With a hilarious face, a cigarette in hand, Kim Jong-un, in a khaki parka, savors the moment. In the distance, above a snowy expanse, rises a large cloud of white smoke. Around the young dictator are arranged, in an outdoor command post, two telephones, a computer and a pair of binoculars.
The photo is from December 15, according to the official KCNA agency, which specifies that the North Korean leader has just attended the successful test of a “solid fuel booster” at the Sohae satellite launch site, in Tongchang-ri, in the northwest of the country. The new thruster is to equip a “new kind of strategic weapon system”.
North Korea continues to advance its weapons technologies, while strengthening its arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles. All are liquid-powered, but Kim Jong-un wants to equip them with solid-fuel engines, which make the projectiles faster and easier to launch. This advance worries South Korean experts, as well as the risk of a seventh nuclear test.
At the same time, another subject, seemingly less threatening, is mobilizing specialists. It all started with images that have gone around the world. We see the North Korean No. 1 walking hand in hand with his daughter in front of a Hwasong-17 intercontinental missile, shortly before its launch on November 18. White fur jacket and small red shoes, the girl is officially mentioned for the first time in the state media, which qualifies her as “adored daughter” of the leader, without mentioning her name. Two months earlier, observers of the regime had believed to identify him on the images of the festivities given for the anniversary of the creation of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Very present in the videos, she appeared in a pink dress and a red scarf of the “pioneers”, among other children singing and dancing in front of Kim and his wife.
A message about his succession
For the South Korean intelligence services, it is Ju-ae, the first daughter of the leader. Married since 2009, Kim would have three children, a boy born in 2010 and two girls, born in 2013 and 2017. After a stay in Pyongyang in 2013, former NBA star Dennis Rodman said he had spent a “moment of relaxation by the sea” with the leader and his family, and held a daughter of Kim, named Ju-ae, in her arms. Why show it like this? John Delury, from South Korea’s Yonsei University, sees Kim’s desire to “soften his image”. The specialized site Daily NK, based in Seoul, reports the analysis of a “high-level executive from Pyongyang” for whom Kim, the “father of the people”, seeks to affirm, by showing his daughter, “that he devotes body and soul to future generations”.
But the initiative could also send a message about his succession. Cheong Seong-chang, from the Sejong Institute, delved into the history of the “Mount Paektu lineage”, a nickname for the Kim dynasty, inspired by the mythical mountain in Korea. “Kim Jong-il (1941-2011) officially named his third son Jong-un as his successor in 2008. But he did so on the child’s eighth birthday, January 8, 1992,” recalls the expert. . On this occasion, a song was composed in honor of the young Jong-un.
By associating his daughter with these tests, “Kim shows that he wants to pursue the reinforcement of nuclear capacities, which will be part of the heritage of this child”, underlines Cheong Seong-chang, for whom it is too early to affirm that the small is “the chosen one”. “But if she appears more often in the media, accompanying her father on inspections of important sites, then we can think that she has been chosen to succeed her father.”
“The status of ‘beloved daughter’ does not necessarily mean ‘more apt to become a dictator,’ adds Soo Kim, political analyst at the RAND Corporation. Kim Ju-ae’s public appearances actually only increase the opacity around regime succession plans. After his sister, Kim Yo-jong, appointed in 2021 to the State Affairs Commission, Kim seems in any case to place all his trust in the women of his family. It remains to be seen whether one of them will one day reign over the communist dynasty.