Friday, December 20, 2002
INTERESTING DESCRIPTION OF NORTH KOREA: Stepehen Endicott, co-author of a book on the alleged U.S. use of bacteriological weapons in the Korean War, recently made a trip to North Korea. His impressions were sent out via CanKor (definitely worth subscribing to if you are interesting in different perspectives on Korean events and affairs). Excerpts (and comments) follow:
Ah, the fabled North Korean hospitality! No hassles with traffic, always accompanied by friendly and useful guides, and the guarantee that you will be put on the nightly news as the latest pilgrim come to pay homage to the Great Leader, the Dear Leader, and Juche.
To be sure, the famine crisis is probably not nearly as great as it was in the "hard years," but I'm reminded of the Saturday Night Live parody of the Clinton-Bush Presidential debate in which Clinton praises Arkansas for edging ahead of Mississippi in reducing the number of cases of rickets.
Once American hostility declines, you too can walk the wide and beautiful streets of P'yongyang!
Some of this is reminiscent of descriptions of and arguments about Castro's Cuba. And while it is undeniable that both Cuba and the DPRK do try to provide housing, education and health care for its citizens, it is also undeniable that there are far more Cubans and North Koreans who attempt to leave their homes than outsiders who attempt to get in. If the people of North Korea and Cuba were genuinely allowed to vote with their feet, I suspect that many, many more would demonstrate their true feelings about the trade-off between free university education and living under totalitarian rule.
True enough. Moreover, I agree that on a moral level, it makes little moral sense for nuclear weapons states (particularly the U.S., the only state to have actually used them) to point fingers at would-be proliferators.
The first part of this is undeniably true. The latter part is news to me. Given that the US still has plenty of ICBM's, submarine-launched missiles, as well as high-tech planes that could deliver nukes to the battlefield, it isn't at all clear to me what tactical advantage would be maintained by keeping a clandestine nuclear presence in South Korea. How does a French diplomat (my guess) know whether the U.S. keeps nukes in Korea or not anyway?
Finally, the pièce de résistance:
While I have frequently harped on the fact that we outsiders really know very little about North Korea, at the very least, there is plenty of sin to go around. Bombing civilian airliners, killing the cabinets of enemy states, exporting drugs, counterfeit money, and missiles, subjecting your population to ceaseless indoctrination, sending entire families to gulags because of the alleged statement of one family member, these are not things one does merely because one is "more sinned against than sinning." But, that's just my ill-informed opinion!
Before taking our leave, the Canadian film director thanked our hosts most warmly, declaring that of all the foreign visits he had made, this group had been the most helpful and congenial in assisting him to achieve his objectives. Mr. Pak responded by saying that he hoped the film, by its balance and good judgment, would be suitable for showing in both the northern and southern parts of Korea.
Ah, the fabled North Korean hospitality! No hassles with traffic, always accompanied by friendly and useful guides, and the guarantee that you will be put on the nightly news as the latest pilgrim come to pay homage to the Great Leader, the Dear Leader, and Juche.
We had heard much about food shortages and hunger in North Korea and were keenly alert to see such signs. Our crew interviewed about thirty people face-to-face for the film and we saw thousands of others on the city streets at close hand, in the countryside, children going to school and in after-school activities: without exception the people we saw looked sturdy and healthy, not emaciated in any way. The hard years, we learned, were 1996-1998 after three successive crop failures, a time when people were down to having 100 grams of cereal grain per day. "It was unimaginable," said one of our young friends. Now the basic grain ration is up to 350 grams daily, getting closer to normal requirements of 500 grams as North Korea reconstructs its economy.
To be sure, the famine crisis is probably not nearly as great as it was in the "hard years," but I'm reminded of the Saturday Night Live parody of the Clinton-Bush Presidential debate in which Clinton praises Arkansas for edging ahead of Mississippi in reducing the number of cases of rickets.
After being leveled by the American bombing in 1950-1951 the city has been reconstructed in a manner reminiscent of the great urban centres of Europe - Paris, Budapest - wide tree-lined boulevards, many parks, seven bridges over the Taedong, grand-scale public monuments including an Arc de Triomphe; stadiums that can seat up to 100,000 people; large, striking public buildings in both traditional and modern architectural styles surrounding Kim Il Sung Square. We saw wedding parties posing for pictures at several of these locations. There is a Moscow-style subway with stations having grand cathedral ceilings and art work, there are electric trolley buses and street cars which are somewhat crippled at the moment owing to shortages of electricity. People seem to do a lot of walking. Nevertheless Pyongyang is a beautiful city and will undoubtedly attract and welcome large numbers of tourists when American hostility subsides and the
economy revives again.
Once American hostility declines, you too can walk the wide and beautiful streets of P'yongyang!
One member of our group thought it monstrous that a starving country builds monuments (not to mention nuclear weapons). Others did not share this opinion. For one thing, we learned that the government suspended its grand-scale building projects when the hard times came in the mid-nineties - a point dramatically illustrated by the unfinished skeleton of a building towering above all others in the centre of town. Apart from that, in addition to spending resources on housing available to everyone at nominal rents, free education up to and including university (there are 300,000 university students), health care paid for by the state, paid holidays for workers and other social benefits that were explained to us at a meeting with a member of the Academy of Social Sciences, Professor Li Gi Gong, there was the argument that a people needs some grand public buildings, arches, vistas, cultural palaces and galleries, theatres, sports stadiums to remind them of their strength as a people and a nation, and places to give them the opportunity to develop and display their cultural achievements. To replace and rebuild their capital city from the ashes of the Korean War was to bolster the people's self-confidence and to create a vision for a better future. It was an argument that I certainly found to be reasonable.
Some of this is reminiscent of descriptions of and arguments about Castro's Cuba. And while it is undeniable that both Cuba and the DPRK do try to provide housing, education and health care for its citizens, it is also undeniable that there are far more Cubans and North Koreans who attempt to leave their homes than outsiders who attempt to get in. If the people of North Korea and Cuba were genuinely allowed to vote with their feet, I suspect that many, many more would demonstrate their true feelings about the trade-off between free university education and living under totalitarian rule.
As for nuclear weapons, to my knowledge, the North Korean government has never said that it has them, only that it has the right to have them so long as other nations keep them.
True enough. Moreover, I agree that on a moral level, it makes little moral sense for nuclear weapons states (particularly the U.S., the only state to have actually used them) to point fingers at would-be proliferators.
The United States did not keep its promises: the generating plants are five years behind schedule (the first one was supposed to start operating in 2003 but only its foundation had been laid by 2002) and it did not withdraw its nuclear weapons from the area. (When in Beijing we met a senior member of a Western embassy and asked if the United States still had nuclear weapons in South Korea as the North Koreans claimed. Speaking off the record his answer was unequivocal that the US continues to have nuclear weapons in South Korea.
The first part of this is undeniably true. The latter part is news to me. Given that the US still has plenty of ICBM's, submarine-launched missiles, as well as high-tech planes that could deliver nukes to the battlefield, it isn't at all clear to me what tactical advantage would be maintained by keeping a clandestine nuclear presence in South Korea. How does a French diplomat (my guess) know whether the U.S. keeps nukes in Korea or not anyway?
Finally, the pièce de résistance:
In recent times there have been many harsh words said about the Democratic
People's Republic of Korea by newspaper columnists who follow Washington's line in international affairs. Their words, it seems to me, are largely based on ignorance or prejudice. Even from a very short visit there I think it can be safely said that North Korea is a country more sinned against than sinning.
While I have frequently harped on the fact that we outsiders really know very little about North Korea, at the very least, there is plenty of sin to go around. Bombing civilian airliners, killing the cabinets of enemy states, exporting drugs, counterfeit money, and missiles, subjecting your population to ceaseless indoctrination, sending entire families to gulags because of the alleged statement of one family member, these are not things one does merely because one is "more sinned against than sinning." But, that's just my ill-informed opinion!
