A 10 Point Promise to the North Korean People
A 10 Point Promise to the North Korean People
September 4, 2024
North Korea’s well documented record of human rights abuses is probably the worst in modern history. The United Nations Report of the Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea[1] is arguably the gold standard among the many reports that have extensively documented the Kim Regime’s systematic abuse of its own people. There is general consensus among the North Korea-focused “Community of Interest” on the need to push more information to the people in North Korea. As part of this effort the Republic of Korea (ROK)—United States (US) Alliance should take a more aggressive stance by bypassing the Kim regime and engaging in a direct, public conversation with the people in North Korea. The first step would be to publish an official version of this paper’s 10 point promise to the North Korean people as the means to demonstrate the sincerity of the outside world and counter what has been the foundation for decades of indoctrination by the Kim regime: The Ten Principles of Monolithic Ideology(TPMI).
The TPMI are, as Robert Collins has written in his book, Pyongyang Republic[2],:
“the primary creed of the Kim regime. In practice, the Ten Principles have a greater impact on the daily lives of every North Korean than the KWP Charter, the constitution, or civil law. North Korea’s own political dictionary describes the principles as ‘the ideological system by which the whole Party and people is firmly armed with the revolutionary ideology of the Suryeong [Suryong] and united solidly around him, carrying out the revolutionary battle and construction battle under the sole leadership of the Suryeong,’…All North Koreans are required to memorize and strictly comply with the Ten Principles. Failure to do so is seen as treason, and results in severe punishment, incarceration, or banishment to political prison camps.”
The people of North Korea need an alternative to this ideological indoctrination. This 10-point promise is designed to give them a framework for better understanding the contrast between what the outside world offers and the way the Kim regime forces them to live. In doing so, these promises undermine the core narrative of the Kim regime and replace the TPMI with a credible lens through which they can process what they see and hear from the outside in a way that provides hope for a better future without Kim. These promises should be used as the core for all outside information efforts. The leaders of the ROK, the US, and prominent figures in the international community who focus on North Korean human rights should publicly embrace this promise and do what they can to put in place policies and practices to make them real.
The 10 Point Promise
The increasingly irresponsible and dangerous behavior of Kim Jong Un is of great concern to the Republic of Korea (ROK), the United States (US) and the other free countries of the world. His aggressive pursuit of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles is a grave threat to the entire world. Contrary to what you are told, the ROK-US Alliance has no intention of invading North Korea. We could easily have destroyed your country many times but have chosen not to because we do not hate you. For proof of this simply compare the wealth and technology you have witnessed in foreign videos to how the Kim regime forces you to live. Who do you think has the real power? If we had truly wanted to destroy North Korea we surely would have already done so. Instead, we seek peace.
Freedom has allowed the ROK to develop a strong economy with a high standard of living while the Kim family, in glorifying itself, has repressed you and maintained a hostile attitude to the outside world to justify this repression. As a result of these hostile policies and the behavior of Kim Jong Un, North Korea is a pariah state, looked upon with worry and contempt.
Why do you need nuclear weapons? Can you or your children eat them? Do they keep you warm or treat your illnesses? These are basic human rights that governments the world over are supposed to provide for their people. Why not you? Instead, Kim tells you he needs these weapons to protect the system that represses you—ask yourself if it is worth protecting?
Until now, North Korea has been a relatively minor threat confined to the Korea Peninsula because it could not do real harm to the world. The nuclear weapons Kim tells you he needs change the game. The ROK—US alliance is extremely concerned by Kim Jong Un’s irresponsible and dangerous threats to use nuclear weapons. We DO NOT seek war but are concerned that his foolish actions and threats will start one. IF this happens, we know that Kim’s weapons could do great damage and kill millions of our people. To prevent this, we will be forced to use our full might to remove the threat to the world. This means you and your families will probably die.
To avoid this we ask you, the North Korean people, party officials and military commanders to consider the fate of your families and if Kim is so foolish as to start a war with the world, do not follow him. In choosing to abandon Kim, YOU, the people in North Korea—common folk and elites at all levels—will gain a brighter future in a peaceful North Korea free from Kim Jong Un. We are NOT calling for you to get rid of him now. We would prefer that he simply focus on improving how you live and stop threatening us but if he is foolish enough to start a war, that will be when you will have to decide to act to secure the safety and future of your families and not follow him into death. If war happens, do not engage in acts of violence or obey his orders—instead, look after your families and survive.
As a sign of commitment to peace we make this 10-point pledge to the rights of the North Korean people. If a war happens avoid violence, survive and we guarantee you a better future.
1. You and your families will not be killed, abused or taken advantage of. Despite what you have been told, we do not seek to subjugate, abuse, harm or kill you or your children. We will seek to establish a safe and peaceful environment for you to live and prosper. If our soldiers commit crimes against you, they will be punished. Your personal property rights will be respected. We will establish the rule of law in accordance with accepted international legal norms and you will have legal rights that will be respected.
2. Freedom from malnutrition. In the event of war, ROK-US alliance, with the support of the International Community, is prepared to provide immediate assistance—to the extent that this is desired and useful. As soon as it is safe to do so, we will bring in rice, meat, vegetables and other nutrition to include baby food—a diet normally available to infants and young children all over the world. If areas of North Korea are damaged in fighting, we will bring food and support to your homes.
3. Modern health care. As soon as conditions permit, Alliance forces will bring in equipment, medicine, and trained medical personnel to assist North Korean doctors in treating diseases and improving the health of the North Korean people. You will not have to bribe or otherwise pay for this treatment.
4. Shelter. You are guaranteed a warm, dry place to live with modern necessities like power and running water. Although this will not be instantaneous or easy, once a safe and peaceful environment can be established, the ROK-US Alliance, with the help of the international community, will repair existing housing, electric power and water systems—and build new modern ones where required to meet the needs of the North Korean people.
5. Freedom from the control of the Korean Workers Party (KWP) and ideological suppression. The Korean Workers Party will be abolished and replaced by a government that serves you, with leaders you will choose and who respect your basic rights. Systems of political control will be abolished. The ten principles of monolithic ideology will be discarded, and mandatory political indoctrination will cease. This means political crimes will be abolished, political prisoners will be released, and mandatory weekly self-criticism sessions will end. The political power of the Inminban will be removed and people will no longer be required to report on each other.
6. Opportunity, education, and freedom to seek employment you want. The government will no longer dictate which jobs you may do. Although it will take time to rebuild—such is that damage that Kim Jong Un has done to North Korea’s economy—the ROK-US Alliance, supported by investment from the outside world will develop the economy. This will provide rewarding jobs and opportunity for you and your children.
a. Jobs & salary guarantee: As peace and stability are established, we want you to remain in place and be industrious in helping rebuild a reunited Korea. With minor exceptions, you will be asked to continue to do the job you currently have but will start being paid a real salary in your current job to enable to you buy food, clothes and other items.
b. Education guarantee: North Korea’s well-established school system will continue to educate your children, but political indoctrination will stop, and classes will focus on real learning—such as science, math, language, art, and music in order to prepare your children with the skills and knowledge to be successful in the modern world.
7. Freedom to travel: As peace and stability are established, you will be allowed to travel freely without government interference throughout the Korean Peninsula and to foreign countries.
8. The rule of law and an end to corruption. As peace and stability are established, the rule of reasonable law—centered on the principle of freedom and fairness which is the norm across the democratic world—will be instituted. Your property rights will be established, your property will be respected and won’t be seized arbitrarily. You will no longer be required to pay bribes to police, government officials and others.
9. Transitional justice: For the past 76 years, the Kim family has abused and mistreated you. To do so, it has put in place a horrible system of policing and repression. Most of you have suffered under it even as some of your fellow Koreans were forced to participate in and enforce this system. However, some have even profited from this system. A transparent, publicly accessible system of transitional justice will be put in place to facilitate accountability, forgiveness and redemption of former KWP officials complicit in the crimes against the Korean people perpetrated by the Kim regime.
10. Full citizenship in a unified and free Korean Peninsula. The North Korean people will take their place in a free, democratic and economically vibrant unified Korea supported by free, equal, and secret elections as well as constitutional conditions that ensure freedom and the protection of basic human rights. The “Songbun” system will be immediately eliminated, and you will no longer live under the restrictions it imposes.
Kim Jong Un and the terrible, unjust system he has put in place is the cause of your current suffering. You live in conditions that are among the worst in the world while just a few kilometers to the south 55 million of your fellow Koreans live in freedoom and prosperity. His arrogance, greed and selfishness are the reasons you suffer in cold misery. It is because of his hostility and irresponsible pursuit of nuclear weapons that we believe he has become a true threat to world peace. We fear his misguided policies will lead to war and destruction which we seek to avoid for both of our peoples. We recognize that no one wins in a war with nuclear weapons where millions will die and so we make you this offer.
If Kim’s foolish behavior leads you to war, find ways to avoid fighting Alliance forces. Our technology and firepower are overwhelming. If this happens you will have to choose under conditions of great uncertainty to trust that people you have never met are not as bad as the man you know Kim Jong Un to be. Do not follow his orders to employ weapons of mass destruction. Do not kill civilians or prisoners. Instead, help end the evil rule of the Kim family, do what you can to lessen the violence and destruction and help your fellow North Koreans to survive. Military soldiers and the officers that control them will be rewarded for weapons, ammunition and missiles and other dangerous items that are turned over unused. Government officials and civil employees find ways to do your part to end violence and continue to provide services to your people.
As time goes forward, we ask you to weigh what you can see and hear of the outside world with the reality of the world Kim Jong Un forces on you. No one knows today what a reunified Korea will ultimately look like, but the destiny of the Korean Peninsula is to be fully part of the international community with respect for human rights and the right of national self-determination. We are aware that the path to Korean unity poses many difficult questions to which no one today can give definitive answers. This especially includes the difficult and decisive question of the overarching security structures in Asia. What happens after Kim Jong Un is gone is a future we need to build together.
In making this 10-point promise, we guarantee you and you families a fruitful place in a reunified Korean Peninsula. Our intent and purpose in making these commitments to you is to avoid a conflict which is likely to destroy the Korean people and damage the rest of the world in the process. We can peacefully overcome the division of the Korean people, but this means prudence, reason, and good judgment on everyone's part.
Commander Fredrick “Skip” Vincenzo, USN (ret.), is a nonresident senior fellow with both the Center for Naval Analyses and the Indo-Pacific Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security—as well as a non-resident fellow with the Irregular Warfare Initiative. He is a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and completed Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training. With a career spanning 28 years—more than two thirds of that spent deployed on operations or permanently assigned overseas—he has extensive experience in Special Operations, Korean security, information operations, counter terror, NATO, and countering hybrid threats. His groundbreaking work on information-based sub-national deterrence is emerging as one of the most promising options for dealing with aggression coercion of authoritarians like Russia, China, and North Korea. His professional writing has appeared in numerous online security publications, and his largest collaborative piece, “An Information Based Strategy to Reduce North Korea’s Increasing Threat[3],” was cited by both the Wall Street Journal and Foreign Affairs Magazine as one of the few underexplored options for dealing with an increasingly dangerous North Korea.
[1] “Report of the Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea | OHCHR.” United Nations Human Rights Council. Accessed September 4, 2024. https://www.ohchr.org/en/hr-bodies/hrc/co-idprk/reportofthe-commissionof-inquiry-dprk.
[2] Robert Collins, “Pyongyang Republic,” HRNK, accessed September 4, 2024, https://www.hrnk.org/uploads/pdfs/Collins_PyongyangRepublic_FINAL_WEB.pdf.
[3] Fredrick Skip Vincenzo, An information based strategy to reduce North Korea’s increasing ..., October 2016, https://georgetownsecuritystudiesreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/An-Information-Based-Strategy-to-Reduce-North-Koreas-Increasing-Threat.pdf.
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