Jack Kim: Power battles await North Korea's 'Great Successor'
Despite the extraordinary show of military power, ceremonial pomp and tens of thousands of weeping extras choreographed to tearful, almost spontaneous perfection yesterday, North Koreans yearn for better. They know that their southern brethren, and even the despised Chinese, live better than they do. They are hungry for change. They are hungry, full stop.
Those who live in Pyongyang are a privileged elite. Well may they weep at Kim Jong-il's death, for they have perks and privileges to lose when -- not if -- North Korea finally comes to its senses.
So far we have not been shown similar scenes of stage-managed grief from outside the capital where, for most, life is grim beyond imagining. The people there too will have shed tears, if they know what's good for them. But they are not deceived.
On average, North Koreans have a life expectancy three-and-a-half years lower than when "Eternal President" Kim Il-sung died in 1994.
And take the cold. For two decades North Koreans have shivered indoors as well as outdoors. Diplomats keep their thickest coats on for midwinter meetings with their hosts, for even the foreign ministry is unheated.
This is not right and North Koreans know it. The official hagiography has a grateful populace thanking their new young leader, Kim Jong-un -- dubbed 'the Great Successor'for sending hot drinks to keep the mourners' spirits up.
But he will need to do more than that if he is to survive in the power struggles soon to come. A nice fat cheque from China would allow him to pose as the bringer of bread and circuses -- surely the only chance he has of cementing real power.
More of the same is not really an option if he is to lift national morale and address the concerns of ordinary Koreans, a third of whom are said to suffer from food shortages. And an anxious, only thinly united elite must decide if they are really ready to entrust the continuation of their privileged status to this whippersnapper.
Though young and untested, Kim Jong-un has all but taken over North Korea's leadership, with state media calling him "supreme commander" and "leader of the state, army and party" well before his late father's body was borne through the streets.
Kim, believed to be about 27, walked alongside a limousine carrying his father's coffin as it set out on a funeral procession amid snow flurries.
After the reclusive state emerges from a period of mourning today, Kim, vice chairman of the ruling party's Central Military Commission, is expected quickly to take on additional titles to cement his place at the top.
Experts who study the North's power structure say it will likely take years for the third member of the Kim dynasty to solidify his grip on the state and be able to run it without a coterie.
The power behind the throne is widely believed to be Jang Song-thaek, the husband of the junior Kim's aunt, a pragmatic survivor of the North's tradition of purge and bitter intrigue surrounding the former leader who died on December 17 at age 69.
Jang could steer the young Kim toward opening up one of the world's most isolated states that has been squeezed tight under international sanctions designed to punish it for its defiant missile and nuclear tests.
Not much is known about the younger Kim, though his father, Kim Jong-il, and his autocratic regime had made preparations for the son's transition to power.
Kim was appointed as a four-star general last year and vice chairman of the powerful Central Military Commission at a Workers' Party meeting, bringing him to the forefront and in line to take over from his father.
Kim Jong-il suffered a stroke in 2008 but had recovered, and led an active public schedule in recent months making field trips with the junior Kim often at his side.
Educated in Switzerland, the junior Kim is thought to speak English and German, and bears a striking resemblance to his grandfather, the North's founder, Kim Il-sung.
Two attacks on the peninsula last year which killed 50 South Koreans, were, analysts say, aimed at winning the army's support for a continuation of dynastic rule and underscored an intent to maintain the state's military-first policy.
The young Kim is likely to follow the same militaristic path, experts say, maintaining a strong grip over one of the world's largest armies and pressing on with a nuclear weapons programme in the face of international outrage.
For added security, Kim Jong-il promoted his sister and her husband, Jang, to top positions to create a powerful triumvirate to run the family dynasty.
"Despite economic hardship, food shortages, and a welter of sanctions, the Kim Jong-il regime seems stable, and the succession process is, by all appearances, taking place smoothly," John Delury and Chung-in Moon of Yonsei University wrote in an article in April.
The two scholars also say China is actively engaged on diplomatic and economic levels in supporting North Korea's survival, stability and development.
China prefers the status quo on the peninsula, worried that if the South takes over the North, the South would bring its US military ally to the Chinese border.
The most frequently viewed photograph of Jong-un before his emergence last year was of him as an 11-year-old. But recent pictures show a heavy-set young man with his hair clipped short.
There is a question over whether his late mother, a Japanese-born professional dancer called Ko Yong-hui, was Kim Jong-il's official wife or mistress -- an issue that might weigh on his legitimate right to replace his father.
Kim Jong-il was very publicly named heir by his father, Kim Il-sung, but he studiously avoided repeating the process and for years none of his three sons appeared in state media.
- Jack Kim in Seoul
Irish Independent
