North Korea Through The Looking Glass

Author : Kongdan Oh,Ralph C. Hassig
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
Page : 290 pages
File Size : 54,8 Mb
Release : 2004-05-13
Category : History
ISBN : 9780815798200

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North Korea through the Looking Glass by Kongdan Oh,Ralph C. Hassig Pdf

Fifty-five years after its founding at the dawn of the cold war, North Korea remains a land of illusions. Isolated and anachronistic, the country and its culture seem to be dominated exclusively by the official ideology of Juche, which emphasizes national self-reliance, independence, and worship of the supreme leader, General Kim Jong Il. Yet this socialist utopian ideal is pursued with the calculations of international power politics. Kim has transformed North Korea into a militarized state, whose nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, and continued threat to South Korea have raised alarm worldwide. This paradoxical combination of cultural isolation and military-first policy has left the North Korean people woefully deprived of the opportunity to advance socially and politically. The socialist economy, guided by political principles and bereft of international support, has collapsed. Thousands, perhaps millions, have died of starvation. Foreign trade has declined and the country's gross domestic product has recorded negative growth every year for a decade. Yet rather than initiate the sort of market reforms that were implemented by other communist governments, North Korean leaders have reverted to the economic policies of the 1950s: mass mobilization, concentration on heavy industry, and increased ideological indoctrination. Although members of the political elite in Pyongyang are acutely aware of their nation's domestic and foreign problems, they are plagued by fear and policy paralysis. North Korea Through the Looking Glass sheds new light on this remote and peculiar country. Drawing on more than ten years of research—including interviews with two dozen North Koreans who made the painful decision to defect from their homeland—Kongdan Oh and Ralph C. Hassig explore what the leadership and the masses believe about their current predicament. Through dual themes of persistence and illusion, they explore North Korea's stubborn adherence to policies that have

Author : Kong Dan Oh,Ralph C. Hassig
Publisher : Brookings Inst Press
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 46,5 Mb
Release : 2000
Category : History
ISBN : 0815764359

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North Korea Through the Looking Glass by Kong Dan Oh,Ralph C. Hassig Pdf

Exploiting domestic and international news broadcasts and international news broadcasts and defector testimony, this book explores what the leadership and masses believe about their current predicament and why they refuse to adopt more pragmatic responses to the post-Cold War environment.

Author : Kongdan Oh,Ralph Hassig
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Page : 256 pages
File Size : 40,6 Mb
Release : 2021-06-15
Category : Electronic
ISBN : 1538151383

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North Korea in a Nutshell by Kongdan Oh,Ralph Hassig Pdf

This deeply knowledgeable book provides a concise introduction to North Korea. The authors trace the country's history from its founding in 1948 and describe its current political, economic, social, and cultural life under the continued stranglehold of the Kim family.

Author : Ralph Hassig,Kongdan Oh
Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
Page : 252 pages
File Size : 41,5 Mb
Release : 2015-04-16
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781442237193

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The Hidden People of North Korea by Ralph Hassig,Kongdan Oh Pdf

This unique book, now fully updated, provides a comprehensive overview of all aspects of life in North Korea today. Drawing on decades of experience, noted experts Ralph Hassig and Kongdan Oh explore a world few outsiders can imagine. In vivid detail, the authors describe how the secretive and authoritarian government of Kim Jong-un shapes every aspect of its citizens' lives, how the command socialist economy has utterly failed, and how ordinary individuals struggle to survive through small-scale capitalism. Weighing the very limited individual rights allowed, the authors illustrate how the political class system and the legal system serve solely as tools of the regime. The key to understanding how the North Korean people live, the authors argue, is to realize that their only allowed role is to support Kim Jong-un, whose grandfather founded the country in the late 1940s. Still a cypher, Kim Jong-un, as did his father before him, controls his people by keeping them isolated and banning most foreigners. North Koreans remain hungry and oppressed, yet the outside world is slowly filtering in, and the book concludes by urging the United States to flood North Korea with information so that its people can make decisions based on truth rather than their dictator's ubiquitous propaganda.

Author : Andrei Lankov
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 350 pages
File Size : 47,5 Mb
Release : 2015
Category : History
ISBN : 9780199390038

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The Real North Korea by Andrei Lankov Pdf

In The Real North Korea, Lankov substitutes cold, clear analysis for the overheated rhetoric surrounding this opaque police state. Based on vast expertise, this book reveals how average North Koreans live, how their leaders rule, and how both survive

Author : Ben S. Malcom
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
Page : 282 pages
File Size : 48,8 Mb
Release : 2016-06
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 9781612348988

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White Tigers by Ben S. Malcom Pdf

Operating from a clandestine camp on an island off western North Korea, Army Lt. Ben Malcom coordinated the intelligence activities of eleven partisan battalions, including the famous White Tigers. With Malcom's experiences as its focus, White Tigers examines all aspects of guerrilla activities in Korea. This exciting memoir makes an important contribution to the history of special operations.

Author : Paul French
Publisher : Zed Books
Page : 356 pages
File Size : 55,5 Mb
Release : 2007-07-15
Category : History
ISBN : 1842779052

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North Korea by Paul French Pdf

This reissue of Paul French's acclaimed introduction to North Korea provides an up-to-the-minute overview of the politics, economics and history of the DPRK, with added chapters dealing with recent events. A new foreword examines why North Korea remains an issue in world politics and argues that an understanding of the country is more important now than ever. A new in-depth postscript offers analysis of recent years, why Pyongyang felt compelled to test a bomb and revert to blatant nuclear diplomacy, and how the crisis can be resolved peacefully.

Author : Yeonmi Park,Maryanne Vollers
Publisher : Penguin
Page : 290 pages
File Size : 42,9 Mb
Release : 2015-09-29
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 9780698409361

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In Order to Live by Yeonmi Park,Maryanne Vollers Pdf

“I am most grateful for two things: that I was born in North Korea, and that I escaped from North Korea.” - Yeonmi Park "One of the most harrowing stories I have ever heard - and one of the most inspiring." - The Bookseller “Park's remarkable and inspiring story shines a light on a country whose inhabitants live in misery beyond comprehension. Park's important memoir showcases the strength of the human spirit and one young woman's incredible determination to never be hungry again.” —Publishers Weekly In In Order to Live, Yeonmi Park shines a light not just into the darkest corners of life in North Korea, describing the deprivation and deception she endured and which millions of North Korean people continue to endure to this day, but also onto her own most painful and difficult memories. She tells with bravery and dignity for the first time the story of how she and her mother were betrayed and sold into sexual slavery in China and forced to suffer terrible psychological and physical hardship before they finally made their way to Seoul, South Korea—and to freedom. Park confronts her past with a startling resilience. In spite of everything, she has never stopped being proud of where she is from, and never stopped striving for a better life. Indeed, today she is a human rights activist working determinedly to bring attention to the oppression taking place in her home country. Park’s testimony is heartbreaking and unimaginable, but never without hope. This is the human spirit at its most indomitable.

Author : Andrew Scobell
Publisher : DIANE Publishing
Page : 51 pages
File Size : 49,8 Mb
Release : 2004
Category : China
ISBN : 9781428910256

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China and North Korea by Andrew Scobell Pdf

Author : Paul French
Publisher : Hong Kong University Press
Page : 329 pages
File Size : 45,9 Mb
Release : 2009-05-01
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9789622099821

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Through the Looking Glass by Paul French Pdf

The convulsive history of foreign journalists in China starts with newspapers printed in the European factories of Canton in the 1820s. It also starts with a duel between two editors over the future of China and ends with a fistfight in Shanghai over therevolution. This book tells the story of China's foreign journalists.

Author : Michael Breen
Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
Page : 217 pages
File Size : 41,7 Mb
Release : 2012-02
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 9781118153772

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Kim Jong-Il, Revised and Updated by Michael Breen Pdf

An expert on North Korea sheds new light on the enigmatic tyrant From his goose-stepping military parades to his clownish macho swagger, North Korea's Kim Jong-il is an odd amalgam of political cartoon and global menace. In charge of a nuclear arsenal he's threatened to use against the U.S. and Japan, the man, his motives, and the mechanisms of his absolute control over a country of twenty-three million people remains shrouded in mystery. In this second edition of his bestselling Kim Jong-il, Michael Breen, a leading expert on North Korea, dispels common myths and fallacies about the so-called "Dear Leader," while turning a spotlight on the man to reveal his true nature and the nature of his hold over a country ravaged by poverty and famine. Looks at Kim from a broad perspective, unlike most other books that cater exclusively to those interested in policymaking and international relations Features new information about succession plans, as well as the latest scoop on the mounting pressure among world leaders to thwart North Korea's nuclear ambitions Illustrated with rare photographs of Kim and his regime Highly accessible and suitable for anyone interested in learning more about North Korea, it's government, and its leader, Kim Jong-il unravels the mysteries, the myths, and the fallacies about the man in charge in ways that will entice even the harshest critics.

Author : Dae-Sook Suh
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Page : 474 pages
File Size : 42,9 Mb
Release : 1988
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 0231065736

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Kim Il Sung by Dae-Sook Suh Pdf

Examines the rule of the Korean dictator who was premier, and then president, of North Korea until his death.

Author : Jack Cheevers
Publisher : Penguin
Page : 448 pages
File Size : 42,9 Mb
Release : 2013-12-03
Category : History
ISBN : 9781101638644

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Act of War by Jack Cheevers Pdf

WINNER OF THE SAMUEL ELIOT MORISON AWARD FOR NAVAL LITERATURE “I devoured Act of War the way I did Flyboys, Flags of Our Fathers and Lost in Shangri-la.”—Michael Connelly, #1 New York Times Bestselling Author In 1968, the small, dilapidated American spy ship USS Pueblo set out to pinpoint military radar stations along the coast of North Korea. Though packed with advanced electronic-surveillance equipment and classified intelligence documents, its crew, led by ex–submarine officer Pete Bucher, was made up mostly of untested young sailors. On a frigid January morning, the Pueblo was challenged by a North Korean gunboat. When Bucher tried to escape, his ship was quickly surrounded by more boats, shelled and machine-gunned, forced to surrender, and taken prisoner. Less than forty-eight hours before the Pueblo’s capture, North Korean commandos had nearly succeeded in assassinating South Korea’s president. The two explosive incidents pushed Cold War tensions toward a flashpoint. Based on extensive interviews and numerous government documents released through the Freedom of Information Act, Act of War tells the riveting saga of Bucher and his men as they struggled to survive merciless torture and horrendous living conditions set against the backdrop of an international powder keg.

Author : Andrew Scobell
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 56 pages
File Size : 42,5 Mb
Release : 2004
Category : China
ISBN : IND:30000139800423

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China and North Korea by Andrew Scobell Pdf

Author : Tae-Hwan Kwak,Seung-Ho Joo
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 270 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 2016-05-23
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781317086611

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North Korea and Security Cooperation in Northeast Asia by Tae-Hwan Kwak,Seung-Ho Joo Pdf

Relations between the two Koreas continue to be hostile, volatile and unpredictable with North Korea’s nuclear issue remaining as untamed as ever. As such, there is a growing urgency for security cooperation in Northeast Asia to be given immediate attention. The key players in the region - the US, China, Japan and Russia - are keenly aware of the security threat of an armed clash between North and South Korea and are committed to denuclearization of the Korean peninsula. This book explores the domestic factors of the two Koreas and the four major powers that influence their security policies towards North Korea and Northeast Asia. This well thought out and consistently analysed volume has huge potential to frame the conversation on Northeast Asian relations in the coming years.