SEOUL // With Kim Jong-un turning up the heat with North Korea’s fourth nuclear test, South Korea will respond on Friday by broadcasting cross-border propaganda that Pyongyang considers an act of war.
From noon on Friday – on North Korean leader Mr Kim’s birthday – South Korea plans to fire up loudspeakers along the heavily fortified border and resume the propaganda blasts that brought the reclusive regime to a war footing in August, and then to the negotiating table.
Dropping leaflets into Mr Kim’s “front yard” is also an option, according to one lawmaker.
From Seoul to Washington, Beijing to the United Nations, world powers are looking at ways to punish Pyongyang for the test of what it called a new and powerful hydrogen bomb.
The loudspeaker broadcasts are certain to infuriate authoritarian Pyongyang.
Years of United Nations sanctions and other penalties have failed to bring Mr Kim to heel, but one thing that can get under his skin is broadcasts over the demilitarised zone of South Korean ballads and rap music, a genre known as K-pop. The speakers have been used only once in the past decade, for part of August in retaliation for the maiming of two South Korean soldiers by DMZ mines.
That spat escalated into what North Korea called a “semi-state of war” that was cooled by marathon talks at a border village where Mr Kim’s officials agreed to halt the mobilisation of forces. One condition was that Seoul turned the speakers off.
“Kim Jong-un isn’t your typical dictator. He’s a god in North Korea, and propaganda broadcasts raise questions among North Koreans about that,” said Park Chang-kwon, a senior research fellow at the state-run Korea Institute for Defence Analyses in Seoul. “Broadcasts from South Korea can reach deep and far into North Korea’s society, imbuing the minds of its people with the images of a free nation and hurting the oppressive personality cult.”
South Korea stopped earlier broadcasts after it agreed with Pyongyang in late August on a package of measures aimed at easing animosities that had the rivals threatening war.
Experts, meanwhile, are trying to uncover more details about the detonation that drew worldwide scepticism and condemnation.
It may take weeks or longer to confirm or refute the North’s claim that it successfully tested a hydrogen bomb, which would mark a major and unanticipated advance for its still-limited nuclear arsenal. Even a test of an atomic bomb, a less sophisticated and less powerful weapon, would push its scientists and engineers closer to their goal of building a nuclear warhead small enough to place on a missile that can reach the US mainland.
President Barack Obama spoke to his South Korean counterpart Park Geun-hye and Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe on Thursday and they “agreed to work together to forge a united and strong international response to North Korea’s latest reckless behaviour”, the White House said.
Ms Park also spoke with Mr Abe over the phone and they vowed cooperation to ensure that the UN Security Council imposes strong and effective measures against the North.
South Korean and US military leaders also discussed the deployment of US “strategic assets” in the wake of the North’s test, Seoul’s defence ministry said.
Ministry officials refused to elaborate about what US military assets were under consideration, but they likely refer to B-52 bombers, F-22 stealth fighters and nuclear-powered submarines.
When animosities sharply rose in the spring of 2013 following North Korea’s third nuclear test, the US took the unusual step of sending its most powerful warplanes – B-2 stealth bombers, F-22 stealth fighters and B-52 bombers – to drills with South Korea in a show of force. B-2 and B-52 bombers are capable of delivering nuclear weapons.
Four rounds of UN sanctions have aimed at reining in the North’s nuclear and missile development programmes, but Pyongyang has ignored them and moved ahead to modernise its ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons.
In parliament on Thursday, South Korea’s defence minister Han Min Koo said that North Korea’s detonation of what it claims to be a hydrogen bomb constitutes an “abnormal situation.” His words carry significance as the late August pact that ended the standoff can be annulled under such circumstances - which means the loudspeakers can be turned back on.
The broadcasts are a low-tech response to Mr Kim’s saber-rattling, compared with options like the tightening of sanctions, Seoul developing its own missile defence system or potentially a beefing up of the US military presence south of the border.
* Bloomberg and Associated Press