The walls have eyes too.
Posted on 03/15/2008 3:49:14 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
03/12/2008 12:51
Kim Jong-il fears coup, strips military of power
A North Korean government source says a major shift is underway in North Korea’s military-first policy. Decisions are overturned and funds for the armed forces are cut by 30 per cent to prevent the generals from taking over. Secret police is strengthened.
Seoul (AsiaNews) – North Korea’s decades-old “military-first” policy is changing as the power of the Communist regime’s army is reduced in favour of the Ministry of People’s Security. Some experts suggest the shift is related to the ongoing battle over the succession to the ‘dear leader’ who fears a generals’ coup.
The report comes from a source inside the government in Pyongyang, anonymous for security reason, who spoke to the South Korean daily Dong-a Ilbo.
The source said yesterday that “Kim Jong Il has ordered the military to transfer its foreign operations to his cabinet and is implementing a radical reform of military authorities.”
Kim ordered a cut to the armed forces by 30 per cent, including the number of soldiers.
The changes should be announced before the end of March, but the source noted that officers in the chain of command including the Ministry of the People’s Armed Forces, the National Security Council, the Ministry of State Inspection and the General Staff Department began retiring in January.
The Ministry of People’s Security is instead being strengthened. Funds taken from the military are said to have already been given to the “secret police” which will now be able to probe the military, hitherto protected from outside interference.
According to the source the shift shows how much Kim Jong-il is afraid of the power vacuum that his death might cause, and that he is convinced that his dynasty has the right to rule over the country. For this reason he does not want the military to come forward in a power struggle.
Ping!
Yeah, that'll work.
Kim..look over there..
that plant moved...
Kim...pssst Kim...
ya better watch that gold fish, he has big eyes...
Kim....psssst Kim
damn Kim....that mop is big, get rid of it...
Kim...psssst Kim...remember that Train wreck and explosion?
ya better tear up all railroad tracks...
Kim....pssst Kim
that toilet tissue looks new,...better have a serf use it first
More communist secret police, that must make the citizens fear what will happen in the future.
Thanks for the ping.
The voices are getting louder now...
Now THIS is interesting. Didn’t some similar power maneuvers happen shortly before Jong Il’s death?
Must be getting hard for him to hear anything over them.
The walls have eyes too.
Lil Kim! Watch out for the “daily Dong-a Ilbo.”
"Foreign operations?" Interesting term, because hardly anybody gets out of that hellhole. Is "foreign operations" the group which plots invasions of S. Korea, or is it the outfit which peddles nukes to the Muzzie terror states?
This affair is reminiscent of Stalin's purge of his military.
Maybe he plans on sending his secret police through the tunnels next time around.
—A North Korean government source says a major shift is underway in North Korea’s military-first policy. Decisions are overturned and funds for the armed forces are cut by 30 per cent to prevent the generals from taking over. Secret police is strengthened.—
This happened in Romania many years ago. The dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu did not trust the regular Army, so he kept its funding on a shoestring and lavished money on his loyal Securitate (uniformed secret police—used to put down “internal” threats) which were loyal to him. This was a foreshadowing of decay in Romania; are we seeing the same thing in the PDRK?
Sounds like a bad idea to get rid of 30% of your military when your country sucks to begin with....
OK, I guess pretty much everybody figures Kim is worried about his own impending death, not the path of succession.
Is there any known or suspected reason he might actually fear a NATURAL impending death and thus actually care about succession?
Pssst! Hey, wanna borrow a knife?
I suspect he knows he's not a strong swimmer.
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