Engage North Korea : Tyranny of the Weak: North Korea and the World, 1950-1992 : Armstrong, Charles K.: Amazon.com.au: Books

Tyranny of the Weak: North Korea and the World, 1950-1992 : Armstrong, Charles K.: Amazon.com.au: Books

Charles K. ArmstrongCharles K. Armstrong
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Tyranny of the Weak: North Korea and the World, 1950-1992 Hardcover – 15 June 2013
by Charles K. Armstrong (Author)
3.7 3.7 out of 5 stars (13)

To much of the world, North Korea is an impenetrable mystery, its inner workings unknown and its actions toward the outside unpredictable and frequently provocative. Tyranny of the Weak reveals for the first time the motivations, processes, and effects of North Korea's foreign relations during the Cold War era. Drawing on extensive research in the archives of North Korea's present and former communist allies, including the Soviet Union, China, and East Germany, Charles K Armstrong tells in vivid detail how North Korea managed its alliances with fellow communist states, maintained a precarious independence in the Sino-Soviet split, attempted to reach out to the capitalist West and present itself as a model for Third World development, and confronted and engaged with its archenemies, the United States and South Korea. From the invasion that set off the Korean War in June 1950 to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Tyranny of the Weak shows howadespite its objective weaknessaNorth Korea has managed for much of its history to deal with the outside world to its maximum advantage. Insisting on a path of 'self-reliance' since the 1950s, North Korea has continually resisted pressure to change from enemies and allies alike. A worldview formed in the crucible of the Korean War and Cold War still maintains a powerful hold on North Korea in the twenty-first century, and understanding those historical forces is as urgent today as it was sixty years ago.
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Review
'With the support of extensive and pathbreaking research, Charles K. Armstrong's Tyranny of the Weak deals with an extremely important subject, tells a good story, and reconstructs the historical origins of one of the most pressing challenges facing the world in the twenty-first century. Armstrongas insightful discussion of North Koreaas changing external policies and domestic politics is highly revealing; it provides a much-needed framework for illuminating and defining North Koreaas complicated encounters with the world.'aChen Jian, Michael K. Zak Chair of History for US China Relations, Cornell University, author of Chinaas Road to the Korean War: The Making of the Sino-American Confrontation
About the Author
Charles K. Armstrong is the Korea Foundation Professor of Korean Studies in the Social Sciences, Department of History, at Columbia University. He is the author of Tyranny of the Weak: North Korea and the World, 1950G??1992andThe North Korean Revolution, 1945G??1950, both from Cornell, and The Koreas, editor of Korean Society: Civil Society, Democracy and the State, and coeditor of Korea at the Center: Dynamics of Regionalism in Northeast Asia.
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From other countriesI am fascinated by the Koreas - both North and South. A divided country, with a South Korea now a mini superpower in the economics of the world, and a North Korea a rogue state with nuclear weapons. How did this happen? What brought the Koreas and the world to this strange juncture?

History, of course, history. Armstrong is an academic, and yet this is a very readable, engaging book that is at once both a history of North Korea and a conceptual framework of how a "weak" state has been able to "wag the dogs," namely the United States, the Soviet Union, and China (and to some extent South Korea).

Unfortunately, because of Armstrong's historical analysis, "everything makes sense." By reading this book you'll understand that there is a "method" to the "madness" of North Korea, and that as a tyranny it "makes sense" for the regime to starve its own people, arm itself with nuclear weapons, and fuse Stalinist totalitarianism with the Korean respect for family.

A great read and I highly recommend it to anyone who would like to understand North Korea.

PS - I purchased the physical book, so I can't speak to the technical issues of the Kindle. I don't think one should give a book a "one star" review because of technical problems that are clearly beyond the control of the author.
Columbia Spectator 12 Sep 2019:

"History professor Charles Armstrong cited nonexistent or irrelevant sources in at least 61 instances in his 2016 book, “Tyranny of the Weak: North Korea and the World, 1950–1992,” according to the findings of an investigation by the University’s Standing Committee on the Conduct of Research.

In a letter sent to select faculty on Tuesday, Interim Executive Vice President of the Arts and Sciences Maya Tolstoy announced that Armstrong, who is on sabbatical for the 2019-2020 academic year, will retire at the end of 2020."
Gives a good understanding of North Korea but falls in terms of legitimacy.
This book is excellent for people who want to better understand North Korea. It is well written and scholarly. I recommend it, as a person who has lived on the Korean peninsula for a decade and a half and is embedded in the culture.
I thought this kindle edition would be the same as the original printed edition. However, finally I found that there is no index in the kindle edition. I even want to return the kindle edition book.
Clear and precise. Great source of information on North Korea, as compared to recent news and other updated literature on the country.