{"id":11562,"date":"2011-12-15T00:12:16","date_gmt":"2011-12-15T00:12:16","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-12-15T00:12:16","modified_gmt":"2011-12-15T00:12:16","slug":"North-Korea-strategy-the-playing-field-and-major-players","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asiancemagazine.com\/?p=11562","title":{"rendered":"North Korea strategy: the playing field and major players"},"content":{"rendered":"

The playing field for North Korean strategy, which reduces the number of relevant players, simplifies North Korea’s strategic situation more than almost anything else. Few other nations see such a combination of global importance and simplicity.<\/p>\n

The map below, from Wikipedia<\/a>, shows nearly everything you need to know about the playing field.<\/p>\n

\"Map
Map of North Korea<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

North Korea shares borders with three countries: China, South Korea, and Russia. Farther to the east lies Japan. No other countries are close.<\/p>\n

For a few reasons, mainly that North Korea developed nuclear weapons and its involvement in the Korean War, the United States is involved.<\/p>\n

Within North Korea I distinguish between the government and the people.<\/p>\n

Each of these players contains multitudes of sub-players with divergent interests. Nonetheless, I think treating these seven groups as the relevant ones and each one as homogenous gets the main structure.<\/p>\n

The main players are<\/p>\n