A critique of"Dangerous, isolated and primed for war? North Korean clichés debunked"

At first sight many friends of the DPRK would welcome Professor Hazel Smith 's "Guardian " article "Dangerous, isolated and primed for war? North Korean clichés debunked " as it apparently demolishes the crude propaganda demonising the DPRK . For example Prof Smith correctly refutes charges that the DPRK is involved in drug production and smuggling as she writes "The major source in the public arena for alleged DPRK narcotics production and smuggling is an unverified list of incidents from a 1999Intelligence Section report by the United States Drug Enforcement Agency.
Such reports acknowledge the tentative nature of the evidence: “data should be considered a ‘far cry’ from anything that might be remotely considered as evidence in a US court of law”, an official US report said on the DPRK’s alleged drug trafficking. "
Prof Smith refers to the DPRK's achievements in wiping out illiteracy and points that 35% of DPRK school students go to higher education (a very high percentage, one of the highest in the world I believe) . Smith also points as we in UK KFA have pointed out that a number of DPRK students study abroad including a number in the UK
However the article whilst being an exposure of crude tabloid style near racist propaganda about the DPRK promotes a different kind of propaganda against the DPRK. It is very much a case of the liberal "Guardian " putting a distance between itself and the tabloids and ultra-right wing broadsheets such as the "Daily Telegraph ". Prof Smith herself has written a number of anti-DPRK books , on one occasion she attacked the KFA and was also awarded a medal by the US. As well a Professor at the University of Lancashire she is on the staff of the US Wilson Center and was on the Honorary Committee of US NGO along with George W Bush and former US bureaucrats . For many years Smith was on the staff of Cranfield University which specialises in "security and resilience "(readers may wish to draw their own conclusion as to what this means).
Various weasel words have crept into Prof Smith's article such as the following " The television footage of weeping crowds after Kim Jong-il’s death in 2011 was not balanced by images of the millions more who did not stop all their activities and rush onto the streets to engage in public mourning, for example." How would Prof Smith know this ? Was she there , what is her source ? It is actually an insult to the people of the DPRK who deeply respected and revered the great leader comrade KIM JONG IL. It is also trying to create an impression that people in the DPRK do not support the system.
Prof Smith also implies that the DPRK is comparable to Saudi Arabia ! This is a statement ignorant of the fact that the DPRK has an advanced socialist system centred on the popular masses with true independence whereas Saudi Arabia is a reactionary feudalistic regime which is a puppet of US imperialism.
What Prof Smith represents a the pragmatic viewpoint of some within the establishment. Much of the anti-DPRK propaganda has been designed to demonise the DPRK in such a way as to hype people up to fight a war against the DPRK. It is similar to the anti Serb propaganda before the bombing of Yugoslavia or the propaganda against Saddam and Iraq before the Iraq War . Now once the imperialist war-hawks got their war against the DPRK the results for them would be disastrous - this writer has every confidence that the KPA under supreme leader Marshal KIM JONG UN could liberate south Korea and reunify Korea (this would deprive the US its main foothold in Asia and possibly spark a domino effect) , even if this was not the immediate result south Korea would be destroyed and there would be tens of thousands of US causalities. The US , Japan , Germany , the UK, France and others would see billions of dollars worth of investments incinerated . Not a good idea . So some in the establishment are not keen to gamble on a "big bang " confrontation with the DPRK but instead favour an insidious war of attrition , a war of pressure and trying to destroy the socialist system of the DPRK by other means.
Clues to this can be seen in Prof Smith's article as she seems enthusiastic about the so-called "free flow of information " in other words imperialist ideological and cultural infiltration. Some people hope to effect the so-called "peaceful transition " or "peaceful conversion" strategy (sometimes called the "Dulles Plan " or "Kennedy Doctrine " ) against the DPRK whereby socialism is destroyed by stealth , by ideological, cultural and economic infiltration and psychological warfare rather than physical conflict .
We in UK KFA stand by the DPRK 100% and defend Juche socialism and are vigilant against false friends of the DPRK who hope to destroy Juche socialism by covert and stealthy methods.