Kimmy's dead

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Kim Jong Il died from heart attack. The next "dear leader" will be Kim Jong Un, a funky young man. So the dynasty continues, however I think that this guy is just a figure. Military heads are running the show.
 
^ yup. The amount of brainwashing done there is just insane. I've watched few documentaries (Western-origin, of course), and my reaction afterwards was one big  :blink:

Vast majority of people are living without basic medical care. When I say basic, I mean basic - filthy operating beds, DIY infusion stuff made of beer bottles, horrifying. Thousands of  people across Pyongyang are blind due to lens clouding (forgot the proper medical term for that condition), which comes from systematic malnutrition. The procedure, in normal world, is quite simple. Surgeon cuts the eyeball, removes the lens and inserts a plastic replacement. It's done in few minutes. They've let a Nepalese humanitarian surgeon in, to organize a mass-operation on hundreds of people in few days. He restored their sights, only to see that their gratitude was directed towards Kim Jong Il and Kim Il Sung - the moment those people got their sight back, they started bowing down to images of dear leaders. In a southern Gospel style hallelujah outburst.

They even let a camera crew visit one of the patients at her home - which is novelty because NK authorities never allowed documenting the private life of citizens. So it's safe to assume that authorities considered her living place as a showcase thing. Mind you - to NK authorities, everything you are permit to see, is a showcase. From facades of Pyongyang itself, to massive "games", etc. Anyways, she has a small flat in a rusty building, place itself was clean, TV, radio, stuff...but for true comparison, it's on par with lower-class Yugoslav workers community flats from 1960's. So I won't even try to picture what kind of housing NK doesn't want to show.

The worst thing about NK is that you cannot just go in, and "liberate" those poor people. They have been isolated and brainwashed for decades. The transition-to-something-normal process would take decades too, and would require an inside job.
 
It's really hard to say what's going to happen. There could be a civil war between one military head and another, as they fight over who gets to be regent. A lot of people think the younger Kim isn't ready to take command in any way, shape, or form.

But the worst possible outcome for us would be the collapse of North Korea. The amount of aid - both humanitarian and financial - that would be needed for that country is astronomical. Kim destroyed the entire populace and half a peninsula.
 
I voiced my thoughts on this a while ago:

Perun said:
If it was possible to assassinate Kim, there are many different outcomes, all of which are speculation and equally likely. There might be a power vacuum that could either lead to the disintegration of the state, or to a civil war, or to something else. But the military could have things so much in their grip that they will prevent a power vacuum from happening. They could also just put Kim's son on the throne for show... or Kim's son is actually powerful enough to take control himself. Or Kim is just a puppet. Or he's actually dead and they're using a doppelganger. Or he never existed. Really, anything is possible.
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I'm still not entirely sure that Kim actually ever existed, in the shape we believe to have seen.
 
If *nothing changes* in North Korea, then I think we have our answer there, my friend.
 
I watched an interview with North Korean defector that worked as Kim Jong Il's advisor. He said that Jong never listened to any advice, eg. he would listen, "take into account", and then do otherwise. Not from him, not from any other advisor. That could mean that either he had complete power over anything, or that he was just a puppet. I tend to side with former, since he's been prepared to take over from Sung since mid 1970s.
 
Entirely possible. And then the question becomes...what happens now? Only one way to find out...and let's hope nobody dies in the process.
 
The clips of people weeping in the streets are among the more quietly disturbing things I've seen in a long time.
 
I think nothing will change soon, as long as the system doesn't.


CNN:

Why does China support North Korea?

Last May, Kim Jong Il visited China again to ask for continued economic and military aid and political support. On this trip Kim went with another urgent mission: to introduce to the Chinese senior leaders his youngest son, Kim Jong Un, as his heir apparent. As North Korea's major ally, experts say, China's support for the young Kim was important.

China-North Korean ties are so close they are frequently described "as close as lips and teeth," and the two neighbors were Korean War allies. Of all the regional powers, Beijing has the greatest potential leverage over Pyongyang. China supplies at least 80% of North Korea's oil and significant amounts of food, fertilizer and military aid. The two Communist neighbors have frequent political, military and party-to-party exchanges.

Foremost in Beijing's mind, North Korea serves as a buffer, keeping the U.S. troops stationed in South Korea away from the Chinese border.

China has a huge stake in North Korea's stability, experts believe. Former CNN correspondent, Mike Chinoy, a veteran Korea-watcher who has visited North Korea several times, said: "The Chinese have made it extremely clear that they are not going to let Korea go down the drain. They are going to do whatever they need to do to prop it up."

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What is in store for North Korea?

North Korea's Stalinist government has survived mostly by closing itself off and defying the rest of the world. The question is, will this strategy continue to work in the years ahead for the third of the Kim dynasty to rule North Korea?

"The news of the death of Kim Jong Il opens a new chapter in the life of this isolated and repressive regime as it negotiates food aid to stave off starvation for its people and attempts to revive economy amid international concerns over its nuclear ambitions," said New York-based Vishakha Desai, Asia Society president who visited North Korea six months ago.

So will the country's Stalinist regime endure?

Kim's death could provide an opportunity for change, or trigger instability and even chaos. His son, the "Great Successor" Kim Jong Un, now inherits a reclusive, unstable regime confronting political uncertainty, diplomatic isolation, economic malaise and food shortages.

North Korea has been dogged by famine since the mid-1990s when it was hit by severe food shortage caused by floods, drought and economic mismanagement. United Nations agencies based in Pyongyang say the North is in desperate need of outside aid to feed its 24 million people.


BBC:

Live coverage of the death of North Korean communist leader Kim Jong-il, who had led the country since 1994.

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North Korean television has announced the death of Kim Jong-il, who has led the communist nation since the death of his father in 1994.

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The death of Kim Jong-il is the ultimate moment of truth for North Korea. This strangest of regimes has survived for 20 years after most forms of communism elsewhere either perished or morphed into something more sensible. So we had best not underestimate its staying power.

Kim Jong-un inherits a poisoned chalice. This untried youth must now run a country both at odds with most of the world and oppressive of its long-suffering people - who may not obey forever, despite the remarkable scenes of publicly orchestrated grief which we are now witnessing.

- - - - - - -

Whaaaat? Communist nation? Stalinist regime?   :blink:
Lies on the internet! Anyone wants to send an e-mail to CNN and BBC to tell them they talk bullshit?
 
Forostar said:
Whaaaat? Communist nation? Stalinist regime? Lies on the internet! Anyone wants to send an e-mail to CNN and BBC that they talk bullshit?
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What the fuck? Dude, nobody said North Korea isn't a Stalinist regime. They are, in fact, a perfect example of Stalinistic totalitarianism. Right down to the personality cult and organization. It's like Kim Il-sung was TRAINED by Stalin to be a little Stalin. The difference is that he was able to survive his own party.

So yeah, I don't know what your jock's in a twist about this time.
 
And perhaps worse: the word communism is even used more often (at least by the BBC). Naturally no one denied that either.

Ahh, it's only CNN and BBC, maybe we shouldn't be bothered, what do they know about it anyway?
 
In an article I read, when Kim Jong-il took over, he declared a 3 year period of mourning for his father before officially taking over power.  That combined a traditional eastern method of transfering power and allowed him to build a Stalinist Cult of Personality.  During this time, he did make overtures to the West and to South Korea (he later backed off of pretty much everything).    There is some speculation that will be the model followed here as well and it would make sense to try to remove international pressure while condolidating power internally.
 
Forostar said:
And perhaps worse: the word communism is even used more often (at least by the BBC). Naturally no one denied that either.

Ahh, it's only CNN and BBC, maybe we shouldn't be bothered, what do they know about it anyway?
Click to expand...


North Korea is of course communist only in name. A regime where power is transferred from father to son and is kept within a military elite does not have much to do with communism. And China are not very Communist either - not any more. The market has its say in that country. The fact that the government controls everything and exercises censorship does not equal communism.

But as LC points out, NK are clearly a Stalinist regime. Stalinism and Communism are not the same. That does not keep some Western communists from defending both Stalin-era Soviet Union, China and North Korea - because all are/were Communist regimes in name - and because they are/were outspoken enemies of Western capitalism.
 
Apparently that does not keep all kinds of non-communist media (and individuals) from naming it a communist nation.
 
Well, a precise language is not what I expect from the media anyway. Stalinism, on the other hand, is a pretty precise term for what we see in North Korea.

By the way, I hope you don't think I'm trying to defend Communism by claiming that North Korea has nothing to do with it. I think it is a rubbish ideology - for reasons that would take more than a few lines to explain. But I wouldn't use North Korea as an argument against it. As I see it, there is little difference between the regimes of North Korea and Iran, despite the difference in ideology.
 
Dr. Eddies Wingman said:
I think it is a rubbish ideology
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Now we're talking!  :D

I don't separate Stalinism entirely from Communism myself. I explained that in a topic you missed (and where I failed miserably to convince others  :innocent: ), and where Perun quoted from.
 
Ok so what Perun said about Kim being any number of things is pretty much how I reacted when I heard the news. NK could pretty much issue any statement they liked and who knows if its the truth or not. For all we know Kim could have decided he wanted to be publicized as dead so he could go tour the world incognito with his pet bear. And that's the problem with that country and its relationship with the outside world...who the fuck knows whats actually going on in there?

As for the debate on communism and Stalinism, I think NK is pretty much the quintessential example of a totalitarian dictatorship, be it dictatorship of the Jong-Il family or of some nameless invisible military man who pulls the strings in the background. I think it has very little to do with communism at all, to be honest.
 
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