Purge and execution of Jang Song-thaek: the transformation of N.Korean political procedure

After the fall of Jang Song-thaek, many saw the removal of such a ‘powerful’ figure as evidence of Kim Jong-un’s absolute power. But the public purge and execution of Jang Song-thaek at once exposes Kim Jong-un’s lack of powers, as well as the struggle of Kim Jong-il’s associates as they uphold a power structure that lacks a de facto head.

These accounts are based on an understanding of Kim Jong-il era politics from the inside-out and according to its internal structure, rather than its surface manifestations.

In this series, we provide an overview of differences between the Kim Jong-il and Kim Jong-un systems, in an attempt to provide a more accurate understanding of both. Here is the link to our first installment, which focuses on the presentational differences between the Kim Jong-il and Kim Jong-un eras. In our second installment, we focus on the procedural differences.

Images from the recent Politburo meeting confirm that the ruling Kim is no longer the absolute centre of authority.

In images of the recent Politburo meeting released by the KCNA, there is a frame in which four cadres are pictured with their arms raised (bottom image). It is an unprecedented and overt confirmation of non-collective engagement taking place between the ruling Kim’s platform and the audience.

In Kim Jong-il’s time, a meeting of cadres in his presence was always a mere formality to ratify an executive decision. No one was ever permitted to raise a hand towards a platform with the ruling Kim on it, and there was never a procedure, actual or staged, in which individuals in the audience might pose a question or even be asked to confirm a point.

Cadres attending these post-policy-decision meetings, the only meetings covered by state media, instinctively knew that they were there to confirm and endorse a result by their presence and their collective behaviour, and not respond to it in any individually distinguishing manner.

This is not the only startlingly unusual feature of the Politburo meeting. In any meeting where Kim Jong-il was present on the platform, no cadre was permitted to rest a hand on the table or lean forward or sideways. They would only write things down when requested to do so, and were otherwise required to demonstrate full attention.

This was not just cynical dissimulation on their part: it was a reflection of the moral conviction and professional pride of cadres permitted to express endorsement of a policy decision in a meeting chaired by the ruling Kim himself.

Any cadre who stood out in such a meeting would be punished. Even the direction of one’s gaze had to be fixed. Yet in this recent Politburo meeting, held in the presence of Kim Jong-un, some in the audience are listening, others are writing and the audience exhibits a wide variety of body postures.

These cadres are not present in the meeting to receive Kim’s diktat in the manner of all previous public meetings.

What is remarkable is that though they are in a meeting chaired by a ruling Kim, they are not behaving according to the established pattern. Instead, the audience is behaving as if it were in a meeting at which the ruling Kim was not present, and where the focus was not on Kim’s person but on the issue and event at hand.

North Korean cadres who have lived and breathed in that world of Pyongyang know there can be no greater manifestation of lack of recognition of the authority and de facto powers vested in the person of the ruling Kim than such a lack of uniformity in behaviour and appearance, and at a meeting supposedly chaired by the ruling Kim himself.

In terms of elite power-brokering, this is a fundamental and systemic recognition that a behavioural demonstration of loyalty to the person of the ruling Kim is no longer the only currency of safety and power; because avenues of safety and power now lie elsewhere than in the personal authority of the ruling Kim.

Kim Jong-un was absent from Pyongyang in the days leading up to the Politburo meeting.

North Korea’s official statement claims that Jang Song-thaek’s crime was factional – and therefore extraordinarily grave and treacherous. It is inconceivable that the days leading up to such an important decision and execution could have seen the ruling Kim (if he were still the centre of authority) absent from Pyongyang. Yet Kim Jong-un was up north in Samjiyon, far from the centre of power.

Through the powers over chain of command structures based in Pyongyang, the neutralising of Jang Song-thaek’s associates would have been initiated before the formal condemnation. A Politburo meeting is therefore redundant if the objective of the purge was limited to the removal from office of Jang Song-thaek and his associates.

Kim Jong-un was out of Pyongyang before Nov 30, when Central TV reported his presence in Samjiyon as on-site guidance. South Korean intelligence officially announced Jang Song-thaek’s purge on Dec 3. They could not have announced such a momentous development on the day it was discovered, not least because a mistaken announcement on such a scale would seriously damage its reputation. In fact, there would have been a minimum of a week of cross-sourcing before the official announcement was made.

Because of this and other crucial factors, we calculate that the fate of Jang Song-thaek was already sealed by Nov 23. This is also the point at which Jang Song-thaek’s family and associates in Cuba and Malaysia were recalled to Pyongyang. Also, by this time, Jang Song-thaek’s closest associates Ri Ryong-hwa and Jang Su-gil had been publicly executed.

Thus, when Kim Jong-un left for Samjiyon before Nov 30, Jang Song-thaek’s power was already constrained and the purge of his associates was well under way.

It makes no sense to suggest that Kim Jong-un orchestrated the Jang Song-thaek purge from Samjiyon because the recall of Jang Song-thaek’s family and associates took place a week before. Not only is there no reason for Kim Jong-un to have made such plans from the remote and northern end of the country, the ruling Kim’s ‘sanction’ for the purge of Jang Song-thaek did not occur until the Politburo meeting itself: Jang Song-thaek was still wearing his Kim Il-sung badge in the Politburo meeting, although a cadre must have his badge removed as soon his fate is sealed by the authority of the ruling Kim.

Jang Song-thaek’s fate was decided by Nov 23, yet the ruling Kim’s sanction was not applied until the Politburo meeting on Dec 8. This reveals an unprecedented separation between symbolic and actual power.

And why was Kim Jong-un absent for those crucial days? Was Kim Jong-un prompted by fear to leave Pyongyang while these events got under way? Or was Kim Jong-un kept away from Jang Song-thaek and his core associates while preparations were made for a ‘Politburo decision’ announced not only publicly, but first and irrevocably to the outside world, and only then to the domestic audience?

The half-full (or half-empty) hall at the Politburo meeting reflects the incomplete authority of Kim Jong-un.

In the images of the Politburo meeting released by North Korea, there is another startling indicator of transformation in North Korean elite politics: the hall is half-empty. Under Kim Jong-il, not only was presence equivalent to endorsement, any meeting chaired by him had to be perfect in its reflection of his authority. Not only was an empty seat unthinkable even in an internal meeting, but the sight of a half-empty auditorium would never have been released to the world.

Whatever it took, all seats had to be filled as an indicator of complete and unanimous support of the ruling Kim. Yet in the Politburo meeting held to announce the purge of Jang Song-thaek, the front half is full and the back half is completely empty. If this were because only powerful cadres were permitted to attend such a momentous meeting, it would be even more ridiculous, because that would reveal the membership of the internal power structure of the elite.

Why, then, is the hall half-empty in this momentous Politburo meeting? Why did they not follow the established tradition of a full meeting?

Our hypothesis is this: this revealing oversight wasn’t by design. The attendees were hastily selected by the driving figures in the purge of Jang Song-thaek and his faction, and the audience was limited to their key supporters and proxies without the usual padding.

The Jang Song-thaek faction, forming one half of the Byungjin line, was excluded: the secrecy of the timing, the consolidation of the plan, and the symbolic endorsement by the ruling Kim were considered to be a higher priority than the apparent upholding of Kim Jong-un’s authority, which was ironically – and tellingly – relegated to the empty back half of the hall.

In our final installment, we will examine the powers and figures who are driving this series of events. Please help us continue our work, opening authentic avenues of interpretation and sources, through Beacon.