Chan Young Bang

Opinion | With North Korea on the edge, Kim Jong-un has three options – but only one will ensure regime survival

Kim could seek to maintain the status quo, or trade nuclear arms for the lifting of sanctions and security guarantees while maintaining totalitarian rule

Yet, his only realistic option is to deliver a bright future by agreeing to open up the country with financing tied to economic reform and disarmament

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Why you can trust SCMP

Chan Young Bang

Published: 8:45am, 4 Oct 2021

North Korea and its leader, Kim Jong-un, are living on borrowed time. This brutal truth is evident given the nation’s dire state of affairs.

The protective shield that has served as a bastion for Kim has evaporated. A derelict and inefficient command economy, harsh sanctions and the Covid-19 border closures have left Kim in an untenable position. He has no viable exit strategy to guarantee his survival or that of North Korea.

So, here are three options as North Korea struggles for survival.

The first is to maintain the status quo and seek survival as a nuclear weapon state, but this is untenable. Nuclear weapons fulfil four essential functions in sustaining North Korea and Kim’s rule. First, the nuclear armaments deter all real and imagined US military threats while cost-effectively providing military superiority over South Korea.

Nuclear weaponry is also one of the two pillars of the byungjin policy (economic development and military development through nuclear arms). By disarming, North Korea would be simultaneously relinquishing byungjin by losing its most cost-effective source of military power.

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North Korea tells UN it has the ‘right’ to test weapons

Moreover, the development of a nuclear weapons programme symbolises a monumental achievement, from which Kim draws his legitimacy as supreme leader. Internally, nuclear weapons provide the basis for public solidarity through waging a belligerent foreign policy.