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Mike Chinoy’s latest book reveals the truth behind North Korea’s nuclear programme, and the complete failure of US foreign policy to stop it, writes Angie Wong

Here’s what the average Joe knows about North Korea: nothing, except for the little news we get out of international news agencies – and even that is not free from bias and editing. Who better, then, to give us the inside track into the soul of North Korea than the inside man himself, Mike Chinoy, who has covered North Korea for CNN for over 12 years.

Chinoy has spent 24 years as a foreign correspondent for CNN, including eight as the chief of CNN’s first Beijing bureau. On the way, the Columbia University graduate has won numerous Emmy, Peabody, and Dupont awards, most notably for his coverage of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. His first foray into Korea as a reporter was when, as he was covering South Korean students defying their country, he was invited by officials to visit the North, too. And since the government liked CNN’s global outreach, Chinoy was invited to cover events there over and over again, including an historical trip to the forbidden state by former US President Jimmy Carter in 1994, when he was the only journalist invited to attend.

During the trip, the North Koreans invited Chinoy and the CNN crew to watch a military parade. “All this was going on when I learned that the CIA had projected the famine was going to cause their country to fall,” he says. “Kim Jung-il was coming out on the balcony… it was all designed to convey a signal that ‘though we are in deep trouble, we are still strong.’” And that’s what CNN was there to do. To show the world everything was okay.

In his new book, Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis, Chinoy gives a detailed account of his collective visits to the ‘Hermit Kingdom’, skilfully guiding the reader away from White House ‘Axis of Evil’ propaganda and towards what really has been happening under Kim Jong-il’s secretive regime. He gracefully fills in the gaps, not by injecting bias, but by offering an interpretation of how both sides see it, and how both might have misinterpreted events which, sometimes, have led to more than a simple misunderstanding.

The book weaves in and out of the politics of Washington and Pyongyang, interviewing over 100 specialists in the field. But first we dip into the cultish North Korea many of us are familiar with: the mass games featuring tens of thousands of performers; the Song of General Kim Jong-il, which includes lyrics such as “without you there is no country, without you there is no us”; the national flower, Kimjongilia, a hybrid begonia named in honour of the ‘Dear Leader’ (the other national flower is named the Kimilsungia, after his father). Chinoy not only speaks of the weird and wonderful North Korea, but also of the heart and soul of the North Korean mindset. This empathy is quickly juxtaposed with the power play of the former Clinton administration’s policies, followed by the unravelling of the promises of the current Bush-Cheney administration.

Political tests such as North Korea’s announcement of its intention to withdraw from the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, and the launching of Rodong-1 missiles with the capability of destroying 90 per cent of Japan, are described with as much heart-throbbing drama as a spy novel narrative. But instead of making Kim Jong-il the comic villain with a penchant for DVDs that Team America portrayed, Chinoy gives North Korea a clear voice. “The world is now calling on our country to show nuclear weapons we don’t have… I have had just about enough,” Chinoy once witnessed Kim Jong-il saying.  “We don’t want war… We have done a lot of construction in our country and we don’t want to destroy it. Those who want war are out of their mind.” Whether sincere or not, this central idea is debated again and again by different interpreters, including Chinoy himself.

This book could not be timelier: as North Korea’s Yongbyon nuclear facilities are being rebuilt, the world debates whether Kim Jong-il is dead or alive. Chinoy’s Washington sources say Kim is alive, but not well. It appears he suffered some kind of stroke in August, Chinese doctors treated him, and now he is in a stable condition, although he has lost some of his ability to walk and speak. “It is the great unmentionable [in North Korea],” Chinoy says. “What happens when God dies?”

Likely successors are one of his three sons by two different wives. None of them have been groomed to lead, but US officials are beginning to profile them thoroughly in the event that they do. Contrary to many Western media reports, North Korea will not collapse. “They are much more resilient than that,” says Chinoy.

At times the book can be tedious for those not familiar with the names and faces of foreign policy. But for those who are, it is utterly fascinating to see how much access Chinoy has had to the top guns. A polished journo, Chinoy asks all of the important questions about the fate of North Korea, including how the incoming US president will handle the looming North Korea nuclear deal: if you were North Korea looking to rebuild a nuke station, whether for internal development or as a political tool, wouldn’t you wait to see who the next president would be? Chinoy predicts John McCain will take a hard line on North Korea, whereas Obama will be more moderate.

Regardless of who wins in November, however, Chinoy reckons that “this might be the first major foreign policy crisis the new president will have to face.” And no doubt, he’ll be right there to tell us exactly what’s going on.

Mike Chinoy on US Relationship with China and North Korea. Renaissance
Harbour View Hotel, 8/F, 1 Harbour Rd, Wan Chai. 2530 6919.
www.amcham.org.hk. Wed 8, noon, $510 ($390 AmCham members).

Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis with Mike
Chinoy. Hong Kong Club (Harcourt Suite), 1 Jackson Rd, Central, 2103 9508.
www.asiasociety.org. Tue 21, 12.15pm, $490 ($390 Asia Society members).