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The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History

Page 28

by Oberdorfer, Don


  The Soviet reversal and later the Soviet collapse would have a powerful impact on North Korea. Strategically, it left Pyongyang more vulnerable and more isolated than before. Economically, the loss of North Korea’s most generous and most important trading partner began a steady decline that would increasingly sap the strength of the Kim regime.

  __________

  * Two years later, when Kanemaru fell from power and was jailed for tax evasion after $51 million in gold bars, cash, and other assets were found in his home, the scandal helped drive the LDP from power for the first time in thirty-eight years.

  10

  CHINA SHIFTS ITS GROUND

  IN MID-JUNE 1991, a Chinese civil airliner bringing Foreign Minister Qian Qichen, and his official party from Beijing floated down slowly over a flat green landscape toward a landing on the outskirts of Pyongyang. Making its gradual approach to the capital’s airport, the plane passed over a seemingly deserted country, with ribbons of roadways nearly empty of traffic and hardly any people visible in the neatly divided plots of farmland or around big apartment houses and other buildings. Seated in the tourist section of the plane, behind the foreign minister’s first-class compartment, I peered down for the first time at the territory of North Korea and wrote in my journal that it looked to be a strange land “left deserted by some invisible plague.”

  Then as the plane roared down the runway, hundreds of people came into view: a colorful crowd lined up in well-ordered rows on the tarmac, enthusiastically waving pink plastic boughs. As we taxied up and the motors were turned off, we could hear martial music from a khaki-clad military band. From the roof of the terminal building, a giant portrait of Kim Il Sung looked down on the scene.

  Waiting near the foot of the steps to welcome the Chinese guest and his party was North Korean foreign minister Kim Yong Nam, the man who was also instrumental in my own invitation to visit. It was pure coincidence that I arrived on the same plane and was in Pyongyang at the same time as the Chinese foreign minister. Although the North Koreans told me nothing of the discussions between the two neighbors, I realized later that I had witnessed the launching of an episode of diplomatic theater that had led to a major readjustment of the relations between Beijing and Pyongyang.

  From its short-lived conquest of ancient Choson before the time of Christ until the twentieth century, China had been the foreign nation with the greatest importance in the Korean world. For more than a thousand years, until Korea’s invention of its hangul alphabet in the fifteenth century, Chinese characters formed the basis of the Korean written language, and they remained important in classical writing into the modern era. Korea adopted not only Buddhism from China but also Confucianism, which remains at the heart of many Korean relationships, public and private. Throughout most of its history, Korea paid tribute to its giant neighbor at the court of the Middle Kingdom. Koreans called China daeguk, “big state” or “elder state.”

  China’s intimate alliance with North Korea dates back to the Chinese communist sponsorship of Kim Il Sung’s rebel bands against the Japanese in World War II and the participation of Koreans on the side of the communists in Manchuria during the Chinese civil war. A few years later, the newly established People’s Republic of China saved the North Korean regime from defeat—and possibly extinction—in the Korean War by sending its “volunteer” troops across the Yalu River, at the cost of close to a million of its own soldiers killed or wounded.

  Even more than the Soviet Union, China maintained a warm official friendship with the North Korean state through most of its existence, relations seriously marred only by the revolutionary tumult of the Cultural Revolution. Even after the 1971–1972 shift in Beijing’s foreign policy, Chinese leaders were careful to maintain close ties with North Korea, which was seen as an important ideological client and ally on China’s border. Despite subsequent ups and downs in relations, both sides knew that the undeniable realities of geography meant they could never afford to drift too far apart.

  Until recent years, Beijing had kept aloof from anticommunist South Korea, which was the only Asian nation to continue to recognize the Nationalist regime on Taiwan as the legitimate government of China into the 1990s. Although Sino–South Korean trade had grown steadily after China opened up to market economics, Beijing was more cautious than Moscow in moving toward normalization of political relations with the South.

  Nonetheless, by mid-1991 Beijing was following Moscow’s lead in moving toward a much closer relationship with Seoul. The previous year, according to Beijing’s figures, Chinese trade with South Korea had been seven times larger than its trade with the North and was increasing rapidly, bringing with it a greater need for multifaceted relations. Moreover, the termination of the Sino–Soviet dispute and Moscow’s sharply diminished ties with North Korea made Chinese leaders less concerned with the possibility that adjusting their policy toward South Korea could push Kim Il Sung into the arms of the Soviet Union. In addition, China could see a potential domestic political gain in establishing diplomatic relations with South Korea, because it would force Seoul to terminate its long-standing official relationship with Taiwan, thus giving a sharp blow to the island state.

  The seriousness of its new situation with China had been brought home dramatically to North Korea during the four-day visit of Chinese premier Li Peng in May, the month before Foreign Minister Qian’s trip to Pyongyang. According to a variety of reports, Li broke the unwelcome news that China did not oppose admission of both North and South Korea to the United Nations and would not veto South Korea’s application, despite the opposition of Pyongyang to dual admission. China’s refusal to veto would ensure Seoul’s entry because the only other obstacle—a possible veto by the Soviet Union—had been eliminated in April when Gorbachev, during his visit to South Korea’s Cheju Island, had promised that Moscow would support Seoul’s application for UN membership.

  On May 27, after some in the Pyongyang leadership—apparently including Kim Jong Il—worked for months to overcome Kim Il Sung’s deep aversion to dual entry,* North Korea announced it had “no choice” but to apply for UN membership because otherwise the South would join the United Nations alone. This forced reversal at the hands of Moscow and Beijing was a symbol of North Korea’s diminished clout with its former communist sponsors. It also may have been the underlying reason for Foreign Minister Qian’s visit three weeks later, which was long on ceremony and short on substance. For years Qian had blocked efforts within the Chinese leadership to move faster toward normalizing ties with the ROK. Sending him to Pyongyang appeared to be China’s way of mending relations after forcing the North Koreans to swallow the bitter pill of dual North-South admission to the UN.

  A VISIT TO NORTH KOREA

  Although it was a coincidence that I arrived with the Chinese minister, given the limited air traffic into the North, it was hardly surprising that someone of diplomatic importance shared my commercial airline flight. The Chinese civil aviation jet was the only plane to arrive from the outside world that day in the entire country of more than 20 million people. In 1991 only eight scheduled airplane flights and seven trains a week entered North Korea, making it one of the most reclusive—and mysterious—nations on earth.

  My traveling companion, Washington Post Tokyo correspondent T. R. Reid, and I were greeted in the airport terminal by our official hosts and transported to our hotel in two chauffeured red Mercedes sedans. So few other vehicles were visible in either direction on the twelve-mile road into town that I could easily count them: twenty-three cars, six buses, three minivans, three trucks, and two jeeps. Hundreds of people could be seen walking along the roadside or waiting patiently for the few overcrowded buses. More than just transportation, the energy shortage seemed to have idled much of North Korea’s industry as well. I saw a number of overhead construction cranes during my week of travels, but not one that was in operation.

  For North Korea, 1991 was a terrible year economically. Beginning in January, the Soviet Union demand
ed hard currency for its exports to Pyongyang rather than continue the traditional concessional arrangements of the past. As a result, North Korean imports from its most important trading partner declined precipitously. The drop was particularly sharp in energy imports, which fell by an astonishing 75 percent from the 1990 level, suddenly making the North dependent on China for more than two-thirds of its imported energy. China, however, was unwilling or unable to make up for the Soviet losses, and in May notified Pyongyang that it would soon discontinue its concessional sales. The dire result was that in 1991–1992, North Korea was forced to abruptly reduce its total petroleum consumption by between one-fourth and one-third, resulting in the deserted roadways and idle construction projects that I observed.

  One might expect from all this to find a regime in a deep funk, fearful of the future and uncertain about which way to go. The greatest surprise to me was that Pyongyang’s officialdom was, outwardly at least, undaunted by the revolutionary reversals in their alliances. In the North Korean worldview, the faltering of communism in the Soviet Union and its collapse in Eastern Europe proved the correctness of Kim Il Sung’s independent policy of juche and his consistent refusal to formally join the Soviet bloc. Foreign Minister Kim Yong Nam spoke optimistically to me of “our people advancing along the road of the socialism they have chosen—socialism of their own style.” This phrase, reminiscent of China’s “socialism with Chinese characteristics,” which justified Beijing’s swing toward market economics, had first appeared the previous December in a Workers Party organ. In this case, “our own style” justified the absence of change rather than a deviation from the previous well-worn path.

  To the evidence before my eyes in 1991, North Korea was unique, a land unlike any other I had seen in my extensive travels as a correspondent. The capital, Pyongyang, had been so leveled by American bombing in the Korean War that the head of the US bomber command had halted further air strikes, saying that “there is nothing standing worthy of the name.” Kim Il Sung had rebuilt it from the ashes to a meticulously planned urban center of broad boulevards, monumental structures, and square-cut apartment buildings that resembled a stage set more than a working capital. Indeed, it was a synthetic city in many respects: according to foreign diplomats, the population was periodically screened, and the sick, elderly, or disabled, along with anyone deemed politically unreliable, were evicted from the capital.

  Pyongyang was dominated by homage to Kim Il Sung. Among its most imposing features was the Tower of the Juche Idea, an obelisk almost as high as the Washington Monument, which was erected for the Great Leader’s seventieth birthday to celebrate his self-reliance dogma; an Arch of Triumph larger than the one in Paris, celebrating Kim’s return from victory over Japan in 1945; and Kim Il Sung Stadium, seating one hundred thousand people for mass demonstrations of loyalty to the ruler and the regime. Less celebrated but equally prominent was a mammoth 105-story hotel, built to be the tallest in Asia, but now standing unfinished and abandoned. Rumor had it that the structure had fatal architectural flaws and could never be finished.* Pyongyang struck me as well suited for gigantic displays but not very convenient for people, who had few cars and buses and, unlike Beijing, no bicycles to help them traverse the capital’s massive spaces.

  On a guided tour of the city, we encountered several hundred fourth-grade boys, led by an adult instructor, doing mass exercises with wooden swords or, lacking these, pieces of flat wood cut to the length of swords. The boys slashed, jumped, and shouted with enthusiasm and on cue. This was only one of many manifestations of the collective activities that were being emphasized. On the other hand, there were signs that behind the public facade, North Koreans had not lost their individuality and humanity. During a performance at the Pyongyang Circus, a spectacular display of acrobatic talent, children squealed with laughter and uninhibited delight at an act featuring trained dogs. Another evening at the apartment of the sister of one of our guides, we experienced the warmth of Korean family life as a seven-year-old in pigtails played a small piano and her reluctant five-year-old sister was coaxed into doing a little dance. The apartment, while modest by Western standards, was doubtless better than most, and a special allocation of food had apparently been granted to provide the guests with an abundant home-cooked dinner. Although hardly typical, it was the closest to everyday life that we were permitted to come.

  Outside the capital and away from the country’s few highways, the landscape reminded me of what I had seen in the South in the 1950s and 1960s. An overnight train to Kaesong, just north of the demilitarized zone, took six hours to go about 120 miles, with antiquated equipment over a rough roadbed. Along the way, I saw a steam locomotive still in use, no doubt burning coal from North Korean mines. I awoke early in the morning to look out at hills and rice paddies shrouded with the familiar heavy morning mist and small houses with chimney pipes on the side arising from traditional under-the-floor heating. Here and there, the landscape was broken by dreary gray buildings that had been thrown up to house members of collective farms.

  All this was in startling contrast to the traffic-choked, neon-lit modernity of Seoul and the dramatically improved living conditions of the South Korean countryside I had seen in recent years. Although poverty had not been abolished, the wealth and health of most South Korean citizens had undergone revolutionary change for the better since I first observed them in the immediate aftermath of the Korean War and immense change from the early 1970s when I spent so much time in South Korea as a correspondent. In the 1970s, the South had the look and feel of a rawboned, gutsy frontier country with garlic on its breath, where its cities gave rise to a hundred pungent odors and even the newsprint had a peculiar musky smell. By 1991 South Korea had arrived, with high-rise buildings crowding out most of the slanting roofs of traditional houses in Seoul and other cities and good roads and modern conveniences in the countryside. Nearly 10 million people, close to one in four of South Korea’s 43 million citizens, were licensed drivers of the country’s 4.2 million motor vehicles, making it increasingly difficult to get from here to there, at least in Seoul. More than 3 million foreign tourists visited the South, and close to 2 million ROK citizens traveled abroad during the year. From rock music to high fashion, South Korea was connected to the world.

  The nexus between North and South was the Joint Security Area at Panmunjom, the principal destination on our trip from Pyongyang. Approaching from the North through the DPRK’s hilltop pavilion, the JSA appeared benign and ordinary. Compared with the heavily manned southern side, we saw remarkably few troops. As our small party of myself, fellow correspondent Tom Reid, and North Korean escorts approached the military demarcation line, an American sailor and two American MPs stood just across the line, assiduously taking our pictures. I felt little of the atmosphere of menace that I recall from visits to Checkpoint Charlie in Berlin before the wall came down, or even from my earlier visits to Panmunjom from the southern side. Perhaps it was because I was inside the enemy tent, having just been briefed by a North Korean major who was accompanying us, and for once I was not concerned about an imminent breach of the peace from the North, or from the South either.

  Earlier in Pyongyang, Foreign Minister Kim Yong Nam had emphasized the high priority his government placed on negotiations to reduce tension at the DMZ and on the peninsula generally, because “we still have heavy danger of war.” Kim painstakingly recounted North Korea’s efforts to begin direct talks with the United States or three-way talks that would also include South Korea. “We have the intention and willingness to improve relations with the United States, but we cannot accept all the unjust demands of the U.S. side,” he said. Recognizing that the issues are deeply rooted in history, he said, “the two countries must first of all officially make public their will to improve bilateral relations and start negotiations.” Knowing the apprehension about North Korea in Washington and the deep reluctance to engage its diplomats, I had great doubt this would happen anytime soon.

  Kim Yong Nam, bo
rn on February 24, 1928, had risen step by step, by diligence and loyalty, through the ranks of the Workers Party to become party secretary for international affairs and, two months after the Rangoon bombing of October 1983, vice premier and foreign minister. The disaster in Rangoon had touched off an extensive reorganization of the bureaucracy dealing with North-South and international affairs. As the new foreign minister, Kim had set about restructuring DPRK diplomacy along more professional lines, in the process becoming the sponsor of many of the country’s career diplomats.

  A Chinese official who had known Kim for many years said that he has extremely good literary skills and that he drafted many speeches for Kim Il Sung. This may have been the source of his unusually close relationship to the Great Leader, who elevated him to full membership in the Politburo in 1980, while he was still party secretary for international affairs—a job that did not usually carry such weight. Kim’s younger brother, Kim Du Nam, was also close to Kim Il Sung, being a four-star general and military secretary to the Great Leader.

  I had met Kim Yong Nam during his first trip to the United Nations as foreign minister in 1984—at the time, a rare visit to New York by a high-ranking North Korean. My persistent requests for an interview finally won out over the extreme caution of Pyongyang’s UN observer mission. A lengthy first meeting in a cavernous Manhattan hotel suite was notable for Kim’s prepared declaration, which he read from a cloth-covered notebook he took from his pocket, that North Korea was interested in talks with the United States on the “confidence building measures” mentioned by President Reagan in his UN address several weeks earlier. This was a reversal of the previous North Korean dismissal of confidence-building proposals and was clearly intended to be an important signal to Washington.

 

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