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March 24, 2006

What happens if Kim kicks the bucket?

A good friend, who is British, but has lived in Japan for years, emails me this:

Thought of you when I picked up the following info. Watched a Japanese TV program on Kim Jong Il and his rapidly declining health the other day. Apparently he has chronic diabetes (would fit with his lifestyle)and some form of heart disease (runs in the family), I had noticed that he looks like hell in recent photos, and is aging rapidly. Seems one of the reasons for his recent trip to China was to get some medical treatment there that he couldn't get in NK. You could tell from the photos etc that his health has declined markedly in the last 3 yrs, he's lost a bunch of weight, has "old" marks on his face, has swelling in his limbs, has lost a lot of hair and his eye sight has declined a lot (you can tell by the thickness and type of his glasses). I'd say the chances of him dying suddenly (like his dad) are pretty good. What would happen then? He has been trying to bring up one of his kids as his successor but the kid is still in his 20s and apparently has no military experience.

Thought you'd like to know the latest! Hopefully I'll be moving out of Taepong Dong range before the cookie crumbles.

You heard it here first. Hmmmm . . . There are way too many variables on that little peninsula for me to be of much good here, but my guess is one of the following scenarios if Kim's life is coming to an end:

1. Last-ditch gotterdammerung-ish "take them all with me" tactic on his part
2. A coup from within, but whether by reformers or hardliners, who's to know . . .
3. Regime collapse. Rather than "coup"ing, those who might have chosen a coup choose to bail instead and sit on a beach earning 20% for the rest of their lives. Signs of this would be: "dissident" activity begins to go unpunished; internal security forces choose to no longer enforce party doctrine; refugees stream south and into China; mass desertions from the army take place;

What probably won't happen:
1. Pre-emptive US military action; except perhaps on a very limited scale if we suspect they will lose control of their nukes, but I doubt we have the means to make a judgment like that.
2. A "color" revolution of some kind; the NKs are not nearly exposed enough to the rest of the world to have developed the intestinal fortitude to attempt something a la Ukraine or Lebanon.

In a collapse scenario, US and/or South Korean military action is possible for a stability/humanitarian mission. A dark horse candidate might be some sort of humanitarian intervention by the Chinese, who might look to gain goodwill on the peninsula for long term use; this scenario assumes a semi-expeditionary capability on the part of China's military that may not exist; of course they did manage to cross the Yalu just fine 56 years ago . . . they've been basing troops along that border for at least the past year or so . . .

Whatever happens, I think North Korea will still be very poor, and not very free, for a long time, though there may be some moments to give us (and them) encouragement . . . kind of like when the wall came down in Berlin.

Posted by Chester at March 24, 2006 6:53 PM

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Comments

Posted by: RPL at March 29, 2006 5:48 PM

Posted by: playertwo at March 29, 2006 6:57 PM