NK: POWER IN THE DARKNESS

ANALYSIS - THE POWER BEHIND THE THRONE IN NORTH KOREA

Jack Kim

Reuters, December 20, 2011

SEOUL (Reuters) - Real power in North Korea now probably belongs to a coterie of advisers following the death of Kim Jong-il, not his youngest son, an untested man in his 20s who has been anointed the "Great Successor."

These advisers will decide whether North Korea launches military action against South Korea to strengthen the succession around Kim Jong-un -- or seeks a peaceful transition.

Confucian respect for age and the influence of the military means the younger Kim lacks the untrammelled authority of his father or grandfather, North Korean founder Kim Il-Sung.

The most powerful adviser is Jang Song-thaek, 65, brother-in-law of Kim Jong-il.

Jang is a survivor of the bloody tradition of purge and political rehabilitation that kept the two elder Kims in power for more than six decades.

"Jang has played a considerable role during Kim Jong-il's illness of managing the succession problem and even the North's relations with the United States and China," said Yang Moo-jin of the University of North Korean Studies.

"Jang is in overall charge of the job of making it formal for Kim Jong-un to be the legal and systematic leader by pulling together the party and the military."

Jong-un is Kim Jong-il's third known son and was given official titles only last year. He was hailed by state media this week as the "Great Successor" to his father, who died on Saturday of a heart attack.

Jang had the full backing of his brother-in-law, who named him to the National Defence Commission in 2009, the supreme leadership council Kim Jong-il led as head of the military state.

That appointment was part of a flurry of moves Kim Jong-il made following a stroke in 2008 which probably brought home the reality that, unlike his father at his death in 1994, he was unprepared for a trusted son to take over.

The commission has been the pinnacle of power in North Korea and which Kim had used to preach his own version of political teaching called Songun, or "military first."

The naming of Jang as a vice chairman of the commission effectively catapulted him to the second most powerful position in the country.

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