The World’s Least Understood Country
"The superior man, when resting in safety, does not forget that danger may come…thus his person is not endangered, and his states and all their clans are preserved."
-Confucius
To understand North Korea and why it behaves the way it does, August 22nd, 1910, is arguably the most important date to begin with. After millennia of warfare and on-off occupation by China, domination by the Mongols, constant raids from Japan, and a brief period of isolated independence, it was on this day that Korea submitted to Japanese occupation. The annexation of Korea led to unthinkable cruelties inflicted on the Korean population, many of which continue to be sources of tension between Japan and both Koreas, even in the 2020’s, and was followed by Soviet domination of what would become North Korea after the conclusion of the Second World War.
This series of occupations across two thousand years of history is critical to understanding what came next.
Juche is the official term for North Korean political philosophy. It is an ideology both communist and ultranationalist in nature, that “means holding fast to an independent position, rejecting dependence on others, using one’s own brains, believing in [oneself], and thus solving one’s own problems for oneself on one’s own responsibility under all circumstances.” - as described by Kim Il-sung, the founder of modern North Korea. It places a particular focus on independence of the government, economy, and military (chaju, charip, and chawi, respectively). It was founded approximately 14 years after North Korea was, out of a paranoid need to remove Kim’s political opponents. Juche sees the toleration of foreign pressure and the maintenance of national security as zero-sum, mutually exclusive phenomenon.
More than anything else, it is dedicated to regime survival.
Yet, although it permeates every level of North Korean society, the state is extremely strict about referring to it as a “religion”. In addition to promoting the eradication of religious beliefs in society, juche has been cited by North Korean individuals sent overseas to earn foreign currency, who claim that “we were taught that religions are used by imperialists to prepare the ground for invasion.”, and former party officials have stated that “If a crime against ideology or [the party] is committed, there is no such thing as forgiveness.”.
In the modern era, particularly during and after the Trump administration, juche is heavily reflected in North Korea’s ballistic and nuclear missile program. High-level defectors and other sources have identified that the possession of nuclear weaponry is closely linked - or perceived as closely linked - to state survival by creating a near guarantee of preventing a hostile invasion. The Libya model is often pointed to by North Koreans as evidence of attempted regime de-stabilisation, given the timeline of less than 10 years between Qaddafi’s relinquishment of a nuclear weapons program, and being overthrown.
It isn’t surprising, then, that the North Korean regime will often turn to illegal activities, often appearing as similar to a criminal organisation as it does a political entity, with crimes including the production and distribution of narcotics, counterfeit currency and items, weapons and banned products smuggling, and human trafficking. After all, juche does require dedication to one’s own country “under all circumstances”.
TAI Score: Degree 5. The threat posed by the North Korean regime is significant. While understanding juche ideology does assist in addressing the issues posed by regional nuclear security, failure to properly engage with North Korea may yield catastrophic results. Even in the best of times, North Korean transnational crime causes significant issues for government and business actors. Risk assessors should remain alert.
