Posted on 09/18/2011 3:06:34 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
Food and stability in North Korea
Deprive and rule
Why does North Korea’s dictatorship remain so entrenched despite causing such hunger and misery?
Sep 17th 2011 | SEOUL |
IF NOBODY else, at least Kim Jong Il, North Korea’s leader, appears to have found something to fill his belly with during the annual Chuseok harvest festival in North Korea this week. “His face beaming with a smile,” as his propaganda machine put it, he dropped into a shop in Pyongyang selling pancakes stuffed with meat.
Outside the capital there are few such treats. Much of the rest of the country is suffering a severe food shortage, say aid agencies. On September 9th the UN’s World Food Programme released video images from a trip to the North Korean countryside showing listless orphans, their growth stunted by malnourishment. A cold start to the growing season and summer flooding has badly damaged rice and maize crops. Potato rations have been cut by a third, to two a person each day.
Mr Kim’s regime, with customary cynicism, has told people to “simplify” their dining habits at Chuseok this year “in the socialist way,” according to DailyNK, a Seoul-based online news agency. Yet in his parallel universe, Mr Kim boasted of the variety of beef, pork, goose and turkey available to the privileged customers of the pancake shop. How does he get away with it? Loosely, that is the question posed by North Korea-watchers trying to understand how an odious regime has remained stable for so long, defying frequent predictions of its downfall.
(Excerpt) Read more at economist.com ...
Oh, I hope it never happens. I don’t ever want to hear of war over there. In fact, I think the North Koreans will eventually collapse on their own — a lot quicker if the Chinese ever tire of their irrational client state.
Don’t mind helping humanity. It’s the right thing to do. But when our own government is starving us in order to support an ideology most are against, I have to draw the line.
Our country serves all of humanity more when we are prosperous.
Nope. They were ready, willing, and able to defend their country when I was there 10 years ago. Considerable upgrades to the Command and Control systems while I was there.
Do you think we still need to be there, then? If so, in what capacity?
THank you for the article, TigerLIkesRooster. Bump
Another progressive running a socialist paradise that turned into a dictatorship designed to enrich the former progressive. How rare. It only has happened every time. They should pick up their guns and throw the rat out. Oh, they can’t, the progressive has all the guns. Wonder why our progressives are so hot on getting rid of private firearms?
North Korea - the ongoing diet reality show.
Just last year at Yeonpyeong Island, he demonstrated the North's willingness to shell civilians with no qualms about a first strike. All for not getting the most trivial of demands met. About 200 shells were fired at the Island in 30-40 minutes. The South took 15 minutes to start firing back and only responded with one third of the firepower.
That regime knows it can only be altered with overwhelming, unwavering force. If Kim feels truly threatened, they will decimate the South's big population centers in hours. Yeonpyeong is a sparsely populated island with 1500 people and 1-2 story buildings. That was only a message. The real attack will hit high-rise metropolises with far greater firepower. The devastation would surpass nearly everything we've seen in WWII.
I'm fairly certain the North has other asymmetric warfare capabilities that we won't hear about from our government until it's too late. Things like biological weapons and sleeper agents hiding in the cities of their enemies.
Modern wars will essentially be years of stalemate punctuated by days of complete devastation whenever a move is made. Strange times are ahead...
I agree wholeheartedly! TigerLikesRooster, you perform an invaluable service by keeping FR updated on things in the DPRK and ROK!
Thank you very much for all you do for us FReepers!!!
Bump.
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