The True Military Power of North Korea. Donald Trump

ruled out as a regime goal by Pyongyang.

      Source: Gause, North Korean Civil-Military Trends, September 2006, p. 36.

       Figure 4. Kpa Military Disposition.

      North Korea’s constitution describes reunification as “the supreme national task.” The current North Korean constitution was adopted in 1972; it was revised in 1992 and again in 1998. The paramount importance of reunification is a central theme in this version of the document, as well as the first North Korean constitution adopted at the founding of the regime in 1948. The preamble to the charter of the [North] KWP declares that “the present task of the Party is to ensure the complete victory of socialism in the DPRK and the accomplishment of the revolutionary goals of national liberation and the people’s democracy in the entire area of the country.”

      This supreme national task should never be forgotten, as it permeates the entire foundation of North Korea’s strategy and doctrine. North Korean media always has held that the North Korean military is for defensive purposes (defense against foreign invasion by “imperialist aggressors and their lackey running dogs” [i.e., the United States and South Korea]).

      This defensive argument is reinforced by North Korea’s supposed fear that the United States will use the Bush Doctrine of 2002 to conduct a preemptive strike against North Korea’s nuclear facilities. However, as Homer T. Hodge explains, the North Korean leaders view the southern half of their country as occupied by “U.S. Imperialists,” and “defense” does not refer to defending North Korea but defending the entire Korean peninsula. Moreover, when Pyongyang officials speak of “peaceful reunification,” their conception of what this entails may be rather different from that of their counterparts in Seoul, Washington, and elsewhere. The Swedish ambassador to Pyongyang recalls being amazed at the terminology employed by a DPRK official in 1975 when the official congratulated North Vietnam for its victory over South Vietnam at a state banquet. The speaker commended Hanoi “on achieving the peaceful unification of Vietnam.”

      North Korea continues to pursue and develop offensive-oriented weapons such as ballistic missiles, nuclear weapons, and submarines. Reunification through force of arms appears to remain possible to Kim Jong Il.

      One should not forget that Kim Il Sung attempted to militarily reunify the Korean Peninsula in 1950 with his invasion (characterized by North Korea as the “Fatherland Liberation War”) into South Korea. Some scholars like to characterize this conflict as a proxy war between the two superpowers. However, as Bruce Cumings and other historians have observed, it was Kim Il Sung who planned and led this civil war.

      Three Revolutionary Forces. Having failed to reunify the peninsula by purely military action, Kim Il Sung recognized the need to combine political and diplomatic efforts with an offensive military strategy. In 1960, Kim Il Sung articulated a “Three Fronts (Revolutionary Forces)” national strategy. These revolutionary forces referred to those revolutionary forces in the north, in the south and the international community necessary for the reunification of Korea and were later redefined as three phases of war. The north revolutionary forces meant “the transformation of the Military Might,” southern revolutionary forces as the erosion of the South Korean alliance with the United States, and the international revolutionary forces would be the diplomatic war to increase support for Pyongyang and isolate Seoul.

      In 1962, the Fifth Plenum of the KWP Central Committee adopted a three-phase plan to employ both conventional and unconventional means to affect reunification: (1) create a military-industrial base in North Korea; (2) neutralize the United States by subverting and destroying the U.S.-South Korea alliance; and (3) liberate South Korea through employment of insurgency and conventional force.

      Despite a period of increased tension, violent clashes, and much bloodshed during 1966-69, the North Korean military strategy ultimately failed to achieve its goals of breaking the U.S.-South Korean alliance or creating an armed revolution in South Korea. However, Pyongyang’s strategic objective of reunification remained unchanged, and by the 1970s, North Korean leaders modified their military strategy to adopt a more conventional approach.

      A long history of bloody incursions into South Korea underscores the offensive mission of the KPA. It is important to note that from 1954 to 1992, North Korea is reported to have infiltrated a total of 3,693 armed agents into South Korea. Not counting North Korea’s invasion of South Korea that triggered the Korean War (1950-53) North Korea’s major terrorist involvement includes: attempted assassinations of ROK President Park Chung Hee in 1968 and 1974; a 1983 attempt on ROK President Chun Doo Hwan’s life in a bombing incident in Rangoon, Burma (Myanmar); and a midair sabotage bombing of a South Korean Boeing 707 passenger plane in 1987.

      Provocations have continued intermittently up to 2003 in the form of armed incursions, kidnappings, and occasional as well as regular conventional threats to turn the South Korean capital of Seoul into “a sea of fire” and to silence or tame South Korean critics of North Korea.

      By 2003, according to USFK estimates, there had been 1,439 major provocations and DMZ violations since 1953 with 90 U.S. troops killed in action (KIA), over 390 ROK KIA (to include six Republic of Korea [ROK] Navy seaman killed by an unprovoked attack by North Korea in June 2002); and 889 North Korean KIA. These are not acts that one would expect from a country concerned with defense but rather with implementing an offensive national military strategy.

      Military-First Doctrine. Militarism has remained an essential aspect of the character of North Korea since its founding in 1948 and constitutes a key element of the strategic culture of the government. North Korean military doctrine further evolved from an element of national power to coexist as an element of political power. On March 21, 2003, Nodong Sinmun published a special article "Military-First Ideology Is an Ever-Victorious, Invincible Banner for Our Era’s Cause of Independence," which declared that the KPA is the basis of North Korea’s political revolutionary strategy.

      The character of the KPA high command has changed since Kim Jong Il came to power. While members of the first (partisan) generation still hold posts of power, the day-to-day management of the military has begun to shift to second (senior officers in their 60s) and third generations. The era of a single senior military figure tied closely to the party and the Great Leader has been replaced by a system in which control with the KPA is more dispersed, and many channels lead back to Kim Jong Il. In this way, Kim has been able to secure his control over the military, a goal that is ultimately at the heart of “military-first politics.” Third generation will serve to protect Kim Jong Il but may also ultimately become his biggest political threat. This strategy "calls for giving priority to military issues over everything, and it is a line, strategy, and tactics of putting the KPA before the working class" to the point that the KPA is "the most pivotal (political) group" in North Korean society.

      North Korea’s military-first policy is ever-present and plays many multidimensional roles as an important economic actor in agriculture, infrastructure construction, research and development, professional education, weapons sales, and hard currency earning. It is the major ideological educator, socializer of the youth, and general backbone of the society.

      Finally, this policy is the principal veto power in all policy deliberations, let alone as the military defender of the nation and the principal guarantor of the regime survival. To begin economic reforms with North Korea, the policy was driven by the pure self-preservation instinct, not based on Marxist-Leninist ideology.

      Without the support of the top military leaders, Kim Jong Il alone could not have made a strategic decision to conduct what one of the authors has dubbed economic “reform around the edges.” What seems to be important is that the KPA was elevated to be the primary actor in the country whereas the more conservative KWP was relegated to be the secondary actor in restructuring the North Korean state and building a “great powerful and prosperous nation.”

      One of the hallmarks of the Kim Jong Il era has been the evolution of power away from the KWP and toward the KPA. In the wake of the revision of the 1998 constitution, there was a dramatic reshuffling of the official leadership rankings with members of the NDC