Stunning North Korean propaganda film shows Trump's critics are wrong

The Fanatic Trump-haters in the media are once again proven wrong, as the North Korean media are stoking public expectations of a deal that will improve their lives. Far from a photo-op that strengthens Kim and denigrates Trump and the USA, the regime's propaganda is stoking North Korean public expectations of a successful denuclearization deal. It also features President Trump as a wise and courageous leader. A remarkable 16-minute North Korean propaganda video has been subtitled and posted to YouTube, and the tone, narration, music, and cinematography all point to efforts to sell the public on a new era that is forthcoming.

It goes without saying that not a word of propaganda would be issued without careful consideration of its political ramifications, so we can take the narrator's words as reflecting exactly what Kim Jong-un and the Politburo of the party want the people of North Korea to hear...and believe. The entire film is embedded below, but here are a few screen grabs showing the narration in subtitles at key points. As the film ends, the narrator expresses surprise at the trust that "we did not expect" while Kim enters his limo (that appears to be a Lincoln, not the Mercedes he formerly used) and drives away.

This film will make it harder for the North Koreans to stonewall, now that they have raised expectations, though the regime is certainly capable of reversing course and switching its propaganda line. Nonetheless, it suggests a sincere effort on Kim's part to achieve a deal that would accept security guarantees and a combination of aid and investment and the resulting prosperity, in return for a timetable for a nuclear stand-down. In fact, I suspect that the real audience for the film is the hard-liners on the Politburo, people who have made their careers on the basis of building the nuclear arsenal and confronting the West as implacable enemies. Unlike them, Kim Jong-un was raised in the West and gets it that his country is a freak, poor, isolated, and not respected, while their cousins to the south have become rich and players in many of the important manufacturing industries of the world. Another key factor that rarely is given sufficient weight is the widespread availability of memory sticks containing videos from South Korea and elsewhere. North Koreans understand, as never before, that they are poor while their relatives are rich. Even the most repressive police state in the world has to fear a citizenry that understands that it is an obstacle to their welfare. Photo credits: YouTube screen grabs. Hat tip: Sundance, Conservative Tree House.