How North Korean missiles are helping to mask Kim Jong-un’s fears

In the days that followed, analysts warned of rapid advancements being made in Pyongyang’s weapons programme, and explained why the display of at least two new missile systems signify progress. Very few people, however, have made it a point to tie what former Los Alamos National Laboratory director Siegfried Hecker has called North Korea’s “menacing arsenal” to momentous domestic changes in the country.

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North Korea claims to produce weapons for defence purposes but, beneath the display of force, the regime is hiding deeply entrenched vulnerabilities under a torrent of simulations.

Beneath the façade of a revived “our-style socialism” visible in its showcase capital, and perhaps even under the veneer of abject poverty, market forces have been at play, supplying the population not only with daily necessities, but also with pirated media that provides a secret window to the outside world.

Much more than a bar of soap or pack of instant noodles in the country’s grey markets, moving images are allowing North Koreans to forge a relation with advanced capitalist societies like South Korea.

This is good news, but it has prompted North Korea to wage an unending propaganda war against its people to reinforce its own sovereignty, even as it is unable to provide an acceptable level of food rations or supply a living wage at many state-owned enterprises.

There is now evidence young North Koreans keep up with the latest trends in the South or watch Hollywood movies delivered to them on flash drives. Many defectors have had some exposure to illegal South Korean media, and the films sometimes motivate them to leave, because the representation is credible enough in a world where reality and images are increasingly exchanging masks.

From time to time, North Korea has claimed it is ready to turn Seoul into a pile of ashes, or to rain nuclear hail on the United States and emerge as the victor in a catastrophic war. While North Korea’s capacity to miniaturise a nuclear warhead and mount it on an intercontinental ballistic missile is subject to debate, the continued arrival of defectors to the South makes it clear that the regime has been handed a resounding defeat in the arenas of soft power and digital influence.