Trying to do a full on reversal of policy would be unlikely to end well. But the first steps would be the ending of forced labor camps and other atrocity level practices. Smapti has the right idea in demolishing the monuments to the previous administrations. Start disassembling the internet restrictions, again, not everything at once.
It would probably be necessary to kick start some organizations espousing independent viewpoints. Set up a couple of newspapers and radio stations through cutouts and then make sure they aren’t harrassed, persecuted, or prosecuted by groups who want to maintain the old ways. Get the people used to expressing themselves without looking over their shoulders.
Monitor and come down hard on people trying to exploit or profiteer on the changes the way they did when the USSR started breaking up.
Any dictator who tried to halve the size of the North Korean military would find themselves out of a job very very quickly. “Out of a job” meaning a bullet to the head, of course.
Submit a proposal describing how you will rebuild NK
Winning proposal will address
[ul]
[li]Transforming the agriculture of NK to allow it’s people (as a whole) to, if not eventually feed themselves, become far less dependent upon foreign food supplies[/li][li]Mass education of the NK people in STEM subjects as well as the humanities (humanities are left to the proposal to define)[/li][li]Development of a solid manufacturing and industrial base in NK producing a positive GDP[/li][li]Movement of NK from a dictatorship to a representative government (left up to the proposal to define)[/li][/ul]
The country with the winning proposal
[ul]
[li]Shall have complete control over the NK nuclear arsenal[/li][li]Shall be allowed to arm and station troops in NK for a period of no more than 20 years[/li][li]Will have access to 0.5% of all NK natural resources and will pay NK for those resources extracted at 90% current market value minus extraction costs[/li][li]Will forfeit all investment including equipment, infrastructure and all other tangible and non tangible assets, including military weapons and systems, in the event the proposal is not delivered within the agreed timeframe unless both parties reach a new agreement within 6 months of the original deadline[/li][li]Upon default of the proposal the partner country will immediately evacuate all personnel and relinquish any claim, financial or otherwise on NK[/li][/ul]
Watch the mass hysteria for a week or three and then say “Nah, we’re just fuckin’ with ya!”
Dictators are paranoid nuts, always playing up fears for more control. If I were me with the condition that nobody’s going to assassinate me, the first thing I’d do is pull back every single soldier, disband the military, and get to work on my industry. Farmers, factory workers, and scientists are what we need, not the military. Get rid of the military entirely, turn the country agrarian to provide basic foodstuffs for people. Not be a dick, that sorta thing
Quite frankly the leader would have to find a way to have him and his family quickly leave the country into a safe exile. Then he could just say “you all work it out”.
How would that help the people of North Korea? A lot of people in this thread are either fighting the hypothetical and insisting that they’d be overthrown anyway, or throwing up their hands and saying “North Korea surrenders”. The sudden collapse of the DPRK government, or an instantaneous transition to capitalist democracy, would be catastrophic for the people and fail rapidly. In my post above, I’m assuming that my goal as Leader is to keep North Korea independent, Communist, and (eventually_ self-reliant.
I think we are all hoping that a gradual transition would be better off than a sudden one. I dont know if it would or could. My point is just make the change and with the leader out of the way transition will happen. Yes it will be I’d guess 10 years of hell but it has to start somewhere.
Well my point of the transition is actually that without a tyrant, it would be an even worse shift. Without an infrastructure in place the only difference would be instead of a single tyrant ruling, you’d have mega-corporations ruling. Take whatever nightmarish sweatshop scenario from SE Asia or mass communal industrial scenario from Western China and multiply it by 10 since there would be zero governmental oversight or accountability.
Economic development is a means to an end of improving the quality of life for the citizens. It’s not the chief concern. A country is not an ant colony.
It will cost South Korea several trillion dollars over several decades to bring NK up to code, more or less. I don’t know if South Koreans really want to pay for that. I would assume South Koreans would prefer NK goes the route of China post 1978, a slow process of economic development followed by improvements in civil/human rights without needing tons of assistance from SK.
I’d more or less do what the OP says (other than some of the military stuff, I don’t know if China would be a threat if NK followed China’s reforms. Plus modernizing NKs military seems pointless, they can’t possibly win a war against SK or China). However I have no idea when NK will be capable of democracy. The country is so rife with physical and mental illness due to mismanagement, plus there is no real sense of community and civics there as everyone is taught to distrust everyone. It is a massive battered wives cult on a national scale. It will take decades to reverse that.
What I would add to the OP are
Empower the small markets
Free up all media outlets so people can get whatever media they want
Murder all people in the Kim bloodline so the Kim Family Regime can’t come back
The reality is even if you free NK from the Kim cult, how long until they are competent to function as a nation? Retardation due to malnutrition, paranoia, other illnesses from malnutrition, lack of valuable education, lack of infrastructure, etc are rampant. They may have to be a protectorate to the international community, or be under military rule for a while.
I agree. That is why I would surreptitiously develop a cadre of junior officers who were personally loyal to me, and when the time is right, they assassinate the current military leaders and replace them.
THEN, having pulled the teeth of my only real rivals, I would go about the humanitarian and political reforms that are so desperately needed. And rather than disband the army, which is ridiculously large, I would have them help out in the agricultural sector to ensure that everyone gets enough to eat. Once the regular guy soldiers realize that their own families are getting enough to eat because of my changes, and with the old officer staff purged, my rule would be unassailable, and I could work on gradually reducing the size of the army, keeping them busy with public works and infrastructure projects which I would carefully transition to private operations.
I would also maintain good relations with China even as I ratcheted down the tension with South Korea. China would probably be happy with a sane and reponsible leader rather than a dangerous madman ruling the Korean peninsula, and more than happy to see them as a profitable trading partner than a leech constantly needing aid to prop up the oversized military.
The gulags would have to go, and the people that run them tried and jailed in more humanitarian circumstances, or executed, or put out to pasture as seems appropriate in each case.
