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My former teacher, the late Bela Balassa, once observed that the maintenance of a radically distorted price structure, as existed in his native Hungary during the communist period, by necessity required a repressive apparatus, since it was human nature to trade to try and better one’s circumstances. I am reminded of this fundamental insight when reading recurrent accounts of special North Korean police details that are being variously described as “stormtroopers” and “Gestapo-like units.”
The most recent round of stories began last month with a story in the Daily NK “Special Forces Deployed Along Border.” Journalists Lee Seok Young and Kang Mi Jin reported that Kim Jong-un ordered the creation of “Stormtrooper units” to fight migration and illicit cross-border trade. Lee and Kang observed that this is not the first time such activities have been reported: crackdowns by Pyongyang-based units, including investigations of local NSA agents and border guards, had been going for some time. The new initiative was supposed to intensify these activities, specifically empowering the stormtroopers to execute individuals, including members of the security services, as necessary. Subsequent Daily NK reporting indicates that the crackdown ended earlier this month and the stormtroopers have been withdrawn.
In a deep sense, this episode is nothing new. In Witness to Transformation, Steph Haggard and I mention in passing the existence of “anti-socialist inspection units.” One close observer with extensive experience in the border region reported several years ago that these groups, which he likened to the Gestapo, had been authorized to mete out capital punishment to anyone—including members of the military, regardless of rank. The point is not to downplay the recent episode or its significance. Rather, the point is that the recurrent resort to such extraordinary repressive measures is reflective of fundamental and enduring contradictions embodied in the North Korean system. As long as the North Koreans attempt to operate an economic and political system that is radically different than those of its neighbors, people will attempt to arbitrage those differences through exchange of goods, information, and ultimately the movement of people themselves . To try and block such activities is to oppose human nature itself. The need for stormtroopers will be never-ending. Bela Balassa would have recognized this instantly.
