SEOUL, South Korea — It was a simple portrait in an otherwise unremarkable photograph that appeared in North Korean state media recently. But for North Korea watchers, it spoke volumes.
The portrait showed North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un sitting in the chair of a classroom at the new Workers Party of Korea Central Cadres Training School in the capital Pyongyang. The cadres, all standing, are busily scribbling down their leader’s “on-the-spot guidance” in their notebooks.
On the wall near the classroom’s chalkboard hung three portraits: one of Mr. Kim’s grandfather, Kim Il Sung, and his father, Kim Jong Il, and a third portrait: That of the younger Kim.
It was a signal some observers have been waiting for.
Mr. Kim, who took power after the death of his father in 2011, has thus far not promoted his own personality cult. He has seemed content to rely upon his bloodline as a sign of legitimacy without feeling the need to stamp his own image onto North Korea’s universe of leader portraits, statuary, lapel badges and murals.
The new photograph, and a recent propaganda song, suggest change. If the trend expands, it will dash the hopes of those who believed that Mr. Kim might create a more normalized system than his father and grandfather.
More worryingly, signals that the nuclear-armed Mr. Kim may be elevating himself above and beyond his predecessors could signal a more hostile policy toward external enemies.
Why it matters
“It is important because North Korea finally acknowledges and accepts the status of Kim Jong-un alongside his two predecessors,” said Kim Kwang-jin, a North Korean defector who directs the Department of Unification and Human Rights Studies at Seoul’s Institute for National Security Strategy.
Age may be an issue: Asian societies customarily revere age more than Western societies. The portrait is appearing the same year that the third-generation dictator turns 40, Mr. Kim, the analyst, noted.
The placement of the portrait comes at a time when the previous two Kims’ avowed policies of peaceful reunification with South Korea are being overturned.
In this sense, the INSS’s Mr. Kim stated, Kim Jong-un may also be seeking to replace his late grandfather’s birthday — known across North Korea as “The Day of the Sun” — with his own.
“There can be only one sun in the sky,” said the analyst.
It is not just the portrait.
Last month, a catchy tune and accompanying video, depicting enthusiastic citizens, beaming miners and ecstatic tank crews gesticulating joyfully while praising their leader as a “Friendly Father,” hit North Korean airwaves.
It has since gone viral on TikTok.
These initiatives look to be putting a long-awaited propaganda sheen on Mr. Kim’s power. In reality, his assumption of power was underwritten by a series of ruthless political maneuvers aimed at eradicating any disloyal elements.
After purging a number of military leaders, Mr. Kim had his powerful uncle, Jang Song Thaek — believed to have maintained high-level relations with Beijing, as well as a personal business power base — executed in 2013.
In 2017, Mr. Kim’s half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, was assassinated in an apparent hit at Kuala Lumpur International Airport.
In a different step to buttress loyalty, Mr. Kim has elevated the visibility of his sister, Kim Yo-jong. More recently, he has been repeatedly seen in public with his teenage daughter, Ju Ae.
Mr. Kim is now deeply entrenched. Pyongyang watchers are unaware of any competing power bases or personalities inside North Korea’s body politic.
Farewell, new normal
The initiatives to embed Mr. Kim into his family’s personality cult may disappoint those who have pointed to some of his normative actions and appearance.
Mr. Kim, who spent years being secretly educated in Switzerland, reinstated the authority of the party over the military, a move that reversed his father’s approach.
After the death of his half-brother, and after having tested a nuclear missile in 2017 with the range to hit the U.S., Mr. Kim engaged in a whirlwind of international diplomacy with Chinese, South Korean, Russian and U.S. leaders.
Mr. Kim certainly follows other authoritarian leaders in overseeing massive, brilliantly choreographed parades of military might.
But unlike his aloof, hermit-like father, he frequently poses in state media beaming at lenses while interacting with citizens in a manner reminiscent of Western politicians on the stump.
While he continues to don traditional tunics, he also wears Western-style suits, sometimes even leather jackets.
However, in a state notorious for its near-total lack of human rights and freedoms, superficial public relations should fool no one, warned another scholar.
“He has tried to make North Korea look like a normal state,” said Peter Ward, a researcher on North Korea at Seoul’s Sejong Institute. “But I would not take his humbleness too seriously.”
Some wonder whether Mr. Kim himself may be a rat stuck inside his own elaborately constructed trap.
“The personality cult is deeply embedded in their political culture,” Mr. Ward said.
Reform of such a stratified system is risky. The personal pleasures that accompany unlimited power should not be overlooked.
“He came to power full of enthusiasm thinking he would change everything, despite his father who created a mess, but now he has had 12 years of a very comfortable life,” said Andrei Lankov, a North Korea-watcher at Seoul’s Kookmin University. “We have seen this kind of young, reformist monarch come in, full of good intentions, but later they understand that progressive moves will not work as intended in their particular country.”
A noted behavior of elites in absolute monarchies and dictatorships is a competition to display loyalty to the leader. Could Mr. Kim have been grudgingly convinced to accept state propaganda trappings by enthusiastic underlings?
“Good bureaucrats know how to make a proposal, and that was exactly how it was explained under Mao and Stalin: That their people wanted a personality cult,” said Mr. Lankov. “But most of these activities are very carefully prescribed by the Workers Party Central Committee, and I don’t see how it could be done without the express approval of the leader.”
• Andrew Salmon can be reached at asalmon@washingtontimes.com.