Dictator’s Readiness Order
North Korea’s War Breeze
The dictator’s readiness order: North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has ordered the acceleration of the country’s war preparations, but currently, the socialist Korea is grappling with food insecurity and increasing internal problems.
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea must be ready for war, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un announced on Thursday, December 28. In a meeting with senior officials of the Workers’ Party of Korea, the only party in North Korea’s dictatorship, he instructed the military, the war industry, and nuclear weapons sector to accelerate preparations for countering what he referred to as unprecedented confrontational actions from the United States.
In the same speech, according to the official KCNA news agency, the North Korean leader assured that Pyongyang would expand its strategic cooperation with independent and anti-imperialist countries to confront its main enemies, referring to the United States and its allies, on the global stage.
The provocative statements of the North Korean leader, the third dictator of the socialist regime after his father Kim Jong Il and grandfather Kim Il Sung, were made at a time when the country is struggling to overcome indigenous food insecurity. Nevertheless, the Pyongyang government tries to conceal the devastating effects on the population or at least interpret them optimistically.
Anti-American Axis
Kim’s statements at the plenary meeting of the party’s central committee were made just hours after South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol visited a military unit deployed at the front line in the eastern province of Yeoncheon.
According to South Korea’s Yonhap news agency, after visiting this military base, Yoon Suk asked the soldiers to take retaliatory action without delay if they observe any provocative movements from North Korea. The South Korean president told the military, ‘I urge you to immediately and firmly crush the enemy’s provocative will.’
Kim’s reference to countries hostile to the United States, with which Pyongyang intends to strengthen relations, is part of a phase of rapprochement with Moscow, which culminated in Kim’s visit to Russia in September and his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Washington openly accuses Pyongyang of providing military equipment to Moscow for use in the Ukraine war. Meanwhile, Russia is also providing North Korea with the necessary technical support to advance its military capabilities. Putin has also promised Kim to help develop North Korea’s satellite technology, especially after North Korea failed to launch two satellites into Earth’s orbit in 2023, with both projects ending in failure.
Pyongyang in Hunger’s Grip
During the plenary meeting of the party’s central committee, the North Korean leader outlined the economic goals for 2024, calling it a decisive year for implementing the five-year development project based on the five-year plan model. National media reported that Kim outlined the goals of key industrial sectors and, more importantly, the stabilization of agricultural production at a high level.
Food insecurity is a long-standing problem for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, which has suffered from severe food shortages leading to widespread famines in recent decades, especially in the 1990s, resulting in the deaths of millions.
Behind the historical food insecurity, according to international reports, both political responsibilities and choices, as well as natural factors and disasters, are involved. According to several international observers, the closure of borders during the COVID-19 pandemic may have exacerbated the situation, making it worse than before. However, it is estimated that North Korea’s agricultural production increased last year compared to 2022, as weather conditions were more favorable.
A South Korean official told Reuters in an interview that despite this, the total production in North Korea is still far below the total required to address the chronic food shortage in the country.
Escalating Tension
The ninth plenary session of the eighth central committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea began on Tuesday, December 26. In recent years, this political state assembly has been repeatedly used to announce decisive steps and important actions. In 2023, this meeting took place at the end of a tumultuous year for socialist Korea, during which Pyongyang incorporated its nuclear development policy into the country’s constitution.
Although this move is mostly symbolic, it reinforces the idea that North Korea intends to present itself as a nuclear power on the international stage, and from Pyongyang’s perspective, the idea of nuclear disarmament or giving up weapons, which is a key demand from the United States and its allies, is not up for discussion.
Additionally, last year, North Korea launched an intercontinental ballistic missile, and in fact, this latest display of North Korean power occurred precisely when tensions with Washington were very high.
At the end of November, after the United States strongly criticized Pyongyang for launching North Korea’s first spy satellite into orbit, Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of the North Korean leader, also rejected the United States’ request to return to diplomacy in response to this criticism.
Like all other dictatorships, Kim Jong Un is no stranger to delivering fiery and epic speeches for propaganda purposes. Therefore, his statements in the past week should not lead us to think that conflict on the Korean Peninsula is ready to reignite.
Nevertheless, the strengthening of the US-South Korea alliance in nuclear deterrence in 2023 has created new concerns for the Pyongyang regime, which takes the latest military developments, including the rotation of US nuclear submarines and Seoul’s involvement in managing strategic weapons, very seriously. However, this new round of military consolidation in the two Koreas may instead risk destabilizing the balance in the peninsula rather than strengthening stability.