Kim Jong Il, North Korea, Nuclear Weapons and Alcoholism
OCTOBER 2004
Can Kim Jong Il be trusted to not sell or use nukes?
There were a number of competing stories from which to choose this month: the continuing antics of Britney Spears, the death of singer Rick James and the arraignment on murder charges of music producer Phil Spector. However, due to the inclusion of North Korea as a topic of the first Presidential debate, the mystery of a massive explosion and mushroom-shaped cloud of debris over the country’s far north and threats against Japan should the U.S. ever intervene, Kim Jong Il and the possibility of alcoholic megalomania wins top honors.
Kim Jong Il (as in “ill” or the post office abbreviation for Illinois, IL) runs what appears to be the most bizarre, totalitarian, repressive, Orwellian and Stalinist regime ever. North Korean propaganda describes Kim (the Korean first name is actually the last) as “incomparable, omnipotent, infallible, clairvoyant, the perfect brain, the morning star” and “one who rivals the sun itself.” The same state apparatus claims Kim says his people are “the most beautiful and excellent beings in the world” and that he “deeply worships them.” Yet, his brand of socialism puts little food on the table”an estimated two million of twenty-three million of its citizens starved during the 1990s”while squandering at least 30% of gross domestic product on a military whose duty is to protect the country against imaginary enemies. The style is frighteningly similar to the waging of perpetual war against its enemies in George Orwell’s nightmare vision of the ultimate totalitarian state, Oceania, in his novel, 1984.
The capital city, Pyongyang, was described in “The New Yorker” magazine (September 8, 2003) as “a city of megalomaniacal architecture and public spaces: immense palaces and coliseums, grandiose [mostly empty] boulevards (six, eight, ten lanes wide), towering monuments to the Great Leader…and skyscrapers (although the tallest [at 105 stories] is a shell, abandoned as structurally unusable during its construction).” Three separate internal security forces independently watch the people (reporting only to the top few and not to each other). Over 35% of time in government schools, from the earliest age, is spent memorizing political propaganda. Every adult takes part in almost daily indoctrination sessions. Each member of every household is accountable for the transgressions of the others, under which a violation by one results in imprisonment for all. Minor infractions, such as speaking poorly of the leadership or using anything other than a special brush to clean the mandatory household picture of Kim Jong Il, which is to be used only on such pictures, can lead to family catastrophe. Every radio and TV set in the country is built to receive only one station, carrying messages such as “Today, the world’s people are consistently envious of our people and their great leader,” during the few hours a day electricity is on. For a visual of the lack of what we consider civilization, cut and paste in your browser http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/dprk/dprk-dark.htm for an amazing picture of the two Koreas at night — and be sure to scroll down.
And this country — actually, a man running a combination prison and fiefdom — may have nuclear weapons.
We know from experience that democracies are far less likely to instigate war than are countries headed by dictators. Arguably, the odds that free societies would ever initiate the use of weapons of mass destruction are also remote. Therefore, the greater concern is over despots, especially if they happen to be alcoholic. Not only are the external checks and balances of a democratic system absent, but such rulers also lack internal constraints, in which the neo-cortex, the seat of reason and logic, restrains the impulses of the pre-mammalian part of the brain, the limbic system. Ask a recovering alcoholic (not one with only a few years’ sobriety, but rather at least ten) what he might have been capable of if, while using, he had been in a position of power. The response will often be, “anything.” The entire world is at peril when reptilian instincts control the actions of the head of an autocratic state with access to WMD.
Here’s the rub: most think that practicing alcoholics act rationally or can at least be reasoned with. The evidence of this can be found in almost any alcoholic family, in which the sober often try to instill logic into the debate, arguing with and attempting to cajole the alcoholic and attempt rational negotiation, sometimes for years. Likewise, the worlds’ leaders naively attempt to negotiate with the Pyongyang regime, which they think acts rationally despite the obvious messianic behaviors of its ruler. Yet if the ruler is alcoholic, damage to the neo-cortex precludes the possibility of consistently rational behavior.
There are countless behavioral clues to alcoholism in Kim Jong Il. He inflates his ego at every opportunity, from statues of himself in practically every public place to the required picture in every home. He feeds his ego with a perpetual threat of war against far more powerful nations. He fuels it by threatening to bathe Japan in a sea of nuclear fire should the big, bad U.S ever attack his small country. As “The New Yorker” points out, Kim Jong Il exploits his country’s secrecy by keeping “the outside world uncertain and off kilter while he stage-manages the crises he creates.” Ask anyone who’s ever lived with an alcoholic and you’ll find this is a classic alcoholic tactic.
His megalomania is also typical of alcoholic despots. I’ve confirmed that the worst despots in history have almost all been alcohol or other drug addicts (see clue # 28 in How to Spot Hidden Alcoholics, in which I include Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini and others among these). I have privately confirmed alcoholism in Saparmurat Niyazov, the ruler of Turkmenistan, who has named cities and celestial bodies after himself, vaingloriously littered his country with enormous statues of himself and put his face on all the country’s money. Other cult-like leaders have also often been addicts, including Jim Jones of Jonestown, Guyana, who convinced 900 people to commit Kool-Aid suicide. Why would Kim Jong Il be any different?
Kim Jong Il already raises funds from drug-running, arms trading and counterfeiting. His government produces missiles in ten facilities, along with nerve gas and chemical agents in eight. The country produces nothing else of export value. What would prevent him from clandestinely selling nuclear weapons once he has enough of them for himself? Before responding, remember one thing: rational thought does not enter into the equation when trying to predict what an alcoholic might do.