Cao Xin

Opinion | What North Korea’s Kim Jong-un is really up to

North Korea’s true aim is not to take military action against the South but rather to create tensions to its own advantage

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Cao Xin

Published: 5:30am, 23 Oct 2024

Tensions on the Korean peninsula are reaching a peak not seen in many years. Of all the regional actors party to the recent escalation, North Korea has always been a disruptive influence with its pursuit of illegal nuclear weapons. Under Yoon Suk-yeol, the South Korean government has recently shifted towards a more confrontational stance, refusing to bend under pressure from the North’s Kim Jong-un regime.

Meanwhile, Russia, still at war with Ukraine, seeks to use the situation on the Korean peninsula to counter the United States and its allies and supporters in the region. China, which should play a key balancing role in its own backyard, has stayed largely silent.

Amid the current turmoil, North Korea’s true aim is not to take military action against the South but rather to create tensions to its own advantage. Its biggest strategic goal is to use all means possible to recreate the alliance between China, the Soviet Union and North Korea that had been in place for much of the time since the start of the Korean war, or at least to form two separate bilateral alliances with China and Russia. All of Pyongyang’s recent efforts are directed towards achieving this.

Consider the actions of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. According to a report by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), Kim held a meeting on national defence and security on October 14, and outlined “tasks to be tackled in the operation of the war deterrent and the exercise of the right to self-defence”.

However, in itself, a report on what should have been a top-secret meeting suggests propaganda purposes. Furthermore, the biggest military action North Korea took afterwards was to destroy its roads and transport links to the South.

This is rather subdued, given Kim’s statements in a Korean Worker’s Party meeting late last year and in parliament early this year, when he spoke of “occupying, subjugating and reclaiming” the South.