From Praeger Security Interantional:

ALL THE KING’S MEN: NORTH KOREAN LEADERSHIP POLITICS UNDER KIM CHONG-UN 

Ken E. Gause 
Feb. 06, 2012

On December 17, Kim Chong-il’s seventeen year rule came to an end as he reportedly succumbed to a heart attack. Nearly 50 hours after the event, the North Korean propaganda apparatus sprung into action, informing the world of Kim’s passing and proclaiming Kim Chong-un, 28, the “great successor.” Moving at a rapid pace, the transition of power appears to have moved smoothly as the young Kim received the title “Supreme Leader” (ch’eogo ryo’ngdoja) and “Supreme Commander” (Choson inmin’gun ch’oego) of the armed forces. An entirely different set of signals have highlighted what appears to be a collective leadership that will advise Kim and facilitate his consolidation of power.

Two months after the event, the leadership configuration around the young successor has come into focus. It is made up of a number of individuals who had close ties with Kim Chong-il and have been at the forefront of the succession process. The inner core will serve as gatekeepers and most likely be involved in decision-making.

• VMAR Yi Yong-ho, as director of the General Staff Department, has operational control over the armed forces. A long time associate of the Kim family, he oversees one of the key support groups within the military that is supporting Kim Chong-un. This group is made up of officers in their 50s and 60s generally considered the rising stars among the field commanders and high command. VMAR Yi through this network will be instrumental in keeping the military in check during the transition period.
• Gen. Chang Song-taek, who has oversight of the internal security apparatus and the economy portfolio, is well situated to support Kim Chong-un in the running of the daily operations of the regime. He is versed in both policy execution and in the machinations revolving around personnel appointments that will be critical for Kim to consolidate his power.
• Gen. Kim Kyong-hui in the period between her brother’s death on December 17 and the final mourning ceremonies jumped from 14th to 5th in the formal leadership rankings. She will likely play an advisory role and serve as a key arbitrator within the Kim family as well as the larger North Korean leadership.
• Gen. O Kuk-yol is a long time Kim family loyalist. He, too, jumped within the power rankings from 29th to 13th. His primary responsibility will be to ensure regime stability. His input into decision-making will be limited, but his opinion could carry weight in deliberations involving tradeoffs between reform and security.

The outer ring of this leadership configuration is centered in the Party’s Central Military Committee (CMC), which is made up of key second and third generation military and security officials from the across the regime. Kim Chong-il’s reinvigoration of the CMC at the Third Party Conference has placed this body on par with the National Defense Commission (NDC) in terms of reach and influence. Under Kim Chong-un, the CMC will most likely replace the NDC as the command post of Military First Politics. It will be responsible for crafting the “great successor’s” image, gathering loyalty toward the new regime, and running the country. In terms of Kim’s relationship with the military, three CMC members are particularly crucial during the transition period. All accompanied Kim Chong-un as he escorted his father’s hearse through the streets of Pyongyang.

• VMAR Kim Yong-chun, as Minister of People’s Armed Forces, oversees the logistics and training of the military. He will serve, along with Chang Song-taek, as a key conduit to the NDC. In addition he has past service in the Korean Workers’ Party (KWP) Organization Guidance Department (OGD) and the KPA’s General Political Department, which give him invaluable experience in sniffing out potential disloyalty within the armed forces. It was reportedly his surveillance in this regard that contributed to the staunching of the Sixth Corps incident in the mid-1990s.
• Gen. Kim Chong-gak is the acting head of the KPA’s General Political Bureau, a responsibility he assumed with the death of Cho Myong-nok. According to North Korean leadership protocol, the director of the GPB, which is the lead agency for ensuring Party control over the military, is the de facto third ranking member in the high command behind the heads of the MPAF and GSD.
• Gen. U Tong-chuk, as first vice director of the State Security Department, oversees the country’s powerful secret police. Gen. U is a leading member of a key support group to Kim Chong-un composed of general grade officers within the security services. Presumably other members of this group include Gen. Yun Chong-rin, commander of the General Guard Command, and Gen. Kim Won-hong, the commander of the Military Security Command. These organizations form the inner ring for internal security inside North Korea.

Other individuals with military portfolios bear watching, such as O Il-chong (director of the KWP Military Department), Kim Kyong-ok (first vice director of the Party’s Organization Guidance Department), and Choe Ryong-hae (KWP Secretary for Military Affairs). They have important roles to play in monitoring the loyalty of the armed forces and ensuring a smooth transition. They will also be critical to creating and facilitating a unified and centralized Party guidance system that invests the “great successor” with the ideological authority he will need to rule. Media coverage, however, does not suggest they will be within Kim Chong-un’s inner circle, at least initially.

By all indications, the initial period of the leadership transition has gone smoothly. With the exception of the disappearance of Yi Chol, the head of the Joint Venture and Investment Committee (JVIC) and financial adviser to the Kim family, rumors of purges within the regime have been relegated to the lower echelons. This lack of drama and turnover is likely due to a system based on leader-centric rule that needs Kim Chong-un if for no other reason than to play a vital legitimizing role for the regime. Despite his youth and inexperience, there are no apparent alternatives to Kim Chong-un and by all indications the senior leadership has closed ranks around him.

Kim Chong-un, however, will not be able to completely consolidate his power by simply relying on a guardian network constructed by his father. At some point (probably in the coming years), he will have to bring his own people into the senior ranks of the leadership. Preliminary indications are that his growing patronage network is made up of a number of groups of individuals.

• Third and Fourth Generation Relatives. Children of North Korean leaders are beginning to monopolize key positions within the second echelon of the regime. Examples include: KWP OGD vice director Choe Hwi (son of Choe Chae-ha), vice director of the KWP International Department Kim Mun-kyong (daughter of Kim Kuk-tae), Minister of Foreign Affairs party secretary Ho Chol (son of Ho Tam), chairman of JVIC Yi Kwang-kun (son of Yi Yong-ku, Kim chong-il’s personal physician). Some of these children are particularly powerful because of their ties to hard currency financing networks. Such individuals include: O Se-won (son of O Kuk-yol), Kim Chol-un (son of Kim Chung-il), Kang Tae-sung (son of Kang Sok-chu), Kim Chang-hyok (son of Kim Chang-sop), and Kim Chol (son of Kim Won-hong), Yi Son-il (son of Yi Yong-ho).
• Rising Military Stars. A close examination of promotion lists, guidance inspections, and the 2010 Third Party Conference reveals a number of young military officers on the rise. All appear to be corps level commanders and recently appointed members of the Party’s Central Committee. While their ties to Kim Chong-un are tentative, the fact that they have been closely associated with events tied to his succession and first months in power would suggest that they are worth watching. Some of the more notable officers include: Choe Kyong-song (XI Corps Commander and member of the CMC), Choe Sang-ryo (Member of the CMC), Choe Pu-il (Member of the CMC), Chon Ho-kyun, Kim Chun-sam. If the past is prologue, many of these officers will be brought into the high command in order to build military loyalty to the regime and ensure stability.

Whether Kim Chong-un will be able to step into his father’s shoes and run the regime on his own will not be clear for some time. Pyongyang watchers will be paying close attention in the coming months to the activities of the regime as it approaches the critical centenary celebration of Kim Il-sung’s birth in April. In the same month, the Supreme People’s Assembly will convene where appointments to state offices, including the NDC, will be revealed. At some point, the Party will convene a major meeting to covey additional leadership posts to Kim Chong-un. These three events will no doubt provide clues to the nature of the regime (Supreme Leader versus Collective, or something in between) and its longer term stability.