By Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein
Kim Jong-un wants to both build a hydrogen bomb and develop North Korea’s economy. It won’t work.
Who decides what in Pyongyang? Do fierce political battles rage between hardliners and reformers, where the former group struggles to replace nuclear belligerence with liberal market economics and trade? Whenever a purge or suspicious death occurs in Pyongyang, speculations come alive about potential policy changes by the regime.
It is a fool’s errand to make guesses about how North Korea’s claimed (but unlikely) hydrogen bomb test fits into the speculative dichotomy of modernizers versus conservatives. After all, such simple divisions are rare in the political life of any country. But looking at the test in the context of the past year makes it clear that Pyongyang is pursuing a messy mix of policies that are mutually exclusive.
Even as the regime attempts to draw foreign investment, diversify its investor base to include other countries than China, and take its industrial zones from plans to reality, it is also actively working against economic progress through nuclear tests and diplomatic belligerence. Either the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing, or the two hands don’t care much about their success.
Read the full story at The Diplomat