are not acts that one would expect from a country concerned with defense but rather with implementing an offensive national military strategy.
Military-First Doctrine. Militarism has remained an essential aspect of the character of North Korea since its founding in 1948 and constitutes a key element of the strategic culture of the government. North Korean military doctrine further evolved from an element of national power to coexist as an element of political power. On March 21, 2003, Nodong Sinmun published a special article "Military-First Ideology Is an Ever-Victorious, Invincible Banner for Our Era’s Cause of Independence," which declared that the KPA is the basis of North Korea’s political revolutionary strategy.
The character of the KPA high command has changed since Kim Jong Il came to power. While members of the first (partisan) generation still hold posts of power, the day-to-day management of the military has begun to shift to second (senior officers in their 60s) and third generations. The era of a single senior military figure tied closely to the party and the Great Leader has been replaced by a system in which control with the KPA is more dispersed, and many channels lead back to Kim Jong Il. In this way, Kim has been able to secure his control over the military, a goal that is ultimately at the heart of “military-first politics.” Third generation will serve to protect Kim Jong Il but may also ultimately become his biggest political threat. This strategy "calls for giving priority to military issues over everything, and it is a line, strategy, and tactics of putting the KPA before the working class" to the point that the KPA is "the most pivotal (political) group" in North Korean society.
North Korea’s military-first policy is ever-present and plays many multidimensional roles as an important economic actor in agriculture, infrastructure construction, research and development, professional education, weapons sales, and hard currency earning. It is the major ideological educator, socializer of the youth, and general backbone of the society.
Finally, this policy is the principal veto power in all policy deliberations, let alone as the military defender of the nation and the principal guarantor of the regime survival. To begin economic reforms with North Korea, the policy was driven by the pure self-preservation instinct, not based on Marxist-Leninist ideology.
Without the support of the top military leaders, Kim Jong Il alone could not have made a strategic decision to conduct what one of the authors has dubbed economic “reform around the edges.” What seems to be important is that the KPA was elevated to be the primary actor in the country whereas the more conservative KWP was relegated to be the secondary actor in restructuring the North Korean state and building a “great powerful and prosperous nation.”
One of the hallmarks of the Kim Jong Il era has been the evolution of power away from the KWP and toward the KPA. In the wake of the revision of the 1998 constitution, there was a dramatic reshuffling of the official leadership rankings with members of the NDC beginning to overtake Politburo and Secretariat members.
Moreover, the principal reason why some foreign observers do not believe that the economic reforms undertaken by North Korea represent a fundamental transformation in Pyongyang’s thinking is precisely the military-first policy, the dominant role that the KPA still plays in the North Korean decision-making process, and the belief that the military-first policy precludes any constructive resolution in major diplomatic overtures such as the nuclear negotiations.
Military Doctrine. KPA military doctrine began as a hybridization of Chinese and Soviet concepts. North Korean military doctrine further evolved from lessons learned from global confrontations such as the ArabIsraeli conflicts, the Vietnam War, Kosovo, Operation DESERT STORM, and more recently, Operation IRAQI FREEDOM.
Throughout the last 70 years, North Korea’s military has learned that it cannot necessarily depend on China or Russia to be there to assist with its development and operations. Although China and Russia provide some support today, they appear to support North Korea as a counterbalance to the U.S. presence in South Korea.
This is another primary tenet of the Juche ideology of self-sufficiency that North Korea has developed regarding all phases of its military from doctrine development to weapons and ammunition production. This doctrine has evolved through as many as four stages since the founding of the KPA in February 1948. North Korean military writings derive from Marxism-Leninism through the conduit of "Kim Il Sung Thought." Kim Il Sung is credited with virtually everything in North Korean military thought, from Lenin’s reformulation of Clausewitz’ classic definition of war to basic squad tactics. Reportedly, Kim Jong Il also is putting his name to several documents which credit him with military doctrine formulation.
North Korean military thinking began as a mixture of Soviet strategic and Chinese tactical influences tempered by guerrilla warfare. From 1951 to December 1962, North Korean military orthodoxy was a conventional warfare doctrine based on Soviet military doctrine and operational art modified on the basis of the Korean War experience. Soviet Stalinist factors that determine the course and outcome of war were incorporated directly into North Korean military doctrine.
In 1962, North Korea’s confidence in the Soviet Union was severely degraded after it witnessed the Soviet acquiescence to the United States during the Cuban Missile Crisis. The Soviet Union voted in December 1962 to suspend military and economic assistance to the DPRK because of ideological differences. Kim Il Sung realized that North Korea’s hopes of stalwart Soviet support for any North Korean military endeavors would be minimal unless it served the well-being of the Soviet Union. Of course, Kim should have learned this from Stalin during World War II and the Korean War.
Thus, North Korean military doctrine shifted dramatically away from the doctrine of regular warfare to a doctrine that embraced people’s war. Kim Il Sung espoused the Four Military (guide) Lines: (1) to arm the entire population; (2) to fortify the entire country; (3) to train the entire army as a "cadre army"; and (4) to modernize weaponry, doctrine, and tactics under the principle of Juche in national defense. The adoption of this military line signaled a shift from a Sovietstyle strategy to a Maoist protracted war of attrition. Conventional warfare strategy was incorporated into and subordinated to the overall concept of the people’s war concept with the mobilization of the entire country through reinforcement of ideological training.
In 1965-67, Soviet military assistance was reinstated which allowed for the KPA to resume a delayed modernization program. In 1966, North Korea determined that a peaceful reunification of the Korean peninsula could not be attained without active guerrilla action in South Korea. Kim Il Sung announced the abandonment of the policy of seeking to unify Korea by peaceful means and the adoption of a new, more militant policy toward South Korea.
Combined Operations and “Two-Front War.” Kim’s speech formed the basis of two new doctrines, “combined operations” and “two-front war.” The combined operations doctrine called for the integration of guerrilla warfare operations with conventional KPA ground force operations. The two-front war doctrine called for close coordination of conventional frontline operations with guerrilla and special operations deep within South Korea.
In the early 1970s, the Soviet-trained officers of the KPA were developing the “Two Front War.” As they envisioned it, a very large conventional force — greatly reinforced with artillery, armor, and mechanized forces, employing surprise attack, speed, and a short violent campaign — would break through the DMZ, envelop and destroy South Korean forward forces, and rapidly overrun the entire peninsula. This operation would be facilitated by a second front composed of SOF infiltrated deep into the South Korean strategic rear to destroy, neutralize, or disrupt South Korean and U.S. air operations; command, control, and communications; and lines of communications. Throughout the 1970s, in the first of a two-phased force expansion plan, North Korea emphasized the commitment of scarce resources, development of industry, and military expansion and reorganization necessary to create such a force.
However, as time moved on, North Korea’s ability to
