Could North Korea Collapse? What Regime Implosion Would Mean for the World

Ever since the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe, analysts have been wondering about North Korea: might the DPRK be next? Might the Kim regime fall as suddenly and spectacularly as the Berlin Wall, leading to German-style reunification with the South? The question seemed most urgent in the 1990s, when Kim Il-Sung died and the Hermit Kingdom plunged into a devastating famine. But it resurfaced when Kim Jong-Un took power in 2011, and has since been trotted out like clockwork every time Pyongyang suffers a crisis — to the extent that it has almost become a cliché. But even a stopped clock is right twice a day. Following reports in late June that the country is suffering renewed famine, analysts are again wondering if regime implosion might be on the cards. The question demands not only weighing up the likelihood of an imminent DPRK collapse, but exploring what that would mean at any time — getting into the weeds of what the end of Kim’s dictatorship might really look like. Because no matter when it happens, a North Korean collapse would shake the entire world.

Key Takeaways

• The mid-1990s North Korean famine killed between 500,000 and two million people out of a population of 20 million, and a UN report estimates the DPRK now barely has enough food for three-quarters of its citizens.
• North Korea sealed its borders in January 2020 and by summer 2023 only a single person — a Chinese diplomat — had successfully entered the country, devastating food imports and informal trade.
• Pyongyang’s 2022 missile tests cost an estimated $500 million, enough to purchase sufficient grain on international markets to ease the food crisis.
• The 2020 Reactionary Ideology and Culture Rejection Act made smuggling South Korean media punishable by execution, up from a fine and a year in prison.
• The Arms Control Association estimated in 2022 that North Korea possesses 45 to 55 nuclear warheads, while the Nuclear Threat Initiative reports up to 5,000 metric tons of chemical nerve agents stored across six major sites.
• Military historian Reid Kirby calculated in 2017 that Pyongyang’s entire sarin stockpile dumped on Seoul would kill 2.5 million and injure 7 million more.

Famine Returns to the Hermit Kingdom

It was one of the worst famines of the post-WWII era. In the mid-1990s, North Korea was nearly obliterated by a tidal wave of hunger that swept its provinces. From a total population of 20 million, it is thought starvation carried away between 500,000 and two million lives. Per capita, that is a staggering death toll — far, far higher than even the worst-affected countries in the recent Covid pandemic. Since then, famine has been a specter that haunts Pyongyang’s elites. It also haunts outside coverage of the isolated state. Claims of renewed famine have surfaced dozens of times, such as the rash of reporting in 2013 that claimed citizens were being forced into cannibalism. In most cases, these reports tend to be a mixture of exaggeration and fabrication — a side-effect of information inside the Hermit Kingdom being hard to access, and defectors wanting to paint the situation in as bad a light as possible. So when rumors started swirling in the spring of 2023 that starvation was again stalking the land, most analysts took them with a pinch of salt. Yet as 2023 ground on, hints of supporting evidence began to emerge. South Korean officials stated in March that deaths from starvation were occurring in the North. Data from North Korean-monitoring website Rimjin-gang showed staple foods trading at above-normal prices. But it was a blockbuster report in June that really brought the issue to the world’s attention. Over months of diligent reporting, a team from the BBC had managed to interview three ordinary people living in different parts of the country. The stories they told pointed towards a nation undergoing its worst food crisis since the 1990s. There was the woman living in the elite city of Pyongyang, who described how a family of three had starved to death in her apartment block. The construction worker up near the Chinese border could not even remember the last time he received his state rations. This last part is important, as the North Korean state controls the food supply. When the system is working, all workers in the country receive rations they can supplement with goods purchased in markets. The fact that state rations have disappeared — at least in some places — would indicate the government simply does not have enough to go around. This is backed up by a UN report which recently estimated the DPRK barely has enough food for three-quarters of its citizens.

A Fraying Social Contract and Brewing Discontent

The knock-on effects of the food crisis are already being felt. The BBC’s Pyongyang interviewee described starving people taking their own lives, or leaving the city for the wilderness to die in solitude. Another talked about being forced to eat puljuk for a week — a mixture of grass and plants mixed with vegetables into a thin paste associated with the 1990s famine. Other outlets have told similar stories. Rimjin-gang reports an increase in robberies and violent crime by desperate people. The Korea Herald, meanwhile, has run stories alleging cannibalism. The situation is not necessarily the same today as it was back in June. South Korea’s unification minister reported in July that food prices in the Hermit Kingdom have since stabilized, despite reports of starvation remaining widespread. Still, with an estimated 40 percent of the North Korean population already suffering malnutrition, any form of food insecurity has the potential to be catastrophic. And that, in turn, could be a catastrophe for the man running things. Part of Kim Jong-Un’s unspoken contract is that he will keep the elites and military shielded from deprivation, in return for them letting his regime continue. People might suffer in the countryside and smaller towns, but residents of the cities are meant to be protected from the worst. But if Pyongyang’s middle-class citizens are starving, then this contract could be fraying. If it snaps completely, then the regime could quickly find itself in trouble. As one of the BBC’s interviewees put it: “Before Covid, people viewed Kim Jong Un positively. Now almost everyone is full of discontent.” It is this brewing discontent that could — one day, perhaps soon — bring the North Korean state crashing down.

Self-Inflicted Wounds: Covid Closures and Deliberate Isolation

The Hermit Kingdom’s current dysfunction is not the inevitable result of decades of mismanagement. It is due to concrete, recent choices made on the regime’s part — choices that took a poor-but-surviving state and turned it into one on the brink of starvation. The biggest choice of all was Pyongyang’s reaction to Covid. Back in early 2020, North Korea was one of the first nations to implement controls. That January, Pyongyang sealed its borders. No one was allowed in, including its own overseas workers and vehicles bringing goods. But while most countries would eventually create workarounds for receiving imports and repatriating citizens from abroad, the DPRK was seemingly content to cut itself off from the outside world permanently. From January 2020 until summer 2023, it is thought only a single person successfully entered North Korea: a Chinese diplomat assigned to Pyongyang. The impact on food security has been devastating. With no vehicles allowed in from China, imports completely stopped — not just of vital grain supplies, but of farm equipment and fertilizers. At the same time, leaving has become impossible. While those living near the Chinese border used to surreptitiously cross to bring back food to sell in black markets, the guards they once bribed now shoot them on sight. Informal markets are what have kept most North Koreans fed for decades. Emerging in the 1990s, they were for a long time tolerated by the state as a guardrail against starvation. Now, though, they stand empty — testimony to the brand-new walls and watchtowers Pyongyang has built along the border with China. Walls designed not to keep foreigners out, but to keep their own people trapped inside. The result has been a surge in black market food prices, even as government rations dry up. One interviewee told the BBC that his daily wage of $0.50 was no longer enough to afford a kilo of rice. That figure gets even more grotesque when set against what the Kim regime spends on weapons. In 2022, Pyongyang’s combined missile tests are thought to have cost around $500 million — a figure that could easily purchase enough grain on international markets to ease the food crisis. Although pandemic measures remain in place, grain is once again being imported from China — enough to at least stabilize food prices. But these imports still are not enough to alleviate the suffering of North Korea’s citizens.

Ideological Control and the Regime’s Calculated Cruelty

Rather than an ill-thought-out reaction to the spread of Covid-19, there is evidence the border closures are part of a conscious effort by Kim to increase his control over the country. Writing in NK News, Korea analyst Chad O’Carroll outlined the ways the regime has grown even more autocratic over the last few years. After Kim’s 2019 summit with Donald Trump failed to bring the results he wanted, Pyongyang seems to have pivoted back to an even more extreme version of its previous isolation — including a renewed crackdown on South Korean shows and music. Passed in 2020, the Reactionary Ideology and Culture Rejection Act mandated new penalties for anyone smuggling South Korean media. Before, smugglers caught selling these shows could expect a fine and a year in prison. Since 2020, the punishment has been execution. For decades, Pyongyang has told its citizens that they live in the greatest country in the world. But South Korean shows challenge that, depicting not a collapsing vassal state of America, but a rich, technologically advanced society just over the border. Clearly, the regime believes these images weaken its hold over the population. Slamming the borders completely shut under the guise of the pandemic was a crude way of strengthening that hold. The darkest dimension is the theory that these border closures may not be just about ideological purity, but a means of ensuring no one will ever be strong enough to rise up against Kim’s regime. When discussing a personalized, authoritarian regime like North Korea, the government does not exist to do what is best for the country. It exists to do whatever is best for the regime — even if what is best for the dictator and his associates might be an utter disaster for the nation. While the informal markets kept ordinary North Koreans fed, they also created a middle class of traders and smugglers. For the nation as a whole, this newly prosperous merchant class was a net win. Had it been allowed to flourish, it might have lifted thousands or millions out of dire poverty. But as analyst Lucas Rengifo-Keller told CNN: “The regime does not want a flourishing entrepreneurial class that can threaten its power.” In other words, Kim weighed up his ongoing rule against lifting millions out of poverty, and decided his rule was more important than their suffering. NK News reached a similar conclusion, describing the ability of North Koreans “to compare their lot against neighbors” as “Kim Jong Un’s Achilles heel,” and arguing that the sealed borders are a net win for the regime — even if the price of that win is objectively horrific. As the article put it: “With no major NGO or U.N. aid, living conditions for many will continue to deteriorate. Chronic food and medical supply shortages could become more acute, leading to increased malnutrition and poor health outcomes… But the regime itself will benefit, tightening its grip on power despite the immiseration of its people.” The existence of widespread starvation might even help with this. As more people grow desperate and denounce their neighbors for illegally buying or hoarding food, the whole of society plunges into paranoia. Perversely, that means everyone spends more time worrying about those closest to them, and less about the regime responsible for their misery. As Prof. Andrei Lankov, who has been studying North Korea for 40 years, told the BBC: “If people don’t trust each other, there is no starting point for resistance. What that means is North Korea can stabilise and last for years and decades to come.”

Three Models of Collapse: Coup, Civil War, or Disintegration

Even if things get extremely bad in the DPRK, Kim and his cronies may manage to lumber on for decades to come — sacrificing the lives and wellbeing of 26 million people just to keep one tyrant and a handful of generals in their state of unearned luxury. But suppose the end does come. Suppose this latest famine really is the catalyst for change in North Korea. What does a post-Kim North Korea even look like? Depending on who you ask, the answer could be anything from “chaotic, but hopeful” to “a nightmare for the entire world.” A Brookings Institute transcript of a 2013 guest lecture by Richard C. Bush on the topic remains remarkably relevant. Bush outlined a framework for the ways the Kim regime might conceivably fall, organized into three categories. A Type One collapse is what Bush calls “essentially a coup” — a move by some of Kim’s generals to liquidate the ruling family, but otherwise leave the North Korean system intact. For those in Europe or America, this collapse would probably be a blink-and-miss-it affair, a kind of anticlimax not dissimilar to the 2017 coup against Robert Mugabe, in which Zimbabwe’s military swapped out one dictator for another. Unfortunately, such a disappointing end to Kim may be the best anyone can hope for. A Type Two collapse would be the next-least bad — “least” there very much being a question of degree. In this scenario, one faction might lead a coup and remove or kill Kim, but then fail to get the rest of the military lining up behind them. The result would be two factions with mutually exclusive claims on power — claims they can only solve by launching a bitter civil war. An analogy here might be the situation in Sudan, where a series of military coups briefly led to stability before cracks split into ongoing warfare between the two sides. Finally, a Type Three collapse, or what might be termed the Libya model. In this scenario, North Korea essentially disintegrates. There is a multifaceted civil conflict that rips the nation to shreds and drags on indefinitely. By the end, the DPRK has ceased to exist. There is no option marked “revolution, followed by eventual reunification with South Korea” — in other words, a replay of what happened to East Germany. These cynical scenarios must be taken seriously, not least because they would undoubtedly drag the rest of the world in.

The Nightmare of Unsecured Weapons of Mass Destruction

As the Rand Corporation wrote in a paper around the time of Richard Bush’s lecture, in the event of regime collapse in Pyongyang: “The Republic of Korea and its U.S. ally will almost certainly need to intervene militarily in the North.” The reason comes down to a single word: proliferation. North Korea is swimming with weapons of mass destruction which could — in a Type Two collapse — be used by one or both of warring factions, or — in a Type Three scenario — simply vanish amid the chaos. In 2022, the Arms Control Association estimated that North Korea is home to anywhere between 45 and 55 nuclear warheads. That is a mere fraction of the arsenals that the US, Russia, or China field, nor are Pyongyang’s nukes even remotely comparable in terms of yield or reliability. Nonetheless, the idea of roughly fifty nukes lying unsecured in a collapsing country is the stuff of nightmares. During Russia’s Wagner Rebellion, Reuters reports that a contingent of the mercenaries split off from the force advancing on Moscow and made a dash for the Voronezh-45 nuclear weapons storage site. There is no suggestion they breached the facility, but the fact they immediately went for the nukes in the handful of hours that it looked like Russia might be tipping into civil war does not bode well for any conflict in North Korea. As former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev put it: “In the history of mankind, there has never been a case where an arsenal of nuclear weapons was controlled by bandits. Such a crisis will obviously not be limited to the framework of one country.” Perhaps more worrisome are the DPRK’s chemical and biological weapons. The Nuclear Threat Initiative reports that North Korea is home to six major sites where chemical weapons like mustard gas, sarin, and VX are stored, including up to 5,000 metric tons of nerve agents. According to Vox, North Korea’s chemical arsenal “is believed to be the biggest and most technologically advanced in the world.” Military historian Reid Kirby gamed out in 2017 what would happen if Pyongyang dumped its entire sarin stockpile on Seoul. His answer was 2.5 million dead, with another 7 million injured. In a collapse scenario, the worry is less that Seoul will be targeted and more that warring factions in the North will use the weapons on each other. The bioweapon stocks might be even worse. Kim has spent his decade-plus in power hoarding some of the nastiest viruses and bacteria on Earth. Credible reports suggest the DPRK cultivates everything from plague to smallpox to anthrax and ebola. If released, these could spread like wildfire through the population, potentially spilling over borders and triggering nightmare outbreaks in neighboring countries. The real fear is the threat of a rogue actor smuggling some of this material out of a collapsing North Korea — maybe to sell to others, maybe to use in a terrorist attack. One hundred kilograms of anthrax, for example, would be enough to kill three million people and leave entire cities uninhabitable for generations. A single backpack would be sufficient to carry enough bioweapons to do untold destruction.

The China Factor: Buffer States, Rival Interventions, and the Fight Over North Korea’s Future

The US and South Korea would not be alone in wanting to intervene and secure the Kim regime’s weapons of mass destruction. There would be another player in the mix: China. For a long time, China has been North Korea’s only official ally. From Beijing’s perspective, Pyongyang provides a useful buffer — a way of stopping US allies like South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and the Philippines from completely hemming it in. But that does not mean Xi Jinping is thrilled about having an unstable nuclear power right on his doorstep. Back in 2018, Foreign Affairs claimed that “China is no longer wedded to North Korea’s survival. In the event of a conflict or the regime’s collapse, Chinese forces would intervene to a degree not previously expected — not to protect Beijing’s supposed ally but to secure its own interests.” A North Korean collapse would not see China rushing to save Kim’s flailing regime, but rather moving to stop the anarchy and secure any WMDs as fast as possible. From a non-proliferation perspective, this is relatively good news. North Korea’s most important nuclear facilities are all situated close to the Chinese border. While a joint American-South Korean force would need to rapidly advance across some 400 km of badly paved, mountainous terrain, Chinese forces would only need to cover 96 km to secure the same sites. Chances are, they would get there before any rogue actors. The downside is that this would create an immediate dilemma for US forces trying to secure those same sites. Cooperate and let China guard them, or try to carry out their original mission? The fear would not be so much what Beijing would do with the WMDs — Xi Jinping has plenty of nukes already. Rather, it would be what China’s presence means for a post-collapse North Korea. Washington and Seoul would be pushing to end the crisis by reunifying the peninsula under a democratic South Korean government. China, obviously, would prefer to keep a friendly buffer state on its doorstep. The aftermath of any intervention might wind up being the most fraught period of all — a period potentially as tense as the standoff between the USSR and Western allies known as the Berlin Blockade, only with even bigger stakes. For China, having an American-friendly leader in Pyongyang would be as unthinkable as a CCP-allied government setting up shop in Mexico would be for Washington. For South Korea, the idea of reunification would finally be within reach — a policy successive governments have worked towards for decades. For the US, it would be a chance to not just allow the North Koreans self-determination, but also replace a belligerent threat with a new government on Washington’s side. With so much riding on the outcome, tensions between Washington and Beijing could ratchet up, and there is no guarantee America would get its way. Speaking to Politico in 2023, South Korean pastor Kim Sungeun — who has spent decades helping North Korean refugees — outlined his gut feelings for a collapse scenario: “My assumption if they collapse is the Chinese government is going to take over first. If they collapse right now, the Chinese will try to take over faster than anybody else.” It will only be when the moment comes that the world gets to see if he was right or not. By planning now for what might happen next month, next year, or even decades down the line, policymakers can ensure that — when the time comes for the sun to finally set on Kim’s regime — the world is prepared for any eventuality, and positioned to secure an outcome that serves not only strategic interests, but the people of North Korea as well — a people who have suffered under their brutal leaders for far too long.

Frequently Asked Questions

Would China defend North Korea in a war?

China’s stance on defending North Korea in a war is complex, with the country being a key ally to the North Korean regime, but also having its own interests to consider, as noted by the Brookings Institute, which suggests that China’s support for North Korea is largely driven by a desire to maintain stability in the region and prevent a potential refugee crisis, with Chinese President Xi Jinping having met with North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un on several occasions, including in 2019, to discuss bilateral relations and regional security issues.

What were common factors in the fall of communism in Eastern European countries?

The fall of communism in Eastern European countries in 1989, as reported by Reuters, was characterized by a wave of liberal democratic movements, with key factors including economic stagnation, popular discontent, and the weakening of communist party control, as seen in the collapse of the Berlin Wall in Germany, and the subsequent reunification of the country, with the Rand Corporation noting that the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe was also driven by the rise of civil society and the emergence of opposition movements, such as Solidarity in Poland.

Is North Korea in decline?

North Korea is indeed showing signs of decline, with the Kim dynasty facing significant challenges, including a struggling economy, food shortages, and international isolation, as reported by the BBC, which notes that the country’s economy has been hollowing out, with the Kim regime facing a legitimacy crisis, and the chances of a military coup being slim, but the potential for collapse still present, with the country’s supreme leader, Kim Jong-Un, facing significant pressure to maintain control and stability.

Is North Korea a serious threat?

North Korea is considered a serious threat by many countries, including the United States, due to its nuclear weapons program and ballistic missile tests, which have been condemned by the international community, with US President Donald Trump having met with Kim Jong-Un on several occasions to discuss denuclearization and regional security issues, and the United Nations imposing significant sanctions on the country in response to its nuclear tests, with the country’s military capabilities and aggressive rhetoric posing a significant challenge to regional stability.

How much is $1 worth in North Korea?

The value of $1 in North Korea is difficult to determine due to the country’s isolated and heavily controlled economy, but it is estimated that the North Korean won is heavily devalued, with the black market exchange rate being significantly different from the official rate, and the country’s economic struggles and food shortages exacerbating the issue, with some reports suggesting that $1 could be worth upwards of 10,000 North Korean won on the black market, although this figure is highly variable and subject to change.

Why did North Korea’s economy collapse?

North Korea’s economy collapsed in the 1990s due to a combination of factors, including the loss of Soviet support, a series of natural disasters, and the failure of the country’s centralized planning system, which led to a devastating famine that resulted in the deaths of an estimated 500,000 to 2 million people, as reported by the BBC, with the country’s economy never fully recovering from this period, and the current regime facing significant challenges in maintaining economic stability and providing for the basic needs of its population.

Is North Korea struggling with food?

Yes, North Korea is struggling with food, with the country facing a significant shortage of staple foods, including rice and corn, due to a combination of factors, including COVID-19 border closures, which have disrupted supply chains and led to a decline in agricultural production, as reported by the UN, which estimates that the country barely has enough food to feed three-quarters of its population, with the situation being particularly dire in rural areas, where people are being forced to rely on alternative sources of nutrition, such as puljuk, a mixture of grass and plants.

What happened to North Korea when the Soviet Union collapsed?

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, North Korea lost a key ally and source of economic support, which had a significant impact on the country’s economy and stability, with the loss of Soviet subsidies and trade leading to a decline in the country’s standard of living and a significant increase in poverty and hunger, as reported by the Brookings Institute, which notes that the collapse of the Soviet Union also led to a significant shift in the global balance of power, with China emerging as a key player in the region and the United States increasing its presence in East Asia.

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