Here’s the scenario; as many prominent scientists know the Earth is most likely an ongoing reality TV show for advanced aliens. Ratings are flagging though; so the alien executives have an idea - vanish every human on Earth (and the astronauts), but those left in its most entertaining country. All at once everyone not in the borders of North Korea instantly vanishes. Planes fall out of the sky, driverless cars crash, ships drift abandoned across the oceans.
Only those left in the 120 thousand square kilometre territory of North Korea are left - approximately 24 and a half million people. The first things the North Koreans notice is the border guards disappearing. They naturally fear some trick; but eventually it becomes clear that the rest of the Earth has fallen silent.
What happens next? Humanity has survived worse - like the season 1 finale, the Toba eruption, but what can viewers expect?
It would be the best thing that’s happened to North Korea since WWII. They will leave. They will have a nicely furnished country just to their south, and a whole world to escape from Lil Kim.
North Korea requires an endless parade of foreign boogiemen to justify the repression, if they disappear who does nk use to justify it’s policies? I assume internal dissenters. Also the new propaganda line would be that God vanquished the world except north Korea for a reason, which would make the propaganda lot more believable. If so, maybe the north would loosen the reigns since there is less risk of internal or external coups.
NK is rather virulently atheistic. Not that rapid about-faces are new to them, propaganda-wise, but still.
I think you’d get deserters like never before. Even the giant numbers of regime stooges they’ve got won’t be able to police the world, and more people would desert that we could reasonably imagine. Especially when foreign food aid starts to disappear.
Deserters to where? To do what? Compared to the rest of the world most North Koreans are unskilled. Think about it…everyone else in the world is {poof} gone. All systems not running automatically grind almost immediately to a halt all over the world. Others break down because of a lack of people to tend them. I think any North Korean who successfully escapes North Korea will be dead within 6 months, if not sooner and, with no influx of goods from the outside, I give the remaining North Koreans 2 years at most before all order breaks down and 5 years at most to live. So yeah, humanity would be doomed.
The question to me is, How would the average North Korean even know this had happened?
There may be a select few with access to the outside world. But oh yeah…there IS no outside world. With strict control of public media, seems to me news of the disappearance would filter in pretty slowly.
And I don’t see any reason to believe that the border would be patrolled any less vigorously than it was before, so how exactly would this mass migration take place? And a migration to where and what?
The more likely scenario has been posited by others…that without the active support given by China, it wouldn’t be too long before the North Korean economy would collapse entirely. By then, it would start to be apparent that something pretty serious has happened…and it would likely be beyond anyone’s ability to fix.
IMHO as soon as the military gets word, it will completely break down. There won’t be anymore border patrols. They’ll just quit and walk across the border and start securing trusty watercraft.
It’s not just the NK border guards that are keeping people in. It’s also the Chinese border guards that are keeping people out. And the Chinese police who will deport you right back to NK if they find you. It’s not that hard to get across now. People go back and forth frequently for commerce/smuggling. Naturally, some bribes are often involved.
As for what would happen next? I honestly think that the average North Korean would try to get his or her hands on some white rice to eat.
And that has previously stopped us how? If you don’t like these type of things, fine. There are a lot of other threads out there.
Yup. The border with China isn’t that well guarded, unlike the DMZ.
The military and government will notice first, not just the border guards, but also those monitoring South Korean, Chinese, US and Japanese communications, as well as radar, TV radio, etc.
The smugglers on the China boarder may notice before the army on that boarder.
It would instantly obvious in the Joint Security Area, with those guards gone, North Korea would send someone over with an empty cup, asking to borrow some sugar. OK, not, but still, the lives of a few men are cheap, so a patrol would be sent over, and further exploration would rabidly show that they can go down to Seoul and load up food and gold.
In the north, without the Chinese, people are going to move into China really quickly, and probably before the guards can secure the boarder.
Without outside enemies, the army is going to come apart, with rival factions possibly even starting shooting wars. The army is going to be busy in the southern end, which is another reason that the northern end will be on its own. I think it would be likely for whole military units to decide to take off on their own.
Once news reaches the common people, it would be really hard to contain everyone. there would be enough scavengable food that small groups could spread out fairly deeply into China and Siberia.
Assuming they did leave, wouldn’t the average North Korean be better suited to survival in a suddenly de-industrialized world than the average South Korean? Think of the advantages that growing up in a shithole would impart.
Used to being cold and hungry and in the dark.
Familiar with endless backbreaking manual labor just to survive.
Generations of practical experience in how to eat bark, grass, and bugs.
Not terribly bothered by the lack of electricity or plumbing or adequate medical care, because you can’t miss what you never had.
