By Michael Breen
Kim Jong-il, the hip leader of North Korea, this week told the foreign minister of neighboring China, “Chill, mo’fo!’ What he meant was that everyone can relax because tensions with the South Korean puppets and its allies had recently eased.
That was heart-warming news for Yang Jiechi, the top Chinese diplomat, whose country has a lot of face at stake as the host of the six-nations talks which, until now, have failed to resolve the issue of Kim’s nuclear weapons.
The Chinese, who as North Korea’s closest ally have the best read on the country’s leadership, have long been concerned that Kim lacks a grip on reality.
They had worried that a miscalculation on his part could lead to an American military response. So Yang was pleasantly surprised to hear Kim call on all sides to implement an agreement to denuclearize the peninsula.
He will certainly have returned to Beijingthinking that Kim not only has a grip on reality, but is also doing what he can for regional peace. After the meeting, Kim, who explained to his aides that the Chinese official was visiting Pyongyang to get a better understanding of what drives a modern economy, took his nuclear negotiating team to watch the movie “300” again.
If you’ve been reading the papers, you will know that a few months ago America started taking the talks with North Korea seriously and, in response, once the problem over frozen bank accounts was cleared up, Pyong yang responded by inviting U.N. inspectors in to verify the closure of the Yongbyon nuclear facilities. So, things are looking up. But, are they really? If you’ve been watching this more than five years, you’ll know that it’s only a matter of time before the other shoe drops.
Why? Because that’s what always happens. The peninsula blows hot and cold, talks are on and off, issues rise and fall. And that’s because the fundamental power reality on the peninsula remains unchanged.
The competition of the wolves-in-human-form since division, have created the world’s 12th largest so-called “economy” and are widely perceived to be the most advanced so-called “democracy” in Asia.
In the meantime, North Korea, a people’s democracy and the world’s only truly Juche state, has become so advanced that it has gone beyond mere economics.
It, for example, has reached a point where it can both deny spirituality and vote in as eternal president someone in the spiritual world. On the downside, though, the puppets and the wolves have blocked the North from access to the world’s banks and, so, despite their advanced nature, northerners are at risk of actually losing the competition.
Without great leadership, one day, if not absorbed into the South, they at least run the risk of having to take orders from southerners. Fortunately, the eternal president’s decision-making in the spirit world is given voice by his son, Kim, who is the head of both the ruling Party and the military.
It was he who saw the development of nuclear weapons as a survival strategy and who brilliantly figured the implementation program, knowing that a half-dozen would be enough.
Without them, North Korea would have been sunk years ago. So what can we make of his call for the denuclearization of the peninsula? It means he’s happy and confident. And that can only come from two things . either he doesn’t need nukes because he’s got something else or the next issue to halt the talks again and ratchet up tensions is just around the corner. Either way, the peninsula will chill again.
Michael Breen is the president of the public relations agency, Insight Communications Consultants, and author of “The Koreans.