The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is famously ill-named. All four words are false. It is no democracy; the people decide nothing. More hereditary monarchy than republic, its culture and institutions owe more to Stalin (who created it) and Mao than to anything Korean.
The prospects for the North Korean economy meeting Kim’s New Year’s demand that “…we should bring about an upturn in improving the people’s living standards”1 looked dim at the start of 2015. The self-imposed Ebola tourism ban lasted until April, cutting off a major foreign exchange earner.2 In
It is very difficult to draw any strategic consideration from the recent escalations in the Korean peninsula. No significant conclusion can be reached through merely analytical means.