North Korea is far away but the decisions made here in relation to Russia can bring changes beyond adding weapons to the war in Ukraine. The balance between powers in the Asian space is also at stake. It is explained by Patrick Maurus (Paris, 1950), a leading member of the French region specialist INALCO, and one of the few with extensive experience in the field.
What does Pyongyang have that Moscow needs?
Obviously I am not aware of the secret pacts but Moscow knows perfectly well that North Korea has been on a war footing for 75 years and is therefore militarily prepared. The weapons of both countries are closely linked and Pyongyang can supply Moscow with a large number of weapons, no matter if they are not sophisticated.
Is it just a question of weapons?
Russia shares a border with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), preventing Beijing from having direct access to the Sea of Japan, but the Rason-Chongjin special economic zone is used by both China and Russia using undisguised ships. of tourist ships as stated in the French press. Now everyone is interested in developing it without losing sight of what others are doing.
And how does supporting Russia benefit Pyongyang?
The realism that governs all decisions leads to a very material response. North Korean weapons, even if they are mainly ammunition, will not be free. Famine-martyred Korea has received almost no aid, and the small extra financial contribution represents exactly what the DPRK needs to get back on its feet. From this point of view, the Kim-Putin meeting is of considerable importance. From a political point of view, and to put it simply, two countries that get along well are no longer alone!
I imagine that for North Korea it goes beyond accessing Russian oil or gas.
A country as planned as the DPRK certainly thinks about the future. There have been Russian students at Kim Il Sung University for a long time. Furthermore, the US, Russia's enemy, is also North Korea's enemy. Militaryly, financially and diplomatically the DPRK wins. And I find it hard to believe that, in the event of new food problems, Russia will be as indifferent as it was last century. From a different point of view, the region has been dreaming for 20 years of gas pipelines that reach South Korea and even Japan. If this were to happen, Russia could choose the North Korean option instead of the Chinese one, a decision that would change the political and economic landscape of the Far East.
What more changes can be expected?
Nor would I be surprised if after the agreement the number of North Korean workers in Siberia increased in the context of what is a great demographic change: the desertification of Siberia - because the Russians are leaving for the west of their country -, compensated in some places with immigrants Chinese.
And so, in what sense is the approach now innovative?
The fall of the Soviet Union meant the end of Pyongyang's economic aid and the same thing happened in China with the return of Deng Xiaoping. So, for more than 30 years, the DPRK has known that it no longer has friends or older brothers in the region. He quickly realized that there were no more gifts to look forward to. But geopolitics continues to play its role and they continue to be allies facing the US, a common enemy. From this point of view the ties between the two are not new; It is the Russian vision that has changed.
Nationalism has been a key banner for Kim and the North Korean regime since its founding, and that also involves Russia and China apart from Japan. Could the latest rapprochement with Moscow lead to instability for Kim within the country?
North Korean nationalism is a force that acts as the cement of North Korean society. Koreans became 'Koreans' during colonization, were treated as defeated in 1945, saw their Japanese executioners favored by the US, and while the Russians quickly abandoned the peninsula after the war, the Americans remain in the South. North Koreans have always had a strong nationalist feeling and they always have a reason to rekindle it. They have been under sanctions for a long time, even during the famine; sanctions initially supported – albeit weakly – by the Russians and the Chinese. So there is no one in Pyongyang who thinks for a second that the Kim-Putin meeting could have undermined the country's independence. On the contrary, and symbolically, it is Putin who went to Vladivostok, 50 km from Korea, to negotiate.
You have defined the North Korean army as a “State within the State” and key in many sectors. Is this new Russian-North Korean 'entente' in turn a consequence of their needs?
The State within the State is a practical formula because, once it was decided that everything possible had to be done to preserve the country's independence from imperialism, it was necessary, on the one hand, to have nuclear weapons so as not to be Iraq and, on the other hand, , have a very well-trained army and not be affected by political or, above all, economic uncertainties. That is why it has priority for supplies and is expected to be able to produce everything it needs on its own without expecting anything from the outside. Like the country itself. In this context, the agreement with Russia should allow North Korea to obtain part of what it still lacks: food and technological aid.
If the agreement is more about realism than supporting friendly states, should it be considered unstable?
That argument can be given a twist: realistic relationships, rather than friendly ones, can be more rational and less prone to eruptive reactions. Apart from a few grandiloquent phrases here and there, North Korea no longer considers itself the leader of the socialist world and barely discusses the policies of others. It knows perfectly well that, behind the labels, China and Russia are two large capitalist countries that need it as a buffer zone against the countries under American influence. As nothing changes on the American side, nothing will change on the side of the alliances between China, Russia and the DPRK.
Tensions abound in the Far East, can the Moscow-Pyonjiang pact lead to new ones?
The internal evolution of each of the countries in the region must be taken into account, although if for decades the DPRK only had the China-Russia antagonism to look for allies with which to gain something, becoming an arms supplier is an important change and It will allow you to be heard more clearly.
Given that they are two nuclear powers, is a nuclear escalation to be feared?
The nuclear issue occupies considerable space in the statements of all parties, usually for internal reasons, but the North has said it will not be the first to use the weapon. Beyond that, it is difficult for me to imagine that deterrence ceases to have an effect.
