After vowing to re-start propaganda operations within North Korea as retaliation for the sinking of the Cheonan, the South Korean government has now backed down on this pledge:

After the results of the Cheonan investigation were released last month, Lee issued a laundry list of things his country would do in response, including stopping all trade with North Korea, barring North cargo ships from South Korean waters and resuming “psychological warfare” through the broadcasting of anti-North propaganda from banks of loudspeakers set up near the DMZ.

North Korea responded by threatening “all-out war” if further provoked. It said any propaganda-blasting speakers would be fired upon, and it threatened to bar South Koreans from commuting to the Kaesong Industrial Complex, where workers from the North and South continue to work side by side just north of the DMZ.

The South has since backed off its threat to put up the speakers, according to South Korean media reports.  [Stars & Stripes]

Not only has the South Korean government backed off on putting up the speakers, but they are not going to send propaganda leaflets into North Korea as well:

Separately, about 300 activists and defectors opposed to North Korea’s government gathered in the city of Paju near the inter-Korean border Thursday to denounce leader Kim Jong Il and launch leaflets and DVDs via huge balloons across the border.

The leaflets and the DVDs contained information on the sinking of the South Korean ship, said Choi Sung-yong, one of the protest organizers.

The activists said the balloons carried 150,000 leaflets, 300 DVDs, 200 portable radios as well as $2,000 in cash to support North Koreans.

Park Sang-hak, who heads a group of North Korean defectors, said the activists wanted to “let North Koreans know the truth” about the ship sinking.

“What a weak, opportunistic government we have in South Korea,” Park said. “The government should be sending these flyers.”

South Korea late last month announced a series of steps to punish the North, including curtailing trade and resuming propaganda operations. The government resumed radio broadcasts into the North, but has so far stopped short of sending leaflets or starting broadcasts via loudspeaker across the border.  [Associated Press]

What is interesting about this latest launch is that they are now sending across subversive media as well leaflets into North Korea.  The sending of subversive media is something that I and other Korea watchers have advocated for.

It is pretty pathetic that the worse punishment being implemented on the North Koreans for the sinking of the Cheonan is not coming from any government or the United Nations, but from Park Sang-hak’s activists.  The North Korean regime despises these propaganda balloons and considering their angry reactions in the past to these launches.  Back in April the North Koreans were implying violence to stop these balloon launches.  The anger from the North Korean regime has been so intense that they even mobilized their communist fifth column within South Korea to stop the balloon launches.