Kim Jong-un is sending postcards of hate to America (again)

Shops catering to tourists in the capital are once again selling cards depicting North Korean soldiers defeating the enemy.

Kim Jong-un supervises a test of long-range multiple rocket launchers and tactical guided weapons into the East Sea this month. Picture: KNCA via AFP

North Korea has resumed a distinctive feature of its propaganda – gory images of vanquished US soldiers – four years after removing them from public display as a goodwill gesture intended to further nuclear disarmament talks.

In a sign of the collapse of diplomatic engagement between Pyongyang and Washington, shops catering to tourists in the capital are once again selling postcards depicting North Korean soldiers defeating the enemy.

The images, obtained by the NK News website, include one of a US soldier being stabbed by a bayonet above the slogan: “Let’s exact a thousandfold revenge against the US Imperialist wolves!” Another depicts US, South Korean and Japanese soldiers being bayoneted through the groin with the words: “No forgiveness, not even in the slightest!”

Such images used to be a feature in the streets of Pyongyang. Stereotypical “Yankee imperialists”, invariably depicted with hook noses and in attitudes of grotesque humiliation, appeared on posters and billboards by roadsides and in museums, as well as in postcard form. US soldiers were seen writhing in agony on the bayonets of the Korean People’s Army, with the White House exploding into smithereens beneath the blasts of North Korean missiles.

In 2018, Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un held the first of three summits in an effort to agree a deal under which North Korea would trade its nuclear weapons for economic investment and assistance. Within a few months, the scenes of North Korean soldiers were replaced by those of farmers, factory workers and business people.

Slogans about smiting the imperialist forces were replaced by sentiments such as: “Let’s safeguard the Party by implementing the five-year strategy for economic development.”

According to an unidentified source in Pyongyang, quoted by NK News, the postcards that have been returned to sale were printed in 2017 and have only recently reappeared.

This year has seen a marked increase in missile and artillery testing by North Korea, including long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles potentially capable of delivering a nuclear warhead to the US mainland. These have been met with US-South Korean military exercises.

It’s a turnaround from the 2018 meeting in Singapore when Kim and Trump agreed to open a new chapter in US-North Korean relations to “build a lasting and stable peace regime on the Korean Peninsula” and to “work toward” denuclearisation.

The Times