Victor Cha

A very thorough history and review of policy towards the DPRK. A couple of take aways for me is how dedicated previous administrations were, especially Bush II, were to finding a solution to the humanitarian crisis in the DPRK. The DPRK officials knew the only reason they were being treated as they were (trips to NYC, steak dinners, etc..) was because they had nuclear capabilities and why would you give up your only pawn.

You come away feeling sorry for the people. They are "a shrimp caught between two whales", a tiny nation caught between China and the US and have had no say so in their position in life.… (more)

The Impossible State: North Korea, Past and Future by Victor Cha is the latest in books on North Korea. Cha is a former Director for Asian Affairs in the White House's National Security Council, with responsibility for Japan, North and South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand. Cha served as President Bush's top advisor on North Korean affairs. Currently, he holds the D. S. Song-Korea Foundation Chair in Asian Studies and is the Director of the Asian Studies program in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. Cha is also senior advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

There have been several books on North Korea in the last few years. The one thing in common with them is that they repeat the same few stories. Granted North Korea is isolated and information is scarce, but there has to be more information. With Cha's impressive background, I expected more information. He does repeat several stories or parts of stories that have been told and retold. However, he includes something that is lacking in other books. He goes into detail with North Korean relations with its neighbors and their history.

Key in North Korea's existence is its ability to play countries against each other. Throughout the Cold War, North Korea played China against the USSR to its advantage. With the fall of the Soviet Union, both China and Russia turned their sites to better relations with South Korea. Better trade with South Korea was more profitable than supporting the North Korean Regime. The puzzling thing is why has North Korea been able to make itself so important. Korea had no strategic importance in the Cold War. There was no economic interest in North Korea, but the idea it was divided created an artificial interest in the area between the powers. Although nothing was worth fighting for neither power wanted to leave. China still has that problem of defending North Korea while enjoying profitable trade with the south. China has recently taken to extracting raw materials from North Korea as a form of trade basically reducing North Korea to an economic colony of China.

North Korea continues to confound its "enemies" as well as its allies. Kidnapping Japanese citizens, sinking a South Korean ship, defying the major powers in nuclear talks. North Korea acts like a spoiled child making outrageous demands and acting poorly in public and regional and international powers act like coddling parents. North Korea although does not have a nuclear delivery system it does have the means to deliver chemical weapons to South Korea and Japan. It possesses enough deterrent to make military engagement costly in lives and property.

How does an isolated regime continue to function? There is the Kim cult of personality and illegal means. North Korea produces nearly flawless counterfeit US currency. Another source of income is methamphetamines. North Korea produces nearly pure crystal meth and distributes it around the world using diplomatic pouches for distribution. North Korea also exports its military hardware, reliable but not highly technical.

Although Cha rehashes old stories and even repeats himself in the book, he sheds light on the North's policies through its relations with its neighbors and trading partners. You can tell quite a bit about a person by the company he keeps. The same can be said of a country. North Korea does not allow much to be seen inside its borders, so what they show outside their borders is the best we can get and adds greatly to the little we know about North Korea.



I purchased this book from Amazon.com … (more)

I'll admit to having something of a fascination with North Korea, surely one of the planet's strangest, most awful places. I've read Barbara Demmick's "Nothing to Envy" and B.R. Meyers's "The Cleanest Race," and while Victor Cha's "The Impossible State" is wonkier than those two volumes, it's may, in the strictest sense, be the most informative of the three. Cha worked on the North Korea issue during the second Bush administration and his knowledge of the the country and region and its problems is deep and nuanced. In my opinion, the most useful facets of "The Impossible State" are Cha's recounting of North Korea's history as it relates to the Kim dynasty and his exploration of the ideology that holds the regime together. He provides an interesting history of North Korea's role in the Cold War -- when it was considerably better off than its southern neighbor -- and how this conflict continues to inform it's leader's worldviews. Cha doesn't just attibute North Korea's situation to world-historical forces, though. "The Impossible State" also contains an extensive history of the truly impressive string of disastrous decisions that North Korea's leaders have made to bring it to its current condition. Cha also explores what the oft-cited concept of "juche" means in a modern context, and includes a lot of interesting material on North Korean identity. It's difficult to know, of course, how many ordinary North Koreans believe the massive amounts of state propaganda that they're exposed to, but Cha convincingly argues that the Kim regime is so closely tied into the Kim dynasty that more North Koreans support their government than most people would think possible. This is the sort of stuff that you won't find in your average news report on North Korea. Likewise, his description of North Korea's confusing but effective negotiating tactics is, although repetitive, enlightening.

There are elements of "The Impossible State" that are probably less relevant to the average reader, though. While I found Cha's description of China and the DPRK mutually non-beneficial relationship interesting, his meticulous description of its relationship with all of its neighbors will probably interest academics and no one else. Cha, who served under George W. Bush, also gives his former boss considerable praise for his work on the North Korea issue: any lefties that still cringe when they hear Dubya's name might want to skip this one. (For what it's worth, Cha makes an effort to argue that Bush's policy towards the DPRK wasn't as disengaged as many people assume). "The Impossible State" runs a bit long, and, even though the text has been updated describe the changes that followed the death of Kim Jong-Il, it's still, at this point, somewhat outdated. Recommended to readers who have a special interest in what's often called "The Peninsula of Bad Options."… (more)