North Korea’s impetuous testing of its nuclear arsenal last Wednesday was a sign of a desperately isolated regime that calculates survival ahead of all other factors, experts noted.

Known as the “byungjin line,” the dual-track policy aims to bolster deterrence against outside attack while simultaneously developing the economy. Adopted in the early 1960s, the strategy has effectively buffered the sustainability of the regime.

The fourth nuclear detonation in North Hamgyeong Province, purported to be of a hydrogen bomb, was planned ahead of time, said Park Young-ho, visiting professor at Kangwon National University, indicating that Pyongyang would not forgo its vital game plan. 

“Pyongyang has always stressed improving relations with Seoul in the new year’s address, but it’s because it allows them to shift blame when the relations sour, as they can claim they always strove for cordial ties,” Park told The Korea Herald last week. “Pyongyang wants to be in the driver’s seat, divide the Korean society and induce policy changes from the South Korean government.”

The communist regime, through nuclear buildup, can fend itself from “external aggression,” concentrate on economic development, demonstrate Kim Jong-un’s leadership and consolidate the totalitarian society, Park highlighted.

Noting that Pyongyang is on track to strengthen its nuclear capability, Park projected that the destructive weapons, estimated to be over 10, will be miniaturized and capably loaded on ballistic missiles in a few years.

Andrei Lankov, professor at Kookmin University in Seoul, said the timing of the test was “strange,” potentially revealing poor coordination between the government’s diplomatic and security branches.

“The North Korean diplomats worked hard last year to improve foreign relations on all fronts. The military, as usual, always wants to possess and display their weapons,” Lankov said in an interview last week. “Kim Jong-un may not have his staff well under his control. His judgement may not be sharp.”

The byungjin policy “makes perfect sense” for North Korea, Lankov asserted, as nuclear weapons are “expensive to develop” but “cheap, efficient and powerful to maintain.”

More fundamentally, he added, Kim Jong-un learned from the fatal mistake of late Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi (1942-2011), who terminated his country’s weapons of mass destruction program in late 2003 for lifting of sanctions by the West.

“Qaddafi was paid with a bullet,” the professor said, referring to his death during the Arab Spring of 2011. Libya’s National Transition Council militants backed by NATO killed Qaddafi. “North Korea believes it is in a very hostile world. Without nuclear weapons, the regime thinks it will be completely defenseless against foreign attacks.”

The only way unification would occur, according to Lankov, is by regime collapse, similar to the fall of the Berlin Wall. “The idea of a gradual, consensual unification is a pipe dream. It has never happened in world history,” he underscored.

Lankov contended that the North Korean elites feared losing all their power and privileges from the powerful South Korean chaebol ― conglomerates ― in the event of a unification.

Unlike the Russian oligarchs, who monopolized state assets following the Soviet Union’s downfall, and remade themselves as democratic capitalists, “If North Korea falls, the apparatchiks are likely to be dispossessed of their wealth, jailed for human rights abuses, or even face death from the court of justice,” he said.

The scholar added, “Even with personal security guaranteed, they are in no way able to compete with the mighty southern capitalists.”

Regarding the marketization of the North Korean economy, which has largely replaced state distribution, the professor underlined that Kim Jong-un had turned a blind eye to appeal to the people and guarantee their livelihood.

According to analysts, the market accounts for roughly one-third of North Korea’s gross domestic product, and while Pyongyang and a few strategic cities still receive rations, allocation has become a thing of the past.

There are now private bus companies, small factories and street vendors, which are registered as government properties and invested with private money. The state apparatus has come to play the role of “market agents,” implementing and experimenting with various reform measures.

Suggesting that the byungjin policy is compatible with foreign trade, Lankov said the communist bureaucrats would not oppose trade with neighboring economies, so long as it would not undermine their grip on power.

“Unlike the democracies that have to take the economy extremely seriously, to win in elections, the communist elites simply don’t care about the economy that much,” he said. “People have no way of influencing politics for economic failures. The elites often control material difficulties to stay in power.”

For Kim Jong-un, national prosperity is not a priority high on his list: “His top concerns are securing his rule, his regime, his family and his country. Making his rule stable will always be a life-or-death issue. He will always think of stability first, and the economy second.”

Related to the recent death of Kim Yang-gon, the late secretary of the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea and key figure in inter-Korean affairs, Lankov pointed out that Kim Jong-un killed more generals and senior officials in the last four years of his rule than the 17 years of his father’s.

“As a fat, young man at the age of most senior officials’ grandsons, Kim Jong-un wants to be taken seriously,” he noted. “What’s interesting is that most of those killed during Kim’s rule are military and security brasses, not economic managers. Kim is afraid of people with guns. He wants to terrify them to get respect.”

Doing so would raise the chance of a coup, but does not necessarily lead to one, he added.

“Stalin killed roughly three-quarters of his generals in the 1930s, but it did not lead to a coup within the Kremlin’s top echelons. After eliminating old dogs, Kim will likely mint youngsters his age.”

By Joel Lee (joel@heraldcorp.com)