By UPDATE:
Dr. Lankov was nice enough to leave a comment and a link to a recent AEI paper he wrote that further outlines his views in regards to what the US should do in regards to North Korea. Like most of the writings from Dr. Lankov, this is a must read, so check it out.
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Original Posting:
For those that follow Andrei Lankov his latest article in Newsweek echoes themes he has been advocating for, for quite sometime:
Much of the recent commentary has suggested that these moves are a ploy—an attempt by North Korea to sweeten a coming deal with the United States—and that ultimately, Pyongyang will give up its provocations and open to the outside world, as China has. This is a dangerous fantasy. Kim Jong Il and his circle know that exposing their subjects to foreign influence would be fatal to the regime. So they’re likely to continue clamping down and provoking the West. There’s only one way for outsiders to stop Kim’s aggression: regime change.
North Korea will never follow the Chinese path because its circumstances are profoundly different. The biggest factor is the existence of a rich and free South Korea across the border. Southerners share the same language and culture as the dirt-poor North, but their per capita income is at least 20 times higher—and at the moment, average North Koreans are ignorant of the gap. The regime’s self-imposed isolation is so draconian that even owning a tunable radio set is a crime. If North Korea started reforming, it would be flooded with information about South Korea’s prosperity. This would make North Koreans less fearful of the authorities and more likely to push for unification with their far richer cousins, just as the East Germans pushed to rejoin the West. [Newsweek]
Read the rest but Lankov goes on to recommend more development aid for North Korea, ways to bring outside influences into North Korea such as scholarships for North Korean regime officials children.
I definitely agree with Lankov in regards to how military strikes and negotiations to get North Korea to disarm and follow the China model are not options. However, increasing development aid to North Korea I would be concerned about because that has been tried with the United Nations Developmental Program (UNDP) and Kim Jong-il simply turned that into his own personal ATM.
Scholarships for regime officials’ children I have no problem with, but I would like to see scholarships for North Korean defectors as well in order to help create an educated class of North Koreans that help rebuild their own country. Also something I am pretty sure Lankov agrees with as well, is that more support needs be given to defector radio stations broadcasting into North Korea along with smuggling in more radios and cell phones to fight the information war within North Korea that will ultimately weaken regime control.
Like I said before make sure to read the whole thing because Lankov is one of the few serious North Korea thinkers that understands the issues on the peninsula possibly better then anyone else.
5:50 am on April 22nd, 2009 1
Re defectors etc. In Newsweek I was given 850 words, so had to talk about less obvious things. More detailed proposals, with references to radio stations, education defectors (creating an “alternative elite”), etc see http://www.aei.org/publications/pubID.29483/pub_detail.asp
Everything which is in your wish list but mobile phones (no that I am against phones). And it is also important to start producing DIGITAL MATERIAL to be smuggled there.
7:36 am on April 22nd, 2009 2
Professor Lankov is advancing an idea from SOROS’s Open Society Institute, which is an organization that I have not see getting behind North Korean issues in a big way, either with funding or equipment. But in a closed totalitarian society, freer access to real information is like kryptonite to the government.
12:28 pm on April 22nd, 2009 3
If S.K. ever wants to get serious and reunite with the north all they have to do is wait for a real cold winter day and prepare several HUGE Korean style Bar-B-Que’s just this side of the DMZ with Pork, Beef Kalbi, Ribs, Ox Tail, along with plenty of San Mekju and Soju. Be sure the wind is heading north..add a dozen or so loudspeakers blaring “Come Join Us!” and this war is OVER!
5:13 pm on April 22nd, 2009 4
Dr. Lankov thanks for commenting and leaving a link. The paper was a great read and does a good job of summarizing all the topics you have advocated for in the past.
I had not realized how widespread DVD players had become in North Korea. That would really make your idea of spreading digital material more relevant.
I agree with all of your proposals except with the musical and economic engagement you favor. I wouldn’t have a problem with either depending on how much money the regime is getting compared to the amount of engagement we are getting in return.
Plus at Kaesong you criticize the “slave labor” label for the place, but what else do you call having workers work 24 hours straight?
http://rokdrop.com/2009/03/04/north-korea-demands-new-regulations-for-kaesong-companies/
Plus much of the pay the workers receive reportedly end up in the pockets of the regime.
You should try and interview the Kaesong worker that defected and see how much money she actually received plus how much contact the workers really had with South Koreans.
http://rokdrop.com/2008/12/15/kaesong-complex-worker-defects-from-north-korea/
With more information and improved work conditions I could be persuaded to support the Kaesong project but the way it is run right now I do not.
Once again thanks for commenting and I appreciate the feedback.
5:15 pm on April 22nd, 2009 5
As per Lankov’s comment about the need for digital information….how about $10 DVD players flooding the northeast China market place and $1 collections of all the trashy Korean TV would help. Any chance of getting documentaries into the mix?
5:23 pm on April 22nd, 2009 6
I just left Dr. Lankov a comment above, but I to like the digital material idea as well. If you read Dr. Lankov’s AEI article, he cites that some 25% of affluent areas in North Korea have DVD players. Smuggling in small DVD players may be another option along with radios to further spread subversive information into North Korea.
5:25 pm on April 22nd, 2009 7
Bob you need to be more specific in regards to your Soros comment because I seriously doubt Dr. Lankov has anything to do with George Soros.
5:53 pm on April 22nd, 2009 8
Alas, right now I have to rush, so cannot write in detail, but the disagreement about engagement is a major one and should be discussed (this is the reason why I wrote about engagement, not support for opposition, in the above-mentioned Newsweek piece). Frankly, I would expect that the ‘destructive engagement’ will be responsible for, say, 60% of the program success while the old good opposition endorsement policies will bring in the remaining 40%. Perhaps,I can write about it later. In a nutshell: regime believes it can take money for cognac and limos from the engagement while neutralizing the political impact on its population. In the long run, it’s their mistake.
But, at any rate, even if only subversive parts are done, it’s still OK (40% are far better than nothing). Unfortunately, not much is done in that way either. Broadcast is growing, but not much else.
6:07 pm on April 22nd, 2009 9
RE DVDs. It is good idea, but some people have already tried something like that (not with DVD player), and it did not work, since local Chinese vendors began to buy the subsidized items for resale in China. RE documentaries. It’s one of my favourite idea, too. Cheap and very efficient. The NK is hungry of information.
6:24 am on April 23rd, 2009 10
I think the problem with the economic engagement is that no one has quantified what the giving of tens of millions of dollars to the North Koreans at Kaesong for example has done.
How many South Koreans did these workers interact with every day? What was the regime propaganda being used to justify the existence of these South Koreans at Kaesong? Did the workers believe it? How much did these workers really bring home in pay? Were they really working 24 hour shifts as reported? Etc., etc.s
Thee same questions should be asked to people that worked at the Kumgang Resort as well if any have defected.
That is why I think interviewing workers at either of these facilities would provide for some interesting reading that could better support a case for supporting the economic projects.
8:01 pm on April 23rd, 2009 11
I am familiar with the work that George Soros’s OSI did in Eastern Europe and Burma, at first with fax machines, and later computers and printers, then with multimedia. Basically “flooding the zone” with all sorts of IT and dissemination tools. Prof. Lankov is advancing an argument for a program that worked in the former Eastern Bloc.
In Burma, however, the junta doesn’t really care what the people believe. The junta has the guns.
1:16 am on April 24th, 2009 12
[...] launch, the restarting of its nuclear program, and continuation of human rights violations. As blogger G.I. Korea noted, Dr. Andrei Lankov, an expert on Korea, advocates a radically different kind of policy, one [...]