When Syd Seiler arrived on the Korean Peninsula as a young U.S. military intelligence officer, the founder of North Korea’s ruling dynasty was still building some of the country’s first nuclear facilities.
Syd Seiler speaks during an interview with the Associated Press in Washington, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2023. Seiler is freshly retired after decades of advising presidents, military commanders and diplomats, making reported secret trips to North Korea and serving as a lead U.S. negotiator on talks to contain its nuclear program.
But the Kim family's worry is not so much about an attack from outside, Seiler argues. He said in sticking to the nuclear program even at the expense of North Korea's economy, Kim Jong Un has taken a lesson from deposed Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. A firing squad abruptly ended the communist leader's rule in 1989 when his people rose up against him.
Worrisome possible outcomes include Russia helping North Korea beef up “its pretty antiquated ... museum-ready” conventional forces or its weapons of mass destruction, Seiler said. As Kim expands and improves his nuclear arsenal beyond what he would need for deterrence, he has sharpened his threats toward the south in the past 1 1/2 years while“North Korea was clearly developing capabilities that would enhance its position vis-à-vis South Korea. And so going forward, this is where the room for concern is,” Seiler said.
It's all"helped create an environment where this issue of what Kim Jong Un might choose to do in the use of force domain, backed by his nuclear weapons, is a greater subject of debate than it was even a year ago,” Seiler noted.‘I WAS BROUGHT TO TEARS'
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