Hey folks. To answer a few questions that keep popping up here and elsewhere:
Was a Chinese medical team dispatched to treat Kim? Yes, this apparently did happen. A Chinese medical team, including cardiac specialists, was sent to North Korea on either Wednesday or Thursday of this past week. Much of the information that's racing across the internet right now is the result of text conversations between them and their colleagues that leaked on Chinese social media. I don't know if the reported screen captures of their phones are legitimate.
Why did they go? It's being reported that Kim Jong-un suffered a cardiac event earlier this month and underwent surgery on April 12th. He either didn't recover well, or didn't recover at all.
Is this plausible? Maybe. Kim Jong-un has definitely not looked healthy in recent years. Even in his earliest public appearances, he was on the chubby side, but you can argue that that helped him. He resembled his grandfather (Kim il-Sung, the "Eternal President" of NK) a great deal and it was thought that that would help him ingratiate himself with the people. However, he became morbidly obese as time passed, and was rumored to have been diagnosed with high blood pressure and diabetes.
What was the first sign that something was wrong? Kim failed to show up at North Korea's celebration of his grandfather's birthday on April 15th. This is basically unheard of. He also hasn't made an appearance today, which is the anniversary of the founding of NK's armed forces and another public event that NK's leader nearly always attends.
Is North Korea hiding something else that happened? Maybe. We know that COVID-19 has reached North Korea, although it's not clear when. The severity and spread of the virus within NK are also unknown. When Kim failed to show up on April 15th, one theory is that he was holed up somewhere waiting for the virus to burn itself out, especially because he's got some of the co-morbidities that are associated with poor outcomes if you get sick.
Super basic and probably unhelpful timeline: This is what I've pieced together from umpteen million news reports, and it's almost certainly incomplete and (more maddeningly) inaccurate.
- On Monday, the Daily NK (an online newspaper in South Korea run by North Korean defectors who have contacts in the country) reported that Kim Jong-un had had surgery on April 12th and was recovering.
- Reuters subsequently picked it up and ran the story internationally.
- CNN picked it up and went to its sources in U.S. intelligence, who weren't willing to be named but said they were monitoring reports that Kim wasn't doing well.
- On Tuesday, U.S. National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien acknowledged this on Fox News.
- South Korea pushed back and stated that no evidence existed of a dire prognosis. (NB: The U.S. and South Korea are not necessarily operating off different sets of intelligence here. SK just tends to be a lot more circumspect about news reports that result from spying on NK, for what I imagine are obvious reasons.)
- China's team (maybe -- timing is iffy) left for NK on Wednesday/Thursday.
- Late Friday, the Japanese magazine Shukan Gendai was reporting that its reporters managed to get hold of one of the Chinese doctors who traveled to NK, and who said that Kim had most likely suffered a heart attack and that complications had happened during the attempted insertion of a stent.
- Friday is when a whole lot of people, from Chinese government officials to the U.S. Department of State to South Korean intelligence, all suddenly decided that they had no comment on the matter.
- The most recent reports of the Chinese doctors' text messages broke late Friday night/early Saturday morning US EST and added rumors that the North Korean doctors treating Kim had little to no experience placing stents in obese patients, had either made a mistake or decided to wait, and that the Chinese specialists arrived too late to make a difference.
So what are the odds that something's seriously wrong with Kim Jong-un? I don't know. I think it's very likely that the initial report of a procedure on April 12th is true, and I also think it's
plausible (not necessarily true, but at least plausible) that Kim is ill or incapacitated. He's been notably absent from two of NK's biggest public events, and NK's state media is reportedly recycling old quotes of his to encourage peoples' efforts with respect to the military and the economy.
Having said that, accurate information is incredibly difficult to get out of NK, and we've been fooled multiple times before. His father Kim Jong-il (most of you know him better as the
Team America villain with the platform shoes and the bouffant hair) had his own "death scares," and Kim Jong-un has disappeared from view a few times previously, and once emerged with an obvious limp and a cane (reportedly the result of severe gout -- yet another health issue).
So if Kim Jong-un is out of the way, who takes over? The most likely immediate successor is his younger sister, Kim Yo-jong, who is around 30. She has been the public face of the North Korean government previously and has assumed a notably higher public profile over the last few weeks (which is another reason I think current reports may be true).
But doesn't Kim Jong-un have kids? He has one child whose existence we can confirm, and possibly three overall with his wife, Ri Sol-ju. He may have others with mistresses (though they would most likely not be in the line of succession). However, his oldest "official" child is likely ten at most, and is obviously not well-placed to assume leadership. Kim Yo-jong may assume power as a regent in the interim, if NK wants to continue Kim Jong-un's line.
Does the potential for instability exist with a young, female, inexperienced leader in a totalitarian dictatorship? Does the Pope shit in the woods?
For real, what's gonna happen? Your guess is as good as mine. If news reports are true and Kim Jong-un is out of the way for the foreseeable future (or even permanently), I think NK will attempt to unify behind Kim Yo-jong, at least in the short term. It does not want to project uncertainty or weakness for either the domestic or international audience, and she is definitely the most high-profile and publicly visible Kim family member at the moment. And with COVID-19 and a lot of economic instability rocketing across the world (including their patron state, China), I think there's definitely an incentive for people to accept this for now. Westerners also tend to underestimate just how omnipresent the Kim family is in every aspect of North Korean life; they have controlled the country for almost three-quarters of a century. And North Koreans have also learned what happens to people who are visibly unhappy about that.
But ... there's always something going on that you don't know about. Are there rebellious elements in North Korea's military or society who see this as an opportunity? Or will they wait to see what Kim Yo-jong (or whoever the next ruler will be) is like in office?
An equally interesting question is what happens over the long term if Kim Yo-jong remains in power and has children of her own. Will she cede power to her brother's children, or would she rather pass it to hers?
Are there alternatives to Kim Yo-jong? Yes. As
I wrote earlier this week: These range from their great-uncle Yong-ju (although the guy's gotta be pushing 100 now if he's even alive) to former rivals for the throne like Uncle Pyong-il (kicked into far-flung ambassadorships when their dad became the heir apparent) to their brother Jong-chul (previously passed over for leadership). Their other brother, Kim Jong-nam, is out of consideration because they had him killed.
There are probably others, but this is the family tree from hell and my brain is mush right now.
Are we all gonna die? Yes. Sorry.
I mean, from this? I don't think there's any realistic threat from NK's nuclear program, if that's what you're asking about. The news on that front has been relatively quiet ever since fall 2017. NK had a nuclear test in September of that year that resulted in the partial destruction of the test site, Punggye-ri, followed by further collapses in later weeks that killed a bunch of workers and scientists. There were also reports of elevated radiation in the area and a lot of tree and animal deaths. (I don't know if this was actually true, but NK has definitely played fast and loose with nuclear safety previously.) Behind the scenes, China reportedly told NK to get its shit together, and the site was later demolished. This is likely one of the reasons that NK was unusually well-behaved in the first half of 2018.
Having said that, NK continues to tinker, particularly with missile engine development. It's something to keep an eye on, but you probably don't need to be worried about NK's new leader lighting up an ICBM and frying New York.
Here's why.
And to repeat:
Please remember to take everything with a grain of salt. There is a LOT of false or misleading information that circulates about North Korea, in part because NK is rarely interested in providing information that gives real insight into the regime. It is entirely possible that ALL of the recent news reports are bullshit, but either way, it may be a while before we get accurate information on what's happening.
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