The Korean War was our penultimate Asian war (so far) and can be positioned somewhere between the popular and accepted Pacific War and the unpopular and contested involvement in Vietnam. That it is positioned closer to the popular end of the spectrum is important because whilst the Vietnam War only lives on in arguments about the past, there is a danger, or so we are told, of a second Korean War with unpredictable consequences even for countries, such as New Zealand, far removed. Personally I think the dangers of an outbreak, as conventionally, portrayed, do not bear much examination but they cannot be discounted. Prophecies can be self-fulfilling and there is no shortage of military establishments in the post Cold War world who focus on, and probably magnify, hot spots to justify their existence. I have heard it said that the one area, apart from presumably the Gulf, that the NZ military foresees a real possibility of war involving New Zealand is the Korean peninsula. This is the rationale, one presumes, for our contribution to the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO).

However, fear of war, warranted or otherwise, is not the only reason. Humanitarian considerations are a major issue. Although detailed information about the famine of recent years is either not available or is of uncertain credibility there is not doubt that the food situation has been, and continues to be, critical. The Western media has carried stories of cannibalism and mass starvation. For instance, in January the Agence France Presse carried a story:

BEIJING, Jan 20 (AFP) - A total of 2.8 million Koreans have died of 'natural calamities', as famine worsens in North Korea, China's official news agency quoted a senior Pyongyang official as saying Tuesday.

The amount of food available per person in drought-stricken North Korea has dropped to just 180 grams (6.3 ounces) a day, the official from the agricultural commission was quoted by Xinhua as saying in Pyongyang.

Even discounting the more lurid cannibalism stories there is no doubt that North Korea has been afflicted by a dreadful calamity and there are plenty of harrowing photographs taken in North Korea of children suffering from malnutrition. I maintain a webpage on the famine appeal which has information from a variety of sources, including up-to-date reports from aid workers.

Participating, in a very modest way, in the attempt to raise funds, it seemed to me important to try and find out more about the situation on the ground.

The third reason is the academic one. In general we are driven by the need to know and understand things. The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is one of the great unknowns. Relatively few people visit. Material published there tends be bizarre and uninformative (the one exception to this is The People's Korea, published in Japan which is a useful, and usually readable, source of information. It also has its own website at http://www.korea-np.co.jp/pk/). To be fair, material published about the DPRK abroad is usually tendentious and intemperate. And that is not merely the tabloid press; it is a feature of many academic or quasi-academic books and papers especially, but not exclusively, American. The DPRK, it would seem, is another world which we cannot understand and one with which there can be little communication. That, to me, is a challenge that should be faced.

These three reasons also interlock. Solutions to the security and the food shortage problems must ultimately be sought, in some way, in greater knowledge and understanding of the situation in the DPRK and its relationship with the outside world, and in seeking to improve communications. For instance, if the exact course of the food shortage is a matter of uncertainty, there is of course no consensus on the reasons for it and the long-term solutions. The DPRK government tends to put all the blame on a series of natural disasters; flooding, salination and drought. Others blame collectivisation of agriculture, and call for a 'Chinese solution'. The collapse of the Soviet Union and the evaporation of the socialist trading system which led, most critically, to a drastic decline in oil, which provided not merely fuel for energy but feedstock for artificial fertilisers is clearly a major factor. Humanitarian food aid, in itself, provides no long-term solution to the problem. We must seek to analyse and understand the underlying problems. Understanding the root cause does not necessarily make solutions attainable, but it is the starting point.

The final reason sits on top of the others. It seemed to me before I went to the DPRK, and I am even more convinced now, that it is vitally important to build bridges between the DPRK and the outside world. Developing academic linkages can play a useful, if modest role in that process. They may, in turn, help to facilitate relations at government and business level. They may also help promote people-to-people communications of various sorts. Coming back from the DPRK with first-hand knowledge and experience, and sharing it, is part of the process of demystifying, perhaps de-demonising, north Korea.

In short, there seemed to me to be all sorts of good reasons for visiting the DPRK if the opportunity arose.

In 1996 I had been approached by the Rev. Don Borrie, President of the NZ-DPRK Society, to arrange for a small delegation from North Korea to visit Victoria University of Wellington and meet interested people. There were three people in the Korea group and, as it turned out, three academics who were interested in meeting them; myself, Dr Stephen Epstein and Dr Sallie Yea. Stephen Epstein is Vice-President of the Korean Studies Association of Australasia and Sallie's PhD was on south Korea. Fired by enthusiasm, Stephen said that he would like an invitation to visit, and Sallie and I agreed. The Koreans said they would pass that on, and they did; we received a letter of invitation. Then, before any firm arrangements could be made we received another one saying that because of 'the difficult situation' it would not be possible to receive us at that time.

Then, in October 1997, the Centre for Strategic Studies (CSS) at Victoria received a delegation from the Institute of Peace and Development (IPD) in Pyongyang. The institute is the DPRK's representative at the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific (CSCAP), a grouping of strategic studies centres started in 1992. The CSS subsequently took the Korean delegation to visit other NZ organisations, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Waikato University.

It seems as if the success of the IPD visit to New Zealand created the right climate, for two months later, ten days before Christmas 1997, I received a fax from the DPRK embassy in Jakarta saying that the Korea Society for Cultural Relations with Foreign Countries would like 'to initiate an exchange of delegations'. Here was our opportunity again.

The renewed invitation to CAPLAB was soon followed by one to CSS itself from the Institute of Peace and Disarmament. Terence O'Brien, Director of the CSS, is leading a delegation in June 1998. The other members are Dr Gerald Chan, Politics, and Mr Mark Pearson of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

This time our arrangements went ahead and there were frequent exchanges of fax with the DPRK embassy in Jakarta as we submitted our list of organisations, people and places we wanted to visit. The official I communicated with in Jakarta gave me great hope that this time we would be successful. Not merely was his English excellent but he came up with a number of useful suggestions on practical matters. Because access to Pyongyang is via Beijing it was arranged that we would collect our DPRK visas there on our way through, but to save time we faxed copies of our visa applications to Jakarta.

At the same time as these preparations Trevor Harvey, who had just completed a Masters in International Relations at Victoria was making his own approaches to the DPRK. Trevor had focused on Northeast Asia and the DPRK and wanted to go and look for himself. He also wanted to write some newspaper articles. Jakarta suggested that it would be administratively easier if he joined our group, and we readily agreed. His visa application was faxed off and we set to making final preparations.

The visit had been timed for the April teaching break. We were scheduled to leave as soon as possible after teaching finished prior to Easter and to come back on the final Sunday. During March we made contact with senior people in relevant NZ organisations, ranging from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and trade and Trade NZ, through the NZ-Korea Business Council and producer boards to the Council of Trade Unions and World Christian Service. Reactions varied. Some were bemused as to why anyone would want to go, but most were supportive, interested, and in some cases, jealous. Graham Kelly, MP for Mana, who had visited some ten years ago gave both useful advice and entertaining stories.

I also wrote to former US President Jimmy Carter, whose 1993 visit to DPRK had been instrumental in making some sort of breakthrough in communications between Pyongyang and Washington. The response from the Carter Center was positive and encouraging, if predictably unspecific. However, the Carter Center has not been limited to matters of high politics. A recent news report from the People's Korea credited it with helping develop a new system of double-cropping which, if successful, might have a big impact on the food situation. Apparently the Carter Center arranged for the exchange of agricultural experts and 'encouraged north Koreans to experiment with two-crop system, multiple cropping of corn, and effective use of chemical fertilizers for increased grain output'.1 If the Americans can provide agricultural expertise, why not New Zealand?

In the meantime Trevor Harvey had been active in garnering interest from the media and, as a result was able to secure a Asia 2000 Foundation media award. Sallie Yea, Stephen Epstein and I also submitted a proposal to the Foundation for partial funding to support our visit but were unsuccessful.

Then, in the week before departure, we had even worse news. The Korean Society for Cultural relations with Foreign Countries withdrew its invitation to Stephen Epstein because, although he was in the process of applying for NZ citizenship, he was still travelling on a US passport. Despite please for reconsideration and strong protests from NZ-DPRK Society, the Korea side was adamant. Why this was remains a mystery. Americans, per se, are not barred, as the experience of the Carter Center indicates.

Sallie Yea, who is working with Stephen on developing a new course on Korea, decided to postpone and we are hoping that they will both go with Rev Don Borrie next year. It was too late for me to think of postponing because Trevor Harvey, who was travelling earlier via south Korea, was on the verge of departure.

So it came about that, our numbers cut from four to two, we flew into Pyongyang on Air Koryo JS 152 on Saturday 11 April.

I tried, not always successfully, to keep a diary. Good intentions can fade away at the end of a busy day, and all of our days were busy. Although we usually had the luxury of a leisurely lunch break back at our hotel, from 12 to 2, we were generally kept on the run for the rest of the day. And when there is free time, and energy, there is always the conflict between doing and writing; why sit in a hotel room in Pyongyang pecking at a computer when you can be out on the streets observing? Although foreigners in north Korea are constrained in their movements, and presumably closely observed, we had no ostensible restrictions on walking around Pyongyang and other places we stayed.

Walking in Pyongyang is a subject in itself. Firstly there is a lot of it. Because of the shortage of fuel, and energy, the public transports system is quite inadequate. There is a underground railway system, which we went on a couple of times. Not as swish as Singapore or Hong Kong, and the stations are gaudy for my taste, but I don't suppose anyone gets mugged on it. There is a network of trolley buses and trams, the latter at least dating from the early 1990s, but the long, patient queues demonstrate that there are not enough of them. Once, when our interpreter and I had to go to another hotel a couple of kilometres away, and our car was not available, I suggested jumping on a tram. "It's not far enough," she said, and she was right. We walked instead. There is a curious lack of bicycles, though people we met said that there were more around than just six months ago. No motor bikes to speak of and very few cars, private, official, taxis or foreign. The result is that there are lots of people walking, some of them clearly for long distances.

The pavements were in good repair, quite different, for instance, from Bangkok or Manila. In the centre of the city, at least, there were underpasses at intersections, just like in Seoul. If a pedestrian was so foolish, or irresponsible, to attempt cross the virtually empty street rather than go down the underpass, the traffic office in the centre of the intersection would blow sharply on her whistle and the perpetrator would retreat to the curb and into the underpass. At least, I did, although I did see some of the locals ignore the call.

Which brings me back to the diary and the conflicting demands of recording and observing and from there to the value of personal experience. Just to be out on the street looking at things, even little things, perhaps especially little things, fills in those areas where reading reports either does not touch, or is not credible. On the other hand, it is important to remember that one is observing a small part of the whole, framed by the contingencies of place, time and the workings of one's Korean hosts. Like the frog in the Chinese story, at the bottom of the deep well, the piece of sky that one sees is just a tiny bit, not necessarily typical. Extrapolation is dangerous and generalisation is hazardous. To take one trivial, but valid example. We were there in spring, during a public holiday (there aren't many of them) and one might expect a certain lightness of spirit. Being there in the depths of winter, dark cold days and the streets with icy, discoloured slush would give a different impression of things. However, whatever the dangers, personal observation can offer insights that second-hand reports cannot match. The attitude of people to police, the interaction between officials of different status, between men and women, military and civilian, and old and young can all be observed and some tentative conclusions drawn. The sight of women washing clothes in a city stream next to tower block of apartments tends to confirm the rumour that in some places (in many places?) water has been cut off of lack of power or some other failure of the infrastructure.

Asking questions of guides and interpreters often does not produce meaningful or credible clarification. They may not fully understand the question, may not know the answer (why are people washing in the stream? how many apartment blocks are without water?) or may be embarrassed; a guide's job is to extol the country, and the country is going through a difficult time. That may be freely admitted, but it does not make it any easier to discuss details.

All this is a preamble to touching down at Pyongyang airport. What is written here is a fraction of what was observed; and what was observed is a fraction of reality; and observation and interpretation of that observation is an uncertain business.

For what it is worth, here is my impression of our arrival, welcome, and trip to the hotel:

There are many things that could be teased out of these rough notes. The role and position of the military for instance. It is said by the Americans (and the Republic of Korea and, probably, by the NZ government) that the DPRK government has over a million men under arms, out of a population of some 24 million (CIA Worldfact book figure). In conversations with Mr Chae and Mrs Pak, who were with us throughout, it was said that 60 percent of young people going into some form of military training after graduation from high school, 30 percent go on to higher education and 10 percent are rejected on health or education grounds 'and go into the workforce'. Military service last for 5-6 years. Mr Chae also, in one conversation on the subject, said that their army was in fact smaller that that of the south.

My guess, and I haven't got the resources of the CIA to back me up, is that a large percentage of the population is in some form of military or quasi-military organisation. Some will be full time, many others probably in part-time or periodic training. However, the number of properly equipped combat ready troops is probably relatively small. Too many, of course, for the size of the nation and the state of the economy, but the DPRK faces the classic dilemma of being cheek by jowl with a much larger adversary (like Pakistan and India, or Israel and the Arabs). It is not merely a matter of the Republic of Korea, with a population twice the size and economy many times bigger but also, of course, the United States which still keeps some 30,000 troops stationed in the south. And there is also, in Korean eyes, the spectre of the Japanese whose 'Self Defence Forces' are amongst the largest in the world.

We drove and walked around a lot of Pyongyang. We drove west through the main port of Nampo to the West Sea Barrage. We drove some 200 kilometres north to the MyoHangSan (Curious Fragrant Mountains) and, most relevantly, drove south through Kaesong to the demilitarised zone at Panmunjon. We saw many people in military and other uniforms. We passed checkpoints at the outskirts of Pyongyang and a series of three as we approached closer to the border. We saw a few armed soldiers in Pyongyang guarding presumably important buildings. However, despite the sight of so many people in uniform there was no great sense of military presence. There was not the very real presence of state power that one is conscious of in Seoul with troops, police and plain clothes riot police (it may be different under Kim Dae Jung). There was not even the military conveys that are not an uncommon sight in parts of mainland Britain (let alone Northern Ireland). It may have been that all the troops were away out of sight preparing for Army Day, which took place a week after we left. Who knows? Another guess, for what it's worth, is the Korean People's Army would be a formidable defensive force but does not have the logistic capacity to contemplate an offensive war. If I'm right, it does have important implications. It means, for instance, there is no justification for American troops to be stationed in Korea. With them removed the way would be open for progress in negotiations between the USA and the DPRK, leading to a peace treaty to replace the armistice, the exchanging of diplomatic recognition, and the lifting of sanctions by the United States. Free trade would, if not prevail at least poke its head through the snow, the DPRK would be able to earn more foreign exchange and buy more oil, rice and medicines. And its children would not suffer from malnutrition.

The barriers in that process, from the recognition of lack of threat and defusing of confrontation, through to the desired end of amelioration of poverty, and the achievement of prosperity which is quite attainable, are high. The attitude of the DPRK, conditioned by fifty years of American hostility and exacerbated by the cult of the Kim family, is an undeniable problem. Nevertheless, the underlying logic is there. The key lies with the Americans. They have the overwhelming military and economic strength. If they could move forward with wisdom and generosity then the way would be open for the economic and political transformation of north Korea.

There is a lot more that could be teased out from my notes on the journey from the airport to the hotel. The Kim cult for one. Bizarre, depressing, misunderstood, misrepresented and underestimated. The idea of 'Juche', usually translated as 'self-reliance'. Commemorated by a huge phallic tower, constantly referred to as the ideological foundation stone of the DPRK, Kim Il Sung's great contribution to political thought. Given Korea's traditional sandwiching between the cultural colossus of China and Japanese militarism one can see the desirability and attraction of the idea, and of course it has its echoes in the South. But dreadfully ironic given the fact that liberation from the Japanese was due to the American's own separate war, and that the specific establishment of the DPRK owed much to the physical presence of the Soviet army. (That the establishment and continuation of the Rhee regime in the south owed even more to the Americans, and the suppression of the People's Committees after the Japanese surrender is another matter).

There is much more that could be commented on from that passage , and I realise that I have come no further than from the airport to the hotel. That was just the beginning, and there were another ten days of intensive activity and observation. Trips outside Pyongyang. To the West Sea Barrage, to the MyoHangSan, Curious Fragrant Mountains, in the north with the equally curious International Exhibition Hall where gifts to Kim Il Sung, and then to Kim Jong Il, are displayed as evidence of the respect and admiration of the peoples and governments of the world. To Panmunjon, where the DPRK and the Chinese signed the armistice which marked the first major defeat of the United States, and which informs so much American antipathy to this day. Within Pyongyang we visited museum after museum, a primary school and a secondary school, the Children's Palace, the People's Study House (the national library), Kim Il Sung University, the Pyongyang Maternity Hospital (recipient of a UNICEF award for being a 'baby friendly hospital'). We saw the international spring festival and the celebrations for Kim Il Sun's birthday on 15 April. We walked the streets and watched the television. We joined in an impromptu picnic of Chinese Koreans in the mountains. And finally we took the train from Pyongyang to Beijing.

And what of the famine? Despite our requests we were not given the opportunity to observe either the affected areas or the relief operation in action. Trevor Harvey especially made contact with a number of aid workers and was able to report that the situation was difficult but that the pain was fairly evenly spread geographically and across society and that dramatic stories of starvation were not verified. The aid is working. It was clear, however, that vulnerable sectors of the population - children, the elderly and lactating mothers - were suffering and that some of the effects would be permanent even when the situation improved.

Any honest report from the DPRK must be ambivalent. This one is also grossly incomplete; there is so much more to be said about this inspiring, depressing, fascinating and bewildering society. I hope that the editor will indulge me in some more space in another issue. I also hope to get back to the DPRK and work on those linkages, and to learn a little more. And I hope that others will make the journey to that far away place. The simplest way to start that journey is perhaps to get in touch with Rev. Don Borrie, Chairman of the NZ-DPRK Society, 7 Thornley St, Titahi Bay, Wellington, ph/fax 04 236 6422.

The Democratic People's Republic of Korea is a far away place of which we should know more. And by knowing more, we may help to bring about peace in our times.