Reviews (29)

An Excellent Primer on the Hermit Kingdom

Great Leader/Dear Leader's Paradise
This book reminds me of the 1990's book "The Private Life of Chairman Mao" by Mao's personal doctor that told the truth about the appalling conditions in the PRC under the Great Helmsman and his dissolute life.If possible things are worse under the Dear Leader.You rarely get such a good picture of day to day life in such a closed society.Remember anyone who goes abroad for the DPRK is in the top 1% of the population and vetted for political reliablity to an extreme.So the diplomats and "businessmen" we see abroad are no more representative of North Korea than Paris Hilton is an average twenty-something here.One point that really stuck with me is the random violence among the children of the middle elite.By that I mean the offspring of families with special priviledges but not at the very top.They seem to vent with almost comic book, mindless violence.Much like China's Red Guards, who would engage in orgies of destruction over invisible differences with rival gangs, the Korean golden children seem to revel in the same disfuctional release.We should take no comfort from the view of many in the north that things can't get any worse so why not try to take the south.Negotiating with these people as if they are normal human beings is a delusion shared by the last two US administrations. It's a fools game.

Best book, I have come across about North Korea
An incredibly detailed study of North Korea today as told by a reporter who obviously has studied the subject in detail.
Read more

Subjects:  1. 1912-    2. 1942-    3. Asia - General    4. Asia - Korea    5. Biography    6. Government - International    7. Heads of state    8. History    9. History: World    10. Kim, Chæong-il,    11. Kim, Il-sæong,    12. Korea (North)    13. Political History    14. Politics / Current Events    15. Asian / Middle Eastern history: postwar, from c 1945 -    16. History / Asia    17. North Korea    18. Political leaders & leadership    19. Postwar period, 1945 to c 2000   

Reviews (8)

An Interesting Story, But Lacking Depth
Although Breen, I'm sure, is a fine journalist, this particular work is little more than a compliation of Kim Jong-il news wire snippets and passages from memoirs.Breen offers little in the way of biography other than material provided by DPRK itself. Granted, Kim Jong-il is enigmatic, however Breen's work would have been substantially furhtered had he persued his psycho-political research.The author's brief passages subjecting Kim Jong-il to J.D. Barber'sThe Presidential Character methodology was clever and thought provoking.Had he been able to move his argument further in that direction, perhaps drawing new scholarship into the picture, a clearer picture of Kim Jong-il would appear.Still, Breen's descriptions of his own travels through North Korea were enlightening. As it is indeed, "the hermit kingdom" any description of the North proves intersting.In conclusion, for a good compliaiton of Kim Jong-il info, Breen serves well, but if one is looking for a more indepth biography, it would likely be best to look elsewhere.

Entertaining reading but not particularly insightful
Michael Breen is well qualified to write about the Korean peninsular, having lived in Seoul for many years, and visiting North Korea several times.Although no scholar (he is a former journalist) Breen is also the author of "The Koreans - Who they are, what they want, where their future lies", an excellent commentary on South Korea.
Horrible and ill-informed
I purchased this book with the intent of providing some back ground on Kim Jong-Il as I was reading his official North Korean biography, and foolishly thought this would be one additional perspective.
Read more

Subjects:  1. 1942-    2. Biography    3. Business & Economics    4. Business/Economics    5. Dictators    6. General    7. Government - International    8. History & Theory - Radical Thought    9. Kim, Chong-il,    10. Kim, Chæong-il,    11. Korea (North)    12. Korea - History    13. Political Ideologies - Communism & Socialism    14. Politics / Current Events    15. Asian / Middle Eastern history: postwar, from c 1945 -    16. Business & Economics / General    17. Business & Management    18. North Korea   

Reviews (4)

Excellently Honest
Anyone who doubts that North Korea is an "Axis of Evil" needs to read this book. Kang gives a straightforward first-person account of his life inside an aquarium called North Korea, where there is only fear, propaganda, corruption, prisons, hard labor and starvation. He gives us his memoir of enduring all these hardships and his astonishment at the freedoms of South Korea, which present him with new challenges. If you want to know the truth about North Korea, it doesn't come much closer than this first-hand experience.

A very disturbing look into the world's last Stalinist country
Aquariums of Pyongyang is the story of one man's life through ten years of captivity in a North Korean gulag....an incredible story of struggle against man's inhumanity to man. Many who read this book will probably view his family as highly naive for leaving Japan for North Korea and in believing North Korean propaganda over what they heard firsthand from people who had been there. On the docks before leaving, they were warned about going back and about the conditions to be found in North Korea. But, the elder family members were ardent supporters of Kim Il-Sung, and believed the propaganda put out on a daily basis. Little did they know they were putting their kids into a deathtrap from which they would have to endure many years of beatings and privation at the hands of the guards. The reeducation lessons are particularly noteworthy, as readers can gain valuable insight into how this regime works. Even dead people were not immune from being used to inculcate hate.....the picture of the prisoners being forced to throw rocks at the people hanging on the gallows (because they were enemies of the state no less, even when dead!) until they were unrecognizable is one of the most chilling things I have ever read. All in the name of propping up one of the worst ideologies the world has ever known.
Wow
An exceptional book.A first hand account of life in a NK concentration camp.The account is horrifyingly similar to other diaries of Nazi concentration camps and the Russian Gulag, but fifty years closer to the present. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Asia - General    2. Biography / Autobiography    3. Christianity - General    4. Personal Memoirs    5. Religion    6. Travelers    7. Asian / Middle Eastern history: postwar, from c 1945 -    8. Biography: historical    9. Human rights    10. North Korea   

Reviews (7)

Another Unique Situation
As other reviewers have pointed out this book is a collection of the author's memoirs and should be treated as such. If a more scholarly work is desired then Bradley Martin's Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader : North Korea and the Kim Dynasty would be a superior choice. However, this book offers insights that few were capable of collecting and remains enjoyable for anyone interested in the "unique situation" in the DPRK. Martin was in and out, but Harrold was a resident.
Very Interesting
I think it must be hard to write a book about North Korea that's not depressing, but somehow Micheal Harrold manages to do just that. Not many westerners have had the opportunity to live in North Korea, so his perspective is unique and interesting. He highlighted many of the problems of the country, but managed to give a certain humanity to his study of North Korea that is lacking in other books about the isolated nation.

Fascinating tale of extreme cross-cultural understanding
Harrold's personal story intrigued me on so many levels.I worked as an English teacher on the southern half of the Korean penninsula during almost the same exact period he was in the North (1987-1993 for me).Much of the xenophobic experiences that he attributes to ideology and politics, is rooted a culture that values much that the West does not:tradition, stability, respect for authority, hierarchical relationships, conformity and consensus.Of course, the DPRK's strident self-reliant communism, coupled with its constant search for "positive strokes" from outsiders greatly exacerbated the author's experiences, relative to my own.
Read more

Subjects:  1. Asia - General    2. Asia - Korea    3. Harrold, Michael    4. Korea (North)    5. Korea - History    6. Travel    7. Travel - Foreign    8. North Korea    9. Travel / Asia / General    10. Travel writing   

Reviews (2)

Commentary on Selig Harrison's Korean Endgame
For a long time I have been searching for a book that addresses the potentially explosive issue of Korea, and even more specifically North Korea. Is Kim Jong Il a madman? What is he seeking? For answers to these questions, and even more imporant ones, this is a book worth reading.
Concise and Well-Researched
I went into this book with the normal American preconceptions about North Korean stability and their aggressive track record.The author takes the time to lay out the reasons - and offers concrete steps for all sides that, if carried out, would end the Korean War once and for all.Significant research went into this book.I have yet to find a more well-researched and documented presentation on the historical and present state of Korea, and what it will take to finally declare the end of the war and reduce the $40B spent anually to drag it out. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. International Relations - General    2. Political Science    3. Politics / Current Events    4. Politics/International Relations    5. American History    6. Asian and Asian American Studies    7. Asian studies    8. International relations    9. Korea    10. North Korea    11. Political Science / International Relations    12. Political Science and International Relations    13. USA   

Reviews (8)

How We Know
This is a detailed study of what we know about the different atomic weapons holdings and development efforts and how we obtained that knowledge.Jeffrey Richelson describes all the development efforts from war-time Germany to Iran and North Korea today.He particularly brings across the importance of the different airborne and satellite surveillance programs, showing how the need for airplane over-flights diminished as higher and higher resolution imagery became available from the KH series reconnaissance satellites.
The Definitive History of Nuclear Espionage
Dr. Jeffrey T. Richelson, arguably the most prolific and certainly the most technically correct writer about the U.S. intelligence community, has done it again. "Spying on the Bomb" describes, in Dr. Richelson's usual thorough and well-researched manner, the U.S. intelligence community's efforts to track--and influence--other nations' attempts to develop nuclear weapons.
A fascinating account on what our activities and capabilities have been in discovering the development of nuclear weapons.
Jeffrey T. Richelson chronicles the efforts the United States has made to deal with the threat of atomic and nuclear weapons from they were first conceived in the 1930s and `40s through the gathering of intelligence.You know, spying.The building of our own (the United States') nuclear arsenal is well chronicled in other books.This volume is more about the kinds of methods that were developed in the human intelligence and technical intelligence areas and the debates that have raged over the decades in interpreting the meaning of what was found out.I found the gradual growth of the intelligence bureaucracy and how each component of the CIA versus the State Department versus the Military became predictable in its interpretation of evidence of nuclear activity fascinating and distressing.It is hard to have confidence that our nation is getting a handle on the threats facing us when intelligence interpretation is more about turf wars than truly understanding what is happening in the laboratories and processing plants of our enemies.
Read more

Subjects:  1. Espionage, American    2. General    3. History    4. History - General History    5. History - Military / War    6. International Relations - Arms Control    7. Military    8. Military - General    9. Military - Intelligence/Espionage    10. Military - Nuclear Warfare    11. Nuclear weapons    12. Nuclear weapons information    13. Research    14. United States - 20th Century    15. Espionage & secret services    16. History / General    17. USA   

Subjects:  1. Asia - Korea    2. Government - Comparative    3. History - General History    4. International Relations - General    5. Korea (North)    6. Political Science    7. Politics and government    8. Politics/International Relations    9. Public Policy - Economic Policy    10. Asian studies    11. North Korea   

Reviews (34)

The Classic Military History of the Korean War
T.R. Fehrenbach's "This Kind of War" is the classic military history of the Korean War.Fehrenbach addresses the strategic and operational aspects of the conflict, but much of his focus is on the tactical experience of U.S. units.His book is a searing indictment of the U.S. military and of the United States for having failed to maintain combat-ready forces less than five years removed from the end of the Second World War.
Must-read for citizens
Fehrenbach's bang-up history of the Korean War is a terrific view of the conflict, written by one who was there.It is not, however, a matter of personal reminiscence.
This should be required reading for those powers that be
This is one of the best books about War that I have ever read.The author is steel on target and should be read by anybody that cares for our nation. His outline of how we got into the Korean War and how we almost got handed our jock strap by a 4th rate nation is scary. There are a lot of lessons to be learned here that could apply to what is going on right now. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. General    2. History    3. History - Military / War    4. History: World    5. Military - Korean War    6. Asian / Middle Eastern history: postwar, from c 1945 -    7. History / Military / Korean War    8. Korea    9. Korean War, 1950-1953    10. War & defence operations    11. c 1945 to c 1960   

Reviews (2)

MIKE KRAWCHECK'S REVIEW
THIS BOOK IS INTERESTING, INFORMATIVE, WELL-WRITTEN AND VERY TIMELY.WHETHER WE IN THE UNITED STATES LIKE IT OR NOT, THE THREAT OF POSSIBLE MILITARY INTERVENTION AND SANCTIONS NO LONGER INTIMIDATES ROGUE NATIONS INTO ABIDING BY THE EXACT WISHES OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENTS AND INSTITUTIONS.JIMMY CARTER BELIEVES IN FACE-TO-FACE DIALOGUE AND KEEPING LINES OF COMMUNICATION OPEN WHENEVER HUMANLY POSSIBLE.THERE MAY BE LITTLE OTHER RECOURSE IN THE MODERN ARENA.DURING MY ALMOST FIFTY YEARS IN BUSINESS, I HAVE OFTEN USED A SIMILAR APPROACH TO ACHIEVE WHAT APPEARED T0 BE INSURMOUNTABLE OBJECTIVES, BASICALLY THROUGH DILIGENT PERSONAL NEGOTIATIONS.THAT IS WHAT THIS IMPORTANT BOOK IS ALL ABOUT.

Carter is willing to listenfirst, andthen offer legitimate compromise
A powerful book about a man who truly understands how to deal with our world enemies. He's not afraid to "look meek" if it will accomplish fair and honest opportunities for discussions about our differences and concerns. His knowledge on "atomic" matters is unmatched for a world leader.
Read more

Subjects:  1. 20th century    2. Diplomacy    3. Foreign relations    4. History    5. History: American    6. International Relations - Arms Control    7. International Relations - Diplomacy    8. International Relations - General    9. Korea (North)    10. Nuclear Proliferation    11. Nuclear crisis control    12. Politics - Current Events    13. Politics / Current Events    14. United States    15. United States - 20th Century    16. International relations    17. North Korea    18. USA   

Reviews (4)

Pretty Damn Good!
I started reading this book a few days before the July 4th misstle launches.I was glad to get more information on North Korea which was a total mystery to me.Now I understand much more.The book reviews Korean history and how Confucianism has just as much influence in North Korea as communism does.Absolute devotion to the Great Leader is rewarded and the slightest deviation from that is punished by execution.How North Korea will play the nuclear card out is yet to be seen, but I don't think I want them to have nuclear weapons.They will use it for terrorism.

Concise and to the point
This is a concise and well written modern chronicle of North Korea.There are very few resources available on this "mysterious" country.I found the book to be engrossing, concise and most informative.

Exceptional!
Ideal for people who live outside North Korea and wish to learn about North Korea, people who live in North Korea and are confused or for Geoge W. Bush. ... Read more

Subjects:  1. Asia - Korea    2. History    3. History: World    4. International Relations - General    5. Korea    6. Korea (North)    7. Politics / Current Events    8. Asian / Middle Eastern history    9. History / Asia   

Reviews (9)

critical baseline study for measuring change in north korea
As another reviewer appropriately noted in assessing this book, "Kim Il-song's North Korea" is now 25+ years out of date.Because of this, Helen-Louise Hunter's study--edited down from a longer, classified report that she prepared while working at the Central Intelligence Agency--offers little meat for assessing the personal style and leadership track record of Kim Chong-il, who succeeded his father--Kim Il-song--as the absolutist leader of North Korea in 1994.Still, the book is a must-read for any scholar or journalist seeking to estimate the likelihood of future social collapse and regime change and/or to establish how much policy change Kim Chong-il has initiated.
Misleading and very limited
A book strictly for North Korea specialists. Certainly, as its reviews and the book-cover blurbs indicate a "unique" study. However what none of them say is; (1) this is strictly a basic socio-economic study; and (2) most tellingly, it may well be "from a declassified CIA study", but what they are not saying is that this study was written in 1980-81 and not updated etc for a 1999-2000 book publication release. Thus a study written in 1980 is dealing with 1970s material. Thus we have Kim Il-Sung's North Korea of the 1970s. We are reading about North Korea of 25+ years ago. Misleading and very limited
A book strictly for North Korea specialists. Certainly, as its reviews and the book-cover blurbs indicate a "unique" study. However what none of them say is; (1) this is strictly a basic socio-economic or sociology-type study; and (2) most tellingly, it may well be "a recently declassified CIA study", but what they are not saying is that this study was written in 1980-81 and not updated for a 1999-2000 book publication release. It is a study written in 1980 and is thereby utilising 1970s material. In consequence we have a book about Kim Il-Sung's North Korea of the 1970s. We are reading about conditions in the North Korea of 25+ years ago.Read more

Subjects:  1. 1912-    2. 1912-1994    3. Anthropology - Cultural    4. Asia - Korea    5. Economic Conditions    6. General    7. History    8. History - General History    9. History: World    10. Kim, Il-song,    11. Kim, Il-sæong,    12. Korea (North)    13. Korea - History    14. Social Organization    15. Social conditions    16. Anthropology    17. Asian / Middle Eastern history: postwar, from c 1945 -    18. Biography: historical    19. Biography: political    20. Ethnic studies    21. Kim, Il-song    22. North Korea    23. Political Science / Foreign Legal Systems    24. Social history   

Reviews (5)

Some history and thoughts on how to deal with this crisis.
This is an excellent overall summary of the crisis with North Korea over nukes.Chang packs a lot into this book.He gives a history of the Kimist regime in North Korea.The Kims are more totalitarian, than communist.He then relates the series of events which the father and son regime have taken in regard to the armed forces and specifically nukes.This regime has been using maximum deception on the west.It makes agreements, then breaks them.Kim doesn't even care about his people.He will let them starve if that means he can get nuclear weapons.His sole goal is to stay in power and if that means nuclear war, he is willing to risk it.
No Real Answers
North Korea is the only nation so far to withdraw from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.It possesses an estimated 7-10 nuclear weapons (believed to mostly have been created post-Bush II) and the missiles to deliver them.North Korea has also said it might sell nuclear weapons to others, and is helping Pakistan with its missiles.America has been reduced to relying on China, the DPRK's best friend.War could result in a million casualties in the first day.Kim is winning the contest so far - if he prevails, a quick erosion of American power will probably result.
Far beyond ongoing nuclear crisis
Gordon G. Chang's "Nuclear Showdown", like his previous book ("The Coming Collapse of China"), allows you many different ways of reading it. Some might read it as an intriguing prescription to resolve the ongoing nuclear standoff among the member nations in the six-way framework, just to say that will, or won't, work when they are through with the 225-page book.
Read more

Subjects:  1. 21st century    2. Arms Control And Disarmament    3. History - Military / War    4. International Relations (Specific Aspects)    5. International Relations - Arms Control    6. International Relations - Diplomacy    7. Korea (North)    8. Military - Nuclear Warfare    9. Nuclear nonproliferation    10. Nuclear weapons    11. Political Science    12. Politics/International Relations    13. World politics    14. Current Events / Political   

Reviews (4)

Balanced reporting on North Korean peace efforts
Target North Korea gets the history right.That's unusual in a contemporary journalism marketed to a generation raised on Fox News fantasies of evil foreign men and evil foreign nations.The hard truth is that the Korean War was an attempt by the popular forces that defeated Japan to unite the country and expel the U.S installed regime.Kim Il Sung was the paramount leader of the Korean national movement and he won that prominence the hard way - in deadly combat with the better equipped Japanese army.The British regarded the U.S. installed leader of the south, Syngman Rhee, as "a dangerous fascist or a lunatic." See p.24Rhee came to power in rigged elections that prevented Kim from being a candidate. And Rhee solidified his regime by murdering about 100,000 people he thought might be political opponents.Conditions were so bad in the south that 49% of the population felt that the savage Japanese occupation of Korea was actually better than the American occupation. (p.18)The brutality of the allies in the Korean War is fully documented in Mr. McCormacks balanced history of the north - south divide.U.S. threats to nuke the North have been unrelenting and continue to this day.Living in a constant state of danger and isolation has warped the economy and the society of the north.McCormak hopes that the DPRK can somehow break out of its U.S. imposed isolation and open to the wider world, as China has. Against significant odds, the North seems to be slowly bettering relations with the ROK and complicating U.S. plans to first-strike their defenses.Target North Korea also details the hostility of Japan to the North.Japan hypes the danger of the DPRK much as Bush and Blair hyped the danger of Iraq-to justify the need for a rapid arms expansion and to win military authority over North Asia.This is a much needed book that has become available at a fateful moment in DPRK - USA relations.

At last, some clarity on the North Korea issue
This is a fantastic book. I know a fair bit about Korea, but it wasn't until reading this book that I came to some understanding of North Korea's behaviour, particularly over the past 5-10 years. It seems that when it comes to North Korea, the media simply trumpet what governments say, and push the line that North Korea is irrational and cannot be understood. McCormack shows otherwise. The book is also concise and easy to read.

A Well Balanced Book on an Emotional Subject
Writing even a political science book about North Korea without emotion or strong bias is a remarkably difficult task.On the surface the Pyongyang represents what most non-Koreans would instinctively loath.At the same time, there are those foreign writers who have been too uncritical and too willing to give the benefit of the doubt in trying to understand the North's (and South's) logic.
Read more

Subjects:  1. Asia - Korea    2. Foreign relations    3. General    4. History    5. History: World    6. Korea (North)    7. Korea - History    8. Modern - 21st Century    9. Nuclear weapons    10. Political Freedom & Security - International Secur    11. Politics / Current Events    12. Politics and government    13. U.S. - Commonwealth Of Independent States Relations    14. United States   

Reviews (17)

Interesting but disorganized work
Jasper Becker's "Rogue Regime" was the first book I read about North Korea.It's certainly interesting, filling us in on lots of fun tidbits about Kim Jong Il: that he sleeps with young girls and then dumps them, builds himself palaces, and refuses to cut rations to anyone working on his nuclear weapons.But the book is extremely irritating in that it clearly has not been properly edited: as someone else pointed out, there are plenty of factual mistakes, stylistic mistakes, and at least one grammar or punctuation mistake for every five pages.The chapters are also annoyingly disorganized -- Becker jumps from a pointless hypothetical war between the United States and North Korea to a chapter about the history of the Kims, to a chapter about the North Korean nukes, and so on.I'm especially surprised at the inefficiency of such a publisher as Oxford -- laughingly, their best defense is to say that simply forgot to have it edited.
Dismal View of a Dismal Empire
Jasper Becker is a bit of a pessimist.But when it comes to North Korea, It's pretty hard not to be a pessimist.When it comes to North Korea, I guess what you need to do is try to get as much information as possible from those who have been there, and then put that together with the history we are all more or less aware of.
A Horrible and Unpredictable Leader!
"Rogue Regime" goes inside one of the most secretive countries in the world, exposing the chaos, blind faith, corruption, and cruelty of its rulers.Most of the material is derived from escapees, plus some first-hand information gathered from refugees at the Chinese side of the border with North Korea.
Read more

Subjects:  1. 1942-    2. Asia - Korea    3. Government - International    4. History    5. International Relations - General