negotiating table.
That leverage should subsequently provide a host of benefits, not least favourable trade terms, foreign aid, as well as an end to the latest UN sanctions that have so enraged Pyongyang and caused the situation to deteriorate so rapidly and to this level.
The question now is what lengths will Kim Jong-un go to prove his mettle as a military force. While an attack on the US mainland remains implausible at the present time, South Korea, Japan, and a host of other US military bases in the region certainly remain firmly on the North Korean radar. The current impasse has not yet witnessed any direct military confrontation, but with the words of warning reaching new levels of intensity each day, the time for mere talking will surely soon be at an end.
Despite this, everyday life in Seoul shows little signs of looming disaster. I arrived here on Mar 1 to begin a year teaching at an English-language school located on the outskirts of the city. My timing was impeccable in this case, and at first the reports occupying the lead stories of most of the major western news organisations were more than a tad disconcerting.
Before I arrived the major impression I had of Kim Jong-un was of an inexperienced ruler thrust into power way before his time — much happier meeting stars of the NBA like Dennis Rodman than attempting to solve the myriad of problems facing his country. His appearance certainly leaves plenty of room for satire also — an opportunity many western comics have not missed out on.
I was surprised though to hear some of my students also make light of the North Korean “Supreme Ruler“, 8-year-olds laughing and joking about their supposed hated enemy. The innocence and naivety of youth perhaps; but should the latest member of the Kim dynasty instead be feared like his father and grandfather before him? He has certainly reacted in the past month like a man and leader with a point to prove, both to his own people and the outside world.
For many South Koreans the behaviour of Kim Jong-un is not cause for grave concern. They have been here before of course, many times; the North and South have technically still been at war since the armistice of 1953 secured a truce but not peace. Since then there have been frequent occasions when a full-scale renewal of hostilities looked likely, but as yet, it has not happened.
Most recently was the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island by North Korean forces in Nov 2010, resulting in the death of four South Koreans. Unsurprisingly, this brought an emphatic response from Seoul and the tinderbox that is the peninsula looked ready to ignite. Eventually cooler heads prevailed, no doubt with the US and China playing a significant part in the decision-making process.
The narrative here often follows a familiar pattern — North Korea reacts through force to what it considers a slight against its nation — South Korea being the recipient of said force meets fire with fire — war looks all but certain — international powerbrokers step in and exert influence — back to where we where at the beginning. It is the reason why many South Koreans have developed a stoic attitude regarding their neighbours.
Kevin Han, 37, lives in the city of Suwon, located just south of Seoul and with a population of 1m people. That a satellite city like Suwon hosts a population almost the same as our capital gives a guide to the sheer size of Seoul (20.5m people in the metropolitan area, making it second in the world behind Tokyo).
Like all males of sound health in the country, Kevin was required to complete military service. His term ran from 1996 to 1999, which as it transpired was somewhat longer than he had expected. The spanner in the works in this case came from a familiar source.
“My military service was with the air force at Osan airbase near my home in Suwon. Nowadays the service is shorter than when I served. I remember back then I had only one month left, but then the Battle of Yeonpyeong happened and I had to stay. That was really serious and everyone back then was worried about what might happen. We all wondered would the war start again.”
Like the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island, the Battle of Yeonpyeong in 1999 occurred when North Korea responded to what it claimed was South Korean encroachment into its territory. The result was seven days of entanglement from the respective navies, which led to about 30 deaths, all on the side of the North.
In 2013 we are yet to see a bullet fired in anger, let alone any deaths, so for the time being Kevin Han believes this to be yet another storm that will quickly pass over.
“There is no difference from my perspective. I think this kind of thing is happening now because we just had a presidential election with Park Geun-hye coming in. I think everything will just go back to normal soon. If they want to commit suicide then they will use nuclear weapons, but they don’t want to. Their government are the ones enjoying the best of everything in their country; they don’t want to lose that.”
That last point is an interesting one. Although Pyongyang does its utmost to bring a cloak of secrecy over its machinations, it is well known that those in positions of power live in opulence while the vast majority of their people live in abject poverty.
Amnesty International published a report in Nov last year from the Food and Agricultural Organisation and the World Food Programme. The report, grim reading and entirely damning of the current regime, found that much of the population suffered ongoing food deprivation from May to September of 2012.
This occurred when the public distribution system in the country reduced the ration of cereal to 200g or less per person per day. To put this in context, this amounts to one third of a person’s minimum energy requirements per day. In 2012, malnutrition also affected one-in-four women aged 15 to 49, while just over a third of all infants suffered from stunting and nearly a fifth were underweight (Amnesty International).
It was for this reason, and perhaps learning some lessons from the sanctions they imposed in Iraq, the UN’s latest measures directly targeted the ruling elite rather than the general population. This meant an embargo on luxury goods such as yachts and expensive jewellery, as well as restrictions on the means to buy these goods — in this case limiting North Korean ability to move money surreptitiously.
In addition were sanctions on sea-bound cargo set to curb the regime’s burgeoning and all important nuclear programme. These measures came under the remit of resolution 2094, first issued on Mar 7 after crucially receiving the support of China. The consequences of the UN’s actions have yet to be fully realised but there are two likely scenarios: The desired effect of reining in Pyongyang and forcing them to abandon their ambitions of becoming a nuclear power, or, more frighteningly, the direct opposite.
It is the position that China has taken in the dispute which means most people remain confident of a less lethal outcome.
North Korea prides itself on its national ideology of Juche or self-reliance; that being said, no country can survive totally independent of outsiders. The DPRK is as close as you are ever likely to get, but without China’s support its fragile existence would have already succumbed.
Beijing has acted as Pyongyang’s sole ally in the majority of disputes with Seoul since the end of the Korean War. Both have a shared history when it comes to their communist past, but China has embraced the free market much more nowadays, setting them on course to becoming the world’s largest economy by 2016. That trajectory would no doubt be knocked off course were another war on the Korean peninsula to break out, so why China has taken its current stance is obvious.
So, what does the future hold for North Korea? Despite the pronouncements to the contrary, even Kim Jong-un must realise that without China’s support, a devastating military strike against South Korea, and by extension, the US, would almost certainly bring about the end of his regime.
That means that the most likely outcome will be further threats and bellicose language emanating from Pyongyang over the coming days and weeks, followed eventually by a climbdown, albeit a face-saving one for the new ruler.
Should that happen then perhaps the UN will relax some of its sanctions, but not before terms are set regarding nuclear disarmament.
Such an occurrence will have a certain ring of déjà vu; this is a game that is surely growing tiresome, not least for the real victims of this saga — the North Korean people.
For the military of the US, South and North Korea alike, as well as an ever hungry western media, the so-called crisis of the past few weeks will ultimately be beneficial. All the while the people of North Korea continue to starve, undergo torture, be forced into political prison camps by the hundreds of thousands, and denied all the basic liberties and freedoms we all take for granted. It has been 60 years since the end of the Korean War, yet still they must endure.
As a native South Korean, Kevin Han has never set foot on the other side of the 38th parallel splitting the two countries, nor has he ever even met or spoken with a North Korean. Regardless, he has read and seen on television the testimonies of those that have managed to escape the despotic Kim regime. For that reason he believes Korea as it is now, divided, will not always be that way
“Before most North Koreans were isolated and they did not have any connection with the outside world. Nowadays I think they are starting to get that. There are cheap computers and gadgets they can import from China; that will change everything.”
* David Keelaghan is a freelance journalist teaching English in Seoul.
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