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The Wreck of the Tribute Train

Several of you have written in or commented on the reports of a train carrying tribute for Kim Jong Eun derailing between Sinuiju and Pyongyang, North Korea, along with speculation that sabotage caused the derailment. Several newspapers in the U.S. and South Korea pick up the story, but they all attribute it to this one, from Open News:

A source in the defense department in North Pyongan province reported on the 23rd that, “The defense department was notified of an incident in which a freight train which left Sinuiju on the 11th was derailed somewhere between Yoemju and Dongrim.”

Eight of the more than forty carriages of the train which was packed with gifts for the successor Kim Jong-eun’s birthday on January 8th were derailed, said the source. For this reason the authorities have launched a full investigation into whether the cause of the incident could be related to forces opposed to the succession.

The source reported that “North Korean rail tracks and sleepers are so old that it’s possible the sleepers were rotting or that nails securing the tracks were dislodged. But in this case the extent of the damage to the tracks and the incident’s timing suggest that the damage was deliberate. The possibility that it was undertaken by someone opposed to the succession is high.” [….]

“I’m not sure exactly,” said the source when asked what the train’s likely contents were, “but probably a large amount of luxury goods like watches and TVs.”

The Korea Times adds a layer of embellishment with a headline that says the train was “derailed by protesters.” The speculation of Open News’s source also loses all of its qualifiers, like “I’m not sure,” and “probably.” Ditto the Joongang Ilbo.

If this was in fact an act of sabotage, it’s likely that it was an inside job. More consequentially, it would suggest that internal opposition is suddenly capable of bold and effective action. This is the sort of stuff that makes for great rumor-mongering within closed societies. As disinformation, it would be sheer genius. And now, let me suggest any number of reasons why it probably wasn’t sabotage at all.

First, we don’t know if any of this is even true.

Second, we’ve seen little other evidence that an internal opposition is capable of anything more than taking clandestine footage or leafleting. This would represent a great leap in sophistication and brazenness.

Third, even if the tracks were deliberately damaged, the “saboteur” may have been doing nothing more subversive than hunting for scrap metal, or wrecking a train to loot it. It seems very “lucky” that the derailment affected a tribute train as opposed to an ordinary passenger or freight train, until you consider that these special trains typically run faster than regular trains, and are thus more likely to topple off the tracks.

Finally, North Korea’s tracks are in such a decrepit state that the simplest explanation is probably the correct one — that most likely, this was an accidental derailment due to bad track maintenance and excessive speed, an especially telling thing for the main line between Pyongyang and Sinuiju. In a society where the security forces are taught to be paranoid, I can understand why sabotage would be considered and discussed. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the regime dislocate the local population for the barest suspicion of sabotage. I just don’t have enough solid reporting here to conclude what happened here. That’s not an uncommon occurrence with reporting from North Korea, which means that we must then ask ourselves if the report in question is consistent with others or is an outlier. This one is clearly an outlier, and would be so consequential if true that it invokes the rule that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

23 Responses

  1. The point that really jumps out at me is that only eight of the cars were derailed, and that forty cars worth of luxuries in total were being transported. While this is not uncommon, it’s never fun to consider the implications. In the end, who cares of it was a sabotage or not, the prince is still getting his goodies.

    I got around to watching a video yesterday of a LiNK talk at Google with a man (forgot his name now, denghyuk or something) born in a total control camp, only to finally escape at age 23. He said, when are we going to stop with the talks and interviews and start with the solutions? We know these solutions will take time, but such a serious topic as this deserves more class time than the holocaust in my opinion. Why learn from history when it hasn’t helped to prevent this sort of thing from recurring? A tired statement I know, but I’m at work, frustrated as usual, and like to express my common thoughts.

  6. I’m sure Joshua will have something good to post about that tomorrow. I think what LMB means is that ‘dialogue’ or rather the status-quo of keeping the North alive is required in order to keep things semi-peaceful.

    I mean, isn’t most of what is said in this article true? : http://www.dailynk.com/english/read.php?cataId=nk01500&num=7190
    Basically they do control the playing field; they always have the ball. They’re the ones willing to shoot the refs in the head so they’ll obviously do as they please.

  7. KCJ-

    Thank you for that link! Love the last paragraph:

    On their way home from required attendance at indoctrination and cheerleading sessions that the regime has been hosting to build war spirit, “today’s students snort at such gatherings, unlike in our generation,” the publication quoted one of its sources as saying. The source added, “Can this kind of national appeal work on people who have been watching South [Korean] movies and learning how to make money and survive from their parents since they were kids?”

  8. Theresa,
    I actually met three North Korean defectors last month and one of the questions I asked them was about the wall-mounted speakers blaring Juche propaganda into everyone’s apartments each day, all day. I said, “does that still go on?” They looked at each other, exchanged short quips in Korean, and answered through our interpreter, “not as much anymore.” Confused by their answer, I asked why had things changed. They answered, “no electricity!” We all burst out laughing. Ya had to be there! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, Theresa.
    kcj

  9. A train carrying tribute to Kim Eun would never derail unless instructed to by China at this point. If the said young prince was expecting gifts, then he would have used the secure railway.

    If the secure railway was sabotaged on purpose by North Korean citizens and party members fed up …

    Then China better be ready for an Asian Romania. The thing Beijing fears most will come true soon if it keeps propping up Pyongyang. And at that time the whole world will be watching Chiina for how it acts as a new Global power.

  10. KCJ, is there anything else you were able to gain from them in the conversation that you could share with us?

  11. I cannot compromise them (they were gracous to meet with me at all), but I may add this:

    They have no heat in their apartments;
    The degree of hunger is difficult to exaggerate;
    They MUST attend indoctrination sessions weekly or face discipline;
    KJI is not popular outside Pyongyang;
    They purposely got arrested in a 3rd country in order to get to the ROK;
    Juche is taught all to NK children from infancy;
    Citizens live in abject terror of the gulags.

    The most striking thing I took away was that they believed that if Pyongyang collapses, NKs would destroy the images/idols of KIS the same way that Iraqis did to the images of Saddam Hussein. That was a shocker for me. The tide is turning very quickly up north against Juche and the Kims.

    These defectors were extremely nervous about meeting an American. They thought I would hate them and seemed disarmed by my cordiality and keen interest in them as people. At the end of the meeting, we were all laughing and speaking very naturally.

    Happy New Year, OFK!

  12. @KCJ , sorry but could you explain why they “got arrested in a 3rd country in order to get to the ROK” , if they were arrested in China would they not have been sent back ??

  13. Apparently this third country (not China) has some kind of deal with the ROK Embassy. That’s all I could conclude since they say they all got arrested there on purpose. The underground railroad begins along the Sino-Korean border and takes various circuitous routes out of China through Asia and finally to Hanawon in Seoul. The journey is arduous, dangerous and requires trusting your life to ‘brokers’ who pass you from way station to way station. The three I met with had not separated since meeting each other in the jail. One was in China for five years. They all worried deeply about their mothers – I didn’t ask, but I assume the regime has since sent their moms to the gulags.

  14. KCJ-

    Bradley Martin writes in his book ‘Under the Loving Care…’ that they no longer send three generations to the camps and that this ended sometime after the famine. I forget which chapter, but maybe someone can confirm. Of course this doesn’t mean it’s true, but I believe he got the information from a defector.

  15. Jason, thanks for the correction. I have that book, I don’t know how I didn’t connect the author of the book to the column.

  16. http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/northkorea/2010/12/30/54/0401000000AEN20101230005800315F.HTML

    Can someone help me understand why the south feels it must keep up the appearance that outwardly, they would never dare admit their goal is the destruction of the kim regime? Every time the north comes out accusing the south of advocating for an end to the dprk, they’re all like, no! No! Dear leader we wouldn’t in a million years wish death upon your evil regime! Why not just admit that their goal is to end them? Do they actually believe dialogue is the right course and that they’ll somehow be in danger if they admit this publicly? Is it the “brotherly” connection and hope for some internal collapse that keeps their honesty at bay? I just don’t see where they’re going with this, just as they’ve always done without any positive results.

  17. Jason, the Juche religion required of every citizen of the DPRK explicitly states that ‘sacred purpose’ of the Juche ideology is the reunification of Korea under the ‘eternal leadership’ of Kim Il-sung. In Asia, cultural annexations typically occur before political and military action. The ROK lives with an ideological and military gun pointed at their head at all times. Truth be told, it is the ROK missionaries who are the real threat to Juche and the DPRK knows this. What the ROK government won’t do (cultural annexation) the ROK missionaries are doing (planting underground churches in China and NK) and it is having a barely detectable but significant effect.

  18. Jason, based in part on the lack of practical support received from the Lee administration by South Korean NGO organizations like mine, it is apparent that the Lee government really is not particularly interested in the North Korean regime’s fall, at all.

    As one of the NGO bosses I know put it to me last week at some point, the right and left in South Korea have the same policy of controlling the North Korea problem; the only difference is that conservatives balk at the idea of giving something away for nothing. If this policy of harshness results in the fall of the regime, that may or may not be embraced, but be sure it won’t have been the primary motivation.

  19. I’m just a casual observer, but as far as I can tell I think it’s at least thinkable that China dunnit. They likely do have the means, and if it’s true that they’re not keen on Jong Eun then they have the motive. Didn’t Carter say that Hu Jintao told him Jong Eun wouldn’t succeed KJI? I don’t think that Hu would just talk loosely in front of Carter. Yes, the Chinese Party doesn’t behave in a very responsible or ROK/US-friendly manner in its dealings with the DPRK, but that doesn’t mean it’s simply on the DPRK’s side. It surely intends to be on its own side when it comes to the DPRK, and wasn’t there considerable (and pretty reasonable) speculation that it was hoping that the KJI succession would be the big chance to consolidate its influence over the DPRK’s government? Wrecking Jong Eun’s toy-train would be a very clear message to send.

  20. At this point, China knows that the U.S. knows China’s intentions. And Vice Versa, China only knows the half-truth behind the New Roman Republic dumping it’s own debt to their supplier. And to think that many out there in posterity actually believe that the United States is an Empire, lol. Not even the Roman Empire at it’s height could Imagine an offspring of itself to acquire while still a young Republic, Imperial status. Beijing knows that Washington D.C. is the only Capitol on Earth that actually has the power to killeveryhuman`. Beijing also knows that even Moscow and Washington D.C. will join together if WarGames ever…

  22. If the Northern Korean King thinks that a sacred War on Earth will be started by Korea, then the DPRK elite are truelly fools for thinking that the world would perish for a peninsula who combined, is only the size of Indiana and Ohio. Unless Kim Jung Eun within the next seven months distances himself from his father’s policies pubicly, then China/U.S./Russia/ROK and Japan will send joint Operatives into Pyongyang secretly to force the Nuclear disarmenment of North Korea stealthy. Orascam and all other NK foreign contracts dealing with Pyongyang under Intl’ rules of law shall be spared aquisition by the six parties. All others will not be guaranteed protection if they are illicit.

    Of course, by that time 7 months from now, the young one will have had plenty of time to decide in his luxury whether he wants to go like his dad. He knows that Korean Romania is calling for Yuri’s head.