Kim Jong-un’s Winter Olympics Ruse
While North Korea’s participation in the 2018 Winter Olympics and its cooperation with South Korea are positives, no one should forget Pyongyang has a long history of attempting to manipulate Seoul. On three previous, well documented, occasions, the Kim regime has pursued strategic engagement with South Korea.
Generally, North Korea’s motivations for engagement meet one or more of three criteria: it feels threatened by outside events; it is in serious need of aid; or it perceives an opportunity to create tension between South Korea and the United States. Kim Jong-un’s efforts during the 2018 Olympics meet two of these three criteria. Pyongyang’s willingness to increase cooperation with Seoul during the 2018 Winter Olympics is based on North Korea’s need for aid and sanctions relief as well as the perception that tension exists between South Korean President Moon Jae-in and U.S. President Donald Trump explain. Seoul and the international community should not fall for Kim Jong-un’s propaganda ploy.
Historically, North Korea’s three earlier engagement attempts with South Korea have been motivated by extreme circumstances. First, President Richard Nixon’s trip to China in 1972 was a dramatic moment for the Korean Peninsula. North Korea became concerned that a shift in Chinese policies might cost Pyongyang a major patron. North Korea’s leader at the time, Kim Il-sung, also believed the U.S. might be retreating from East Asia, leaving South Korea vulnerable. Second, the collapse of the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact as well as increasing international recognition of South Korea, in turn, left North Korea exceedingly vulnerable. The ensuing 1992 Joint Declaration of the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula was Kim Il-sung’s attempt to remove U.S. nuclear weapons from the peninsula, thus dramatically reducing the perceived threat from South Korea and its allies. Third, Kim Jong-il used the Sunshine Policy of Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun (1998–2008) to acquire needed foreign currency and aid. Given tension between South Korea and the U.S. at the time, Kim Jong-il hoped that Seoul might further distance itself from Washington. Clearly, regime survival and the hope that U.S. armed forces may leave the peninsula have, in great part, guided North Korea’s policy toward the South.
Kim Jong-un is using the goodwill stemming from the 2018 Winter Olympics to achieve two goals. His short-term and most pressing concern is food aid and sanctions relief. North Korea requires approximately five million tons of cereal per year. In 2017, the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization reported that rainfall during the peak growing season was at its lowest level since 2001 when cereal production was only two million tons. In combination with the drought, sanctions may be taking a greater toll than anticipated. The food distribution system, ineffective at best, is now only providing 300 grams of food per person, per day. These pressures may help to explain the increase in North Korean fishing vessels recovered by Japan, with 104 “ghost vessels” in 2017 alone, as they seek to extend their range.
