North Korea without the Kims

samcster94

Banned
To be fair North Korea is extremely ethno-nationalist but it doesn't seem to be expansionary. While domestic policy and the official ideology/propaganda in North Korea is more similar to fascism than the eastern bloc, the North's propaganda has never advocated empire-building or the conquest/settlement of non-Korean territory the way Germany and Japan did.

Would a North Korean regime that had conquered the peninsula (let's say more direct Soviet involvement means the Busan pocket is closed and the war is basically over in a year) feel it had enough security/space to reform?

In theory, the North would see its conquests as complete once the Koreas reunify. The Korean peninsula is kind of like Asia's Belgium, expansionism isn't really an option with so many great power neighbors.
A non Kim regime reforming to be like Vietnam wouldn't be too hard. NK never wanted to conquer anybody but SK, but they do see other countries as racially subhuman and don't recognize Israel.
 
A non Kim regime reforming to be like Vietnam wouldn't be too hard. NK never wanted to conquer anybody but SK, but they do see other countries as racially subhuman and don't recognize Israel.
What would the territorial aspirations of an expansionist "greater Korea" be? All I can think of is some Korean-speaking border villages in Manchuria and disputed islands in the Sea of Japan and East China Sea.

The non-recognition of Israel is probably just a legacy of the cold war. I don't think there's a potential for virulent antisemitism in a region without a historically sizable Jewish population or most of the population being part of an Abrahamic religion.

Pyongyang has a close trade relationship of arms sales and technology transfer with other historically pro-Soviet and/or pariah states, so there's some economic incentive to jump on the anti-Israel bandwagon. The Israeli government has war-gamed some tom clancy-esque scenarios where North Korea goes broke and starts selling WMDs to countries or terrorist groups to gain foreign currency.

North Korea Reportedly Sending Missile, Chemical Weapons Parts To Syria (NPR)
The Times reports, "North Korean missile technicians have also been spotted working at known chemical weapons and missile facilities inside Syria, according to the report, which was written by a panel of experts who looked at North Korea's compliance with United Nations sanctions.
 
You can easily get rid of the Kims by having a successful August Faction Incident in 1956 removes Kim from power.

But for one side affect of Kim getting killed in WW2 and no Korean War is the KMT and Taiwan are throw under the bus by the US and conquer by the PRC.
 
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