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International calls mounting for harsher responses
By Kang Seung-woo
North Korea's surprise nuclear test on Wednesday has shown that its young leader Kim Jong-un is the world's most unpredictable dictator and far more enigmatic than his father, analysts said Thursday.
They say that Kim's predecessors showed consistency in their pursuit of strategies, but the isolated incumbent leader is entirely unpredictable, posing a graver security threat for South Korea and the international community as a whole.
Unlike in the past, the secretive state did not inform China and the United States that it was due to conduct a hydrogen bomb test, for the first time in its history.
Moreover, the young leader stabbed the South and the international community in the back with the test after hinting at a conciliatory mood on the Korean Peninsula in his New Year speech.
Analysts said that regardless as to whether the device the North detonated is an H-bomb or an atomic bomb, the latest nuclear test underlined the gravity of the threats resulting from Kim's unpredictability and underscored the need to overhaul the North Korean policy fundamentally.
"Kim has taken bolder and more ill-considered moves than expected, so it is too difficult to figure out Kim's plans," said Chang Yong-seok, a senior researcher at the Institute for Peace and Unification Studies at Seoul National University.
"We need to reanalyze Kim's every move in the past."
He also said that Kim's moves are very different to those of Kim Jong-il, the late former leader of the North and Kim's father.
"As for the peace treaty agreed between the North and the U.S., for example, the elder Kim tried to pave the way for this before making strategic proposals to Washington. However, the younger Kim's leadership just made suggestions and if these are rejected, he pushes the button on a nuclear test," Chang said.
An Chan-il, the head of the World North Korea Research Center, said, "The unexpected nuclear test proved Kim's unpredictability that has become increasingly worried about in the international community."
The analysts said that Kim's unpredictable governing style adds to unease about security on the Korean Peninsula.
"Under a scenario that the two Koreas stand face-to-face across the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), Kim may order military provocations such as the Aug. 4 landmine attack," Chang said. The blast from the landmine seriously injured two South Korean soldiers.
An echoed Chang's view, saying that the unpredictable tyrant may opt to engage in a border skirmish, or pursue other small-scale provocations.
"In the lead-up to the congress of the Workers' Party in May, other provocations such as an intercontinental ballistic missile or a submarine-launched ballistic missile are a possibility," he added. The North plans to hold the first congress of the ruling party's in 36 years.
In the wake of the nuclear test, there are calls for the international community to take stricter measures in order to prevent the North from scrapping its nuclear weapons program before it goes completely out of control.
"Tactically, Beijing can better enforce U.N. sanctions and clamp down on front companies in northeastern China procuring weapons parts for North Korea," said Sean King, an East Asia specialist with the Park Strategies consulting firm located in New York.
Park Won-gon, an international relations professor at Handong University, said, "Above all, the six-party talks should be resumed to resolve the issue."
He added that negotiations for the North's denuclearization have virtually come to a standstill after the talks were suspended in late 2008 despite the fact that the Kim Jong-un regime continues to pursue developing the nation's nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities.
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