 And welcome to Figments, The Power of Imagination, season three episode nine, my arbitrary numbering system. Got a great episode for you today with two repeat guests, really smart guys. That's how I keep this show afloat is by getting people smarter than me on it. And before we try to entertain and inspire with the discussion of North Korea, I would like to go on a weekly rant or bi-weekly rant. I'll start each of our shows up this way to kind of blend what we did on Figments on Reality with Figments, The Power of Imagination. So you might be able to tell that my initial rant is going to be about what? About the Hawaii mask mandate. All of the other COVID restrictions came off at midnight Saturday, but the mask mandate remains the single least effective method of preventing COVID. So I'd like to paraphrase Ronald Reagan and say Governor Igay tear off this mask. It's annoying because it's nonsensical and doesn't have any impact. So there's that. An update on the government scan my reveal last week, talking about my adventures with government, the Hawaii state government offices are reopened today. So that's progress. I'm not sure about the Social Security Administration, but if you remember my discussion, not making any progress. I may be on some sort of a blacklist, but I'll keep tilting in the windmill and keep you all posted. And then something that I feel compelled to talk about is the Russia, Ukraine got the TV on in the background and so I can see what other awful things happen there. There are two comments I'd like to make on Russia, Ukraine one, two are government policy makers, military folks. I guess my tendency would be to say shut up, but I can't say that out of respect. So let me say, stop over sharing and over explaining. The discussion about the no fly zone is troubling because why are we talking about this in public? Why are we tipping our hand? Why are we taking options off the table? It's like people are compelled to show a picture of their breakfast when they go out to Denny's or IHOP. Just stop, be quiet and do things both diplomatically and militarily with some sense of secrecy. Yeah, that's it. Secrecy can be a good thing. The other thing I'll say about Russia, Ukraine is it is kind of an unreal conflict because it's on TV and we have the long buildup coming to a station near you, the Russian invasion, but it is real and I wanna make it real for all of our viewers because it's so tragic. Even if you just look at the refugees, 1.7 million is the refugee count today. What does that mean? That means that the Hawaiian islands where we live would be uninhabited, in fact, plus 300,000. That's more people than live in the entire Hawaiian house. If you don't have the good fortune to live here in Hawaii, let me put it in mainland terms and say it's like taking the city of Phoenix, Arizona and emptying it out. And if you've been to Phoenix, I lived there for four years, that's a big town. That many people have been forced from their homes. It's tragic and I'm not sure where it's going. So what can you do about it? Let me tell you, I am on the advisory board of a charity that calls itself not neutral because they support American interests and kind of get an old slide there, but at the bottom you see Spirit of America. If you Google it, they have a project in Afghanistan they're bringing non-lethal aid to the country. They can't help with the evacuations, but they can provide aid, go to their webpage and please support Spirit of America. Again, I'm an unpaid senior advisor, I believe a lot in what they do and that's why I'm affiliated with the organization. Okay, so let's get to the topic at hand, North Korea part one, imagining North Korea part one and that means that I want to do this again because these two guests are really smart guys. Let me welcome first Simon Lee, the retired Foreign Service diplomat. You saw him on the 22nd of February, Aloha Simon. Aloha. And Colonel Ed Hawkins, retired Air Force, a great long time friend, longer than I've known. Simon and an Intel analyst is the best way to describe it. Ed, how are you? Hi, Feg. Hi, Simon, how are you doing? Yeah, glad to have you both here. So two perspectives, you'll bring two perspectives to the issue of why North Korea is testing missiles and that this has been kind of lost in the buildup to an execution of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but it's a serious business and there's a lot going on and Simon and Ed, the question that I'd like to try to answer today is why? Why now? What's going on? Because Kim Jong-un doesn't have a big bank account and the COVID pandemic has even reduced his ability to have funds for the basic needs which are nuclear weapons and maybe then feeding people. So why would he invest in so many missile tests before? I think I knew back in the day what the reason was and that was shown in a slide that I put together. Hopefully we'll see it right here. Back in 2017, 18, when you looked at the tests during the Kim Il-sung, Kim Jong-il era, to me it was clear that they were pursuing capability. It was such a dramatic change. Let me ask first, does that historical judgment that I made make sense to you Ed? What do you think? You're an Intel guy. What do you think he was trying to do back then? Well, I think back then, there was a lack of a confidence, I think a little bit of a confidence within the leadership of North Korea. And I remember one time as an Intel analyst that trying to predict when North Korea would show off some of its capabilities on table dung in the late 90s became a subject of interest. There was speculation that maybe they would parade it to show the world that now they had, but it didn't happen. And I think that's an indicator to me at that time since I had to provide that assessment to the commander that the confidence wasn't still there. They're secretive, definitely, but they hadn't reached that point where they wanted to show that capability. I think as you show on the chart that you show, that as they became confident of their technology, that they displayed it more and more to the world through parades and other means and firings. And I think that's one factor that you should take a look at is just a building up of their confidence over time. Yeah, and that's why I called it a relentless pursuit of capabilities. As you know, Ed and Simon, we may have talked about this. I was in the space business for a few years in the Air Force as the Vice Commander of Air Force Space Command in rocket science is, here's a surprise, still rocket science and it's really hard. And so you have to do it to prove it. But now we're past that. They established credible capability. I think the world would largely agree that they have some nuclear capability and some delivery system capability. But now we're seeing a spate of tests and I've got a list here. I'm not sure it's complete. I might be missing one because it's really hard to find information and I'm no longer in the secret squirrel loop. But Simon, that's a bunch of tests just this year. Yes, indeed. Yes, indeed. And you used to negotiate with North Koreans. So you understand this as well as anybody. What's your initial take on it? Why they'd be doing it? Touching back a little bit on what Ed mentioned and also what you touched on a little bit as well, Fig, earlier, is the notion of capabilities. I look at it as, yes, they do have capabilities and they've demonstrated it. And I also do believe that North Korea's ballistic missile program and the nuclear program, both such that they need to continue development in order for them to reach their desired goal. And so in my mind, the bigger question is for the last couple of years prior to January, why were the tests not corrupted? I think just as a frame of reference, I had served at the US Embassy in Seoul from 2016 to 2019. And this was at a time when crazy time indeed, unprecedented levels of provocations from the DPRK. And if my memory serves me well, I think that the consensus among most observers in and out of government at the time was that the DPRK was continuing its trajectory of further developing and refining its capabilities. And so what loomed fairly large in my mind these last couple of years was the relative quiet, considerable dying down of testing. And although I don't know if I have the means of being absolutely 100% sure, I think the money is on the notion that the COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact in the DPRK's either ability to conduct further development of its posting result capabilities or its political will to do so or actually a little bit of both. But in my mind, I think it's a very safe assumption that the COVID-19 pandemic had some type of an impact on the DPRK's willingness to conduct test. So then we fast forwarded time to 2022, January in particular and the intervening months. Why now? As going back to your original question, why now? In my mind, I believe it's because it is able to and it certainly has stepped up its conversations with Beijing. In all likelihood, it has had some conversations with Moscow. Now, whether this equates to collusion, that's a different story altogether. Yeah, there's a fairly active community of North Korea observers, both in and out of government. And among a lot of the chatter that I've been hearing from very experienced analysts is depending on the timing of when North Korea conducts its missile launches and its tests, it may or may not have connections with whatever decisions coming out of the Kremlin. I think the last thing that I've seen among some of the analysis coming up, some of my friends in on government institutions is that a lot of the tests seem to have been at least timed not to coincide directly with the invasion of Ukraine. So it does cast doubt on the level to which Pyongyang colluded with Beijing and Moscow, if at all. But I think that there are some useful things to think about some data points out of this entire phenomenon. And one is, again, going back to what I said earlier, why did it wait until January 2022 to break the moratorium and resume testing? And two, Pyongyang stayed relatively quiet, of course, around the time of the Winter Olympics and all likelihood to save some face for Beijing. And then three, at least as far as I know, none of the tests have really coincided directly with the invasion of Ukraine. So it has somewhat of a doubt on 100% direct collusion or a pre-negotiated, pre-rehearsed set of provocations or invasion by the Kremlin and Pyongyang. Simon, I've got to say that I've always been very skeptical about the notion of global conspiracies because it's difficult enough. And we're going to talk in the lighter parts of today's episode about decision-making in North Korea, but it's hard enough to get agreement in however big or small it is. And I think that's one of the things it's hard enough to get agreement in however big or small your circle is to do it. But having said that, I think that whether he was asked to or not, the odds are that Kim Jong-un elected not to mess with the Winter Olympics of his big neighbor and to some degree big brother, China. And that explains the pause, which to me says it may just be a pause. And in fact, on March 5th, I think it was, we had another test. So I think now I'm going to give my assessment when we talked about this and I don't know that I'm right about this, but it's something I've come to believe over my years of looking at Korea and I'll ask you to respond quickly. My view is that part of the motivation is inattention from the United States, which by the way is only going to get worse as we're so focused on Europe and Russia, Ukraine, that when you look at North Korean priorities certainly not treating the people, but the US plays a central role. We are the raison d'etre of their regimes, the foundation of the regime's legitimacy such as it is, we're the big bad wolf bastards as they call us in their propaganda. And we need to occasionally be brought into the public eye to justify the suffering, sacrifice and repression that they go through. And we use the word provocation, but they're not really, because we're training a puppy in our house as Ed knows, having met Ace the Wonder Dog. I don't know that they're trying to provoke that they have to at least get interaction. And what do you think of the notion that the US is key to North Korean decision making? A key consideration of not the only one. And I'm sure it's not the only one. Yeah, I agree with you, that is a big factor and that has a lot to do with it. If I could, I'd like to just dovetail onto that and maybe offer a slightly different perspective to Simons, focusing more internally to North Korea because they do a lot of things internally as well. And maybe we're gonna talk about this, but the decision making parts of the strong parts of North Korea, the army, the Korean Workers Party and the leadership at the very top level that there is, and I think I mentioned it to you before, there is some competition, if you will, amongst those to get the good graces of the leader. And the hiatus, although Simon explained it very well, that there was a time, during the Trump administration, there was this love fest, right? So four years of a policy, which I don't think the military or the Workers' Party really liked because this constant war or adversary relationship with the United States is what drives them. So this was an aberration during that time and this new push to showcase their missile capabilities and they've showcased a lot. The 1960s Polaris missile type submarine launch, they don't even have a submarine to launch it from, but they show it, you know? So they want to show this capability and it may also be, and this perspective that I wanted to offer is that this is a way for Kim to come back in and re-engraciate himself with the military. Interesting. To do more launching and show that he is really hard against the United States after this failed four years of this love fest, which I don't think we'll ever get back to again. So that may be a part of their calculus as well. Hard to imagine a return to that period. And frankly, I think it's a lost opportunity on the U.S. as part. Hold these thoughts and we'll talk about this competition who is in the competition here in bed right after a plug. The next episode of Fickman's The Power of Imagination on the 21st of March. Hope to have a good friend of mine who's starting an institute focusing on practical policy. He's going to look initially at climate change, but really the question is, are we making decisions that can be implemented in our governance? And the thesis is, no, not very much. So what are the reasonable and responsible decisions that can be made? He's got a better story than that. I'm going to save that till he actually agrees to be on because we've kind of talked about it, but please tune in in two weeks. And I'm sure we'll have plenty of other things to talk about in my weekly rant. Okay, so Simon and Ed back to North Korea, who's in charge was a big question when Kim Jong-un came into power, but to the casual observer, it sure seems like he's in power. He eliminated his uncle, his half brother got assassinated, but he's also done a lot of purging and restructuring that solidified his power, but that doesn't mean there aren't organizations as Ed said. So Simon, other than Kim Jong-un, first of all, let me ask you one question with a one word answer, and then we'll get to the rest. Does Kim Jong-un have absolute power as the dictator of North Korea? Or no? My answer to that question is the capital of Nebraska would just Lincoln. There's your one word. Okay. Does he have absolute power? I do think that it depends somewhat on your definition of absolute power, and I know that sounds counterintuitive, but I do think that the way the DPRK Society and its government operate, there are different gradations of absolute power. I think that certainly in the symbolic, political sense, he has absolute power. In practical terms, I don't believe he does. That said, the degree to which he can exercise power is certainly, I think, undoubtedly quite significant. And I think looking at the various organizations in the North Korean government, bear scrutiny, and I do believe that they play significant roles in the decision-making process. And then one additional thing we can add to it is with all aspects of North Korean decision-making, there is always an external factor as well as an internal factor. So what it does, particularly in terms in matters of national defense, foreign policy, national security, the DPRK has a tendency to pay very careful attention to how its actions are perceived abroad, and most certainly how it is perceived domestically. So in what circles, you don't just go have however many tests at work, like nine missiles total, I think it was six tests, nine missiles if I remember correctly. That's a big deal, that's a program, you got to move assets, you got to spend money when you're trying to get through another bit of a famine if there's such a thing. So there are some deliberations about what's the right thing to do. It isn't just Kim coming down and saying, we're gonna do this. What body would those deliberations occur in either Ed or Simon, is that in the party, is it in one of the committees or departments of the party is probably not in their unicameral Supreme People's Assembly? Which office was burning the midnight oil in December to get ready for the tests in January? Ed, I'll start with you. Any idea? I don't. That's an area that I really haven't focused on, but one, as I mentioned to you before, I agree with Simon that the capital of Nebraska is Lincoln. Good job. But that's as far as I can go on figuring out who makes the decision where. But I suspect that as in any society that has this agenda of hatred and animosity towards a country or people that, I mean, Kim or his family, let's say, they just don't come up and say, well, let's do this. Let's go and kill my half-brother. Let's shell the Northwest Islands with artillery. I don't think the top person does that. It's these organizations that come with ideas, options on what to do, and they're selected. And I think that Kim and his inner circle will be the final decision makers, but I think that's how these programs will, including the missile test, it has definitely internal messages well to the people who are strong. It also has messages to the countries surrounding them and to the United States, although deterrence-wise, several missiles with nuclear weapons, that's not enough. I mean, I believe that Kim himself feels that if he started something, he's not mad enough to think that he can get away with that because his country would be destroyed. But I think it's a combination of those things and that the decision-making process is at the top, but these options float up for that particular military, political, and other kinds of things that might go into the picture. And even perhaps, as Simon alluded to, something to do with maybe collusion with Russia. Okay, Simon, as we're quickly blew through our 28 minutes, which always happens. It means we have to get you back for part two, hopefully many parts of North Korea sometime soon. Closing thoughts on the decision-making process and more importantly, maybe an assessment, should we be worried or is this just another cycle of what we like to call provocations? Is this something new or same old, same old? Again, with a very strong caveat that it's impossible to know for sure, my belief is that this is somewhat of a return to normal and that the last two years were somewhat of an abnormality that I believe largely resulted, perhaps not 100%, but largely resulted as a side effect of the COVID-19 pandemic. And it's certainly important to pay heed to what happens at the DPRK China border, before and during any missile tests and things of that nature by the DPRK. Most noteworthy thing that came to mind is that in the first couple months of this year, the very recent, very, very recent resumption of border trade between DPRK and China and that the series of provocations since January, more or less appear to have coincided somewhat with the resumption of border trade. So that's something certainly to look at, which again, addresses what I said earlier about perhaps a return to normal or perhaps a return to the usual. A return to the abnormal normalcy of North Korea. That's a great point. And so I'd like to wrap up our discussion by saying, how about if next time in four or six weeks when I can get you two back on, because I love this stuff and I get two great guys to discuss it with, maybe we could examine the zero case pandemic COVID in North Korea because they claimed to have zero cases, but the effects have been really very dull. North Korea doesn't have a relatorious for even North Korea. So you guys willing to come back and do another figment sometime in the reasonable future? Sure. Absolutely. Count me in. Great. Thanks. It would have been really embarrassing if you'd said, hell no on the ear. So I'm glad you didn't. Okay folks, well let me remind you that the legacy episodes of figments on reality are available on YouTube. Get out your phones. Take a happy snap of our QR codes. Those are playlists on YouTube for both Figments, The Power of Imagination, the current show, and Figments on Reality, and I hope you'll check out our legacy episodes. Figments is brought to you courtesy of Think Tech Hawaii, and I'd like to thank all the folks at Think Tech Hawaii, including today's engineer Eric, for making it possible, and you make them possible through your donations. So please be generous in supporting Think Tech Hawaii, the home of Hawaii's citizen journalists. See you in a couple of weeks. Aloha. Aloha.