• Convergence Security Journal
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• v.14 no.6_1
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• pp.75-87
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• 2014

It may be meaningful that analysis of possible continuity and change of North Korea's Kim Jong-un's ruling in its third year. For this analysis, for the application more rational and statistical analysis methods, this study takes advantage of the new years' messages of Kim Il Sung, Kim Jong Il, and Kim Jong-un. In North Korea, the new years' messages are rare enough to give influence to every field of the North Korea's community and the New Year's message performs tutorial role throughout the whole year. The said messages of Il Sung, Kim Jong Il, and Kim Jong-un regimes have been researched and comprehensively summarized. The summarized New Year's Message by Kim Il Sung, Kim Jong Il, and Kim Jong Un are separated, compared and analyzed by the regime by presentation method, configured information, and others followed by New Year message's characteristics and implications of each North Korean regime that have been investigated. Based on the results of this analysis of Kim Jong-un era, possibility of its continuation and change is forecasted. Above all, for possible continuation of the ruling, sticking to the governing socialist way and military-first politics are presented. For possible causes of change, such the four factors as partial opening to overcome economic problems, the North Korean nuclear issue, influx of the nature of capitalism, and Kim Jung-un's control weakness have been presented. Such the factors of possible change and continuation of the North Korea Kim Jung-un ruling are expected to work as a combination of factors. The issue of continuation and change of North Korea Kim Jong-un's control is a key point for us to solve the issues between North and South Koreas. In the situation that the whole people of South Korea have a national consensus in the effort of gathering the public opinion, it is a high time that we needed to have much flexibility to actively cope with the North Korean issues.

• Strategy21
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• s.39
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• pp.82-113
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• 2016

This paper analyzes the contents and the effects of the UNSC 2270, and its implications to South Korea's defense strategy and navy. The UN Security Council passed strong sanctions against North Korea which punish North Korea's 4^th nuclear test. The sanctions compared to the previous ones require international society to take practical actions such as comprehensive trade bans as well as diplomatic isolation which will put significant pains on North Korea. Especially, these measures would greatly hamper economic development policy of Kim Joung-un regime. Because Kim Jung-un regime has inherent legitimacy problems which stems from the third family succession of the power, economic difficulties may play an important cause on the regime instability in the long term. In fact, the United States sees this possibility as an option to coerce North Korea in which North Korea choose denuclearization for its regime survival. Nevertheless, the prospects of the UN sanctions are not so optimistic. Considering North Korea's willingness for nuclear development and its level of nuclear technology, North Korea will try to play a gambit with the US and South Korea by exploiting its strategic advantages. North Korea's response will have three following strategies. First, it would actively pursue political and economic survival strategy by using China's support for the regime, strengthening its power grip in the name of countering US hostile policy, and enhancing peace propaganda. Second, North Korea will accelerate efforts to position its status as a nuclear de facto state. For this purpose, it could create nuclear crisis on the peninsula. Third, it would exploit local provocations as an exit strategy to get over the current situation. In order to counter North Korea's actions and punish North Korea's behavior strongly, South Korea needs following strategies and efforts. It should first make all the efforts to implement the UN sanctions. Strong and practical nuclear deterrence strategy and capability with the U.S. should be developed. Effective strategy and capabilities for the prevention and deterrence of North Korea's provocation should be prepared. For this purpose, North Korea's provocation strategy should be thoroughly reviewed. Active international cooperation is needed to punish and coerce North Korea's behavior. Finally, South Korea should prepare for the possible occurrence of North Korea's contingency and make use of the situation as an opportunity to achieve unification. All these strategies and efforts demand the more active roles and missions of South Korea's navy and thus, nullify North Korea's intention militarily.

• Analyses & Alternatives
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.115-162
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• 2022

The Rules of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK), revised at the eighth Party Congress in 2021, reflect the Kim Jong Un regime's changes in strategic lines and ideological justifications on North Korea's socialism and communism, and its recent stances against the external environment. Moreover, they contain critical changes in the party's organizational system encompassing the central and the provinces. This study explores the organizational changes of the "monolithic guidance system of the party core" stipulated by the new party rules in January 2021, based on the analysis of the entire nine revised rules of the WPK since 1945. In the 2021 Party Congress, the Kim Jong Un regime, which officially came to power after the fourth Party Conference in 2012, has institutionalized the monolithic guidance system centered on the party core, or the head of state, Kim Jong Un. The newly set leadership and execution system, which reorganized party, government, and military organizational structure and accompanied the relevant personnel changes, was derived from the attempts for reinstating the Kim Jong Un regime as a more normalized party-state structure before its 10th year in power in April 2022. The "monolithic leadership system of the party core" established a system of "organizational leadership" through the organization of the Central Committee, directed by the Party Head, or General Secretary. The institutionalization of the new system resulted from the ten-year development of the revival of the party-state structure, which compromised the status of the military and reconfirmed the party's control of the military. This study explains the new system from the perspectives of both institutionalization and top-down unity, shedding light on the new party-military-government relations of the Kim Jong Un regime. The analysis contributes to a better understanding and forecasting of the Kim Jong Un regime's governance, which currently strengthens the monolithic leadership system as a crisis management system in the face of the "triple hardships" of sanctions, Covid and disaster.

• Strategy21
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• s.39
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• pp.5-46
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• 2016

North Korea's 4th nuclear test on Jan. 6 and following developments once again awakened the world into seriousness of the nuclear matters on the Korean peninsula. On March 2, UNSC adopted Resolution 2270 which is complemented by Seoul government's measures such as withdrawal from the Gaesung Industrial Complex (Feb. 9) and announcement of unilateral sanction (March 8). Seoul government also strongly urged the international community to strangle North Korea's 'financial resources.' The U.S., Japan, China, and other countries have issued unilateral sanctions to complement the UNSC measure. South Korea and the U.S. conducted their annual joint military drill (Resolve-Foal Eagle) in the largest-ever scale. North Korea, however, responded with demonstration of its nuclear capabilities and announcement of de facto 'nuclear-first' politics. North Korea test-fired a variety of delivery vehicles, threatened nuclear strikes against South Korea and the U.S., and declared itself as an 'invincible nuclear power armed with hydrogen bombs' at the 7th Workers 'Party Congress held in May, 2016. Considering the circumstantial evidences, the North's 4th nuclear test may have been a successful boosted fission bomb test. North Korea, and, if allowed to go on with its nuclear programs, will become a nuclear power armed with more than 50 nuclear weapons including hydrogen bombs. The North is already conducting nuclear blackmail strategy towards South Korea, and must be developing 'nuclear use' strategies. Accordingly, the most pressing challenge for the international community is to bring the North to 'real dialogue for denuclearization through powerful and consistent sanctions. Of course, China's cooperation is the key to success. In this situation, South Korea has urgent challenges on diplomacy and security fronts. A diplomatic challenge is how to lead China, which had shown dual attitudes between 'pressure and connivance' towards the North's nuclear matters pursuant to its military relations with the U.S, to participate in the sanctions consistently. A military one is how to offset the 'nuclear shadow effects' engendered by the North's nuclear blackmail and prevent its purposeful and non-purposeful use of nuclear weapons. Though South Korea's Ministry of Defense is currently spending a large portion of defense finance on preemption (kill-chain) and missile defense, they pose 'high cost and low efficiency' problems. For a 'low cost and high efficiency' of deterrence, South Korea needs to switch to a 'retaliation-centered' deterrence strategy. Though South Korea's response to the North's nuclear threat can theoretically be boiled down into dialogue, sanction and deterrence, now is the time to concentrate on strong sanction and determined deterrence since they are an inevitable mandatory course to destroy the North' nuclear-first delusion and bring it to a 'real denuclearization dialogue.'

• Progress in Superconductivity
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.62-67
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• 2007

The effects of the heat-treatment temperature on the carbon (C) substitution amount, full width at half maximum (FWHM) value, critical temperature ($T_c$), critical current density ($J_c$) have been investigated for 10 wt % malic acid ($C_4H_6O_5$)-doped $MgB_2/Fe$ wires. All the samples were fabricated by the in-situ powder-in-tube (PIT) method and heat-treated within a temperature range of $650^{\circ}C$ to $1000^{\circ}C$. As the heat-treatment temperature increased, it seemed that the lattice distortion was increased by a more active C substitution into the boron sites from the malic acid addition. These increased electron scattering defects seemed to enhance the $J_c-H$ properties in spite of an improvement in the crystallinity, such as a decrease of the FWHM value and an increase of the $T_c$. Compared to the un-doped wire heat-treated at $650^{\circ}C$ for 30 min, the $J_c$ was enhanced by the C doping in a high-field regime. The wire heat-treated at $900^{\circ}C$ resulted in a higher magnetic $J_c$ of approximately $10^4\;A/cm^2$ at 5 K and 8 T.

• Strategy21
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• s.34
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• pp.58-92
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• 2014

Even after S. Korea took 5.24 Measure(24 May 2014), N. Korea has not stopped raising provocations such as the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island, electronic and cyber attacks. To make matters worse, the communist country lunched long-range missiles(twice) and conducted 3rd nuclear test, escalating tensions which could possibly lead to an all-out war. Korean Government failed to respond properly. However, escalation into an all-out war was deterred by the CFC immediately carrying out its peacetime duty(CODA). The US made a rapid dispatch of its augmentation forces(Aircraft carrier, nuclear-powered submarine, strategic bomber, F-22) to the Korean Peninsula. In recognition of the importance of the Combined Forces Command, since May 2013 the Park Geun-Hye Administration has been pushing ahead with re-postponement of Wartime Operational Control Transfer(which initially meant the disassembling of the CFC as of 1 December 2015) More recently, there has been a series of unusual indicators from the North. Judging from its inventory of 20 nuclear weapons, 1,000 ballistic missiles and biochemical weapons, it is safe to say that N. Korea has gained at least war deterrence against S. Korea. Normally a nation with nuclear weapons shrink its size of conventional forces, but the North is pursuing the opposite, rather increasing them. In addition, there was a change of war plan by N. Korea in 2010, changing 'Conquering the Korean Peninsula' to 'Negotiation after the seizure of the Greater Seoul Metropolitan Area(GSMA)' and establishing detailed plans for wartime projects. The change reflects the chain reaction in which requests from pro-north groups within the South will lead to the proclamation of war. Kim, Jeong-Un, leader of N. Korean regime, sent threatening messages using words such as 'exercising a nuclear preemptive strike right' and 'burning of Seoul'. Nam, Jae-June, Director of National Intelligence Service, stated that Kim, Jung-Un is throwing big talks, saying communization of the entire Korean Peninsula will come within the time frame of 3 years. Kim, Gwan-Jin, Defense Minister, shared an alarming message that there is a high possibility that the North will raise local provocations or a full-fledged war whenever while putting much emphasis on defense posture. As for the response concept of the Korean Government, it has been decided that 'ROK·US Combined Local Provocation Counter-Measure' will be adopted to act against local provocations from the North. Major provocation types include ▲ violation of the Northern Limit Line(NLL) with mobilization of military ships ▲ artillery provocations on Northwestern Islands ▲ low altitude airborne intrusion ▲ rear infiltration of SOF ▲ local conflicts within the Military Demarcation Line(MDL) ▲ attacking friendly ships by submarines. Counter-measures currently established by the US involves the support from USFK and USFJ. In order to keep the sworn promise, the US is reinforcing both USFK and USFJ. An all-out war situation will be met by 'CFC OPLAN5027' and 'Tailored Expansion Deterrence Forces' with the CFC playing a central role. The US augmentation forces stands at 690,000 troops, some 160 ships, 2,000 aircraft and this comprise 50% of US total forces, which is estimated to be ninefold of Korean forces. The CFC needs to be in center in handling both local provocations and an all-out war situation. However, the combat power of S. Korean conventional forces is approximately around 80% of that of N. Korea, which has been confirmed from comments made by Kim, Gwan-Jin, Defense Minister, during an interpellation session at the National Assembly. This means that S. Korean forces are not much growing. In particular, asymmetric capabilities of the North is posing a serious threat to the South including WMD, cyber warfare forces, SOF, forces targeting 5 Northwestern Islands, sub-surface and amphibious assault forces. The presence of such threats urgently requires immediate complementary efforts. For complementary efforts, the Korean Government should consider ① reinforcement of Korean forces; putting a stoppage to shrinking military, acquisition of adequate defense budget, building a missile defense and military leadership structure validity review, ② implementation of military tasks against the North; disciplinary measures on the sinking of ROKS Cheon-an/shelling of Yeonpyeong Islands, arrangement of inter-Korean military agreements, drawing lessons from studies on the correlation between aid for N. Korea, execution of inter-Korean Summit and provocations from the North, and ③ bolstering the ROK·US alliance; disregarding wartime operational control transfer plan(disassembling of CFC) and creation of a combined division.