Monthly Chosun, the journal of South Korea’s conservative Chosun Ilbo newspaper, has released a piece by columnist Cho Gab Je, “Ceausescu and Kim Jong Il, Companions in the Same Fate,” in which he asserts that North Korea is entering the fifth phase, “Resistance,” of a seven-stage transition towards the collapse or total reconstruction of the regime.

The seven phases Cho refers to are those suggested by Robert Collins, a former Strategy Division Chief of the ROK-US Combined Forces Command. He predicted that the collapse of North Korea would be observable through the analytical framework of, in this order: resource depletion - failure to maintain infrastructure - rise of independent and spontaneous economic activities - suppression - resistance - fracture of the regime - formation of new national leadership.

“Now,” Cho believes, “North Korea is moving on to the fifth phase. The currency redenomination, suppression of the markets, other side effects and the expansion of discontent against the regime are encouraging moves.”

As some experts tend to do, Cho points to the process which ended with the televised execution of former Romanian dictator Ceausescu as a good model for analyzing North Korea’s future.

Mentioning also those changes brought about by inflation in Poland during the communist era, Cho implies that rising prices and the scarcity of goods in North Korea may incite disorder. Additionally, if and when market traders, who live off the markets which they spontaneously created, suffer hardships, he thinks they may turn into a power willing to try and reform the system; that is, into fighters for democratization.

In support of his and Collins’ hypothesis, Cho quotes an anonymous former North Korean high official who defected to South Korea in 2005, “The biggest change happening lately in North Korea,” the official said, “is that the open slandering of Kim Jong Il is spreading.” According to the defector’s explanation, Cho says, the biggest difference from the mid-1990s is that the middle class of officials in the Party, Army and Cabinet who traditionally support the Kim Jong Il regime have been severely shaken up by recent events.

Cho’s analysis suggests, therefore, that massive moves to incapacitate the regime may occur even while Kim Jong Il is still alive.

“The possibility of North Korea’s collapse is getting higher,” he concludes, “If the South Korean administration and people take advantage of this chance, the door to reunification will be open. Otherwise, division will be fossilized.”