Becoming Kim Jong Un: Understanding North Korea’s Young Dictator

Good value.

The author is a deputy assistant secretary of state in the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs. Pak has written an absorbing and intelligent book about a dictator who has nuclear weapons. The meetings with Trump were PR exercises. Pak,a former CIA expert on North Korea shows Kim is no fool. Aged 37 he has had a very privileged life. While his people often starve he eats gourmet meals. He comes over as a very unlikeable man. Any opponent is got rid of. Some 340 have been removed so far. Murder is routine. There is very little America can do to bring this nasty despot to heel.

This book offers me, a Brit, an insight into the DPRK, Kim Jong Un, it’s economy and society. It’s a good read. But it also offers far more than this. A better understanding of intelligence analysis, of politics, and of how the US thinks.I enjoyed the book until the concluding pages, which I thought were very much a ‘the US knows best and our way is the only way.’ But that might be a little unfair.My personal view is that our world is diverse, and diversity matters, for our world would be somewhat boring if everything was the same. I also think that every nation has the right to govern as it sees fit. Sure nations can offer friendly advice to others, and hopefully they will listen and consider such friendly advice, but to impose one country’s ways on another is problematic on various levels. But that is me.While I would not want to live in DPRK, as this book makes clear it is a nuclear power, and hence has earned its place at the nuclear table. That’s the reality. I for one hope that the US recognises that, like it or not, the balance of power in our world is rapidly changing, and it needs to maintain wise leadership. As China rises, as Russia reinvigorates, as DPRK continues to develop its ability to both (1) hit America, and (2) trade such knowledge with other nations, the US needs to ensure that it’s leadership and policies maintain relevance and potency. Which is where and why the last few pages of this book worry me. The forward plan seems to ignore the facts on the ground that global power balances are shifting. But what do I know.This book makes clear that the DPRK wants to develop its economy on its own terms. Fair play to them. Given that it has nukes that could hit US territory, perhaps it might be better to offer a hand of friendship and help, instead of being paranoid and overly concerned with the past. Things have changed. I mean, in reality, sanctions haven’t stopped nuke development, all they seem to be doing is hurting the poor. Helping Kim Jong Un give his people the economy he desires as described in this book, might actually make the world a safer place, if it is done on his terms.But I am just an armchair analyst.In short a brilliant book until the last few pages, which are too US centric in our rapidly evolving world. That said I recognise that I may be wrong. Either way it is a book very much worth reading.