North Korean Policy Elites - Defense Technical Information Center

Kim Sung-ae, who is Kim Il Sung’s second wife and Kim Jong Il’s hated step-mother, 14
is unlikely to resume her previously lost battle royale for the transfer of power to her eldest son
and Kim Jong Il’s younger half-brother Kim Pyong Il, born in1953, let alone to her younger son
and Kim Jong Il’s second half-brother Kim Yong Il, born in 1955. 15 Two daughters of Kim
Song-Ae, who are Kim Jong Il’s half-sisters, and their respective children, have never been
considered in contention for the supreme power mantle in Pyongyang. In specifics, the eldest
daughter, Kim Sung-il (or Kyong-il), born in 1951, is married to a MOFA official, Kim Kwangsop,
born in 1949, who served as the DPRK Ambassador in some African countries and Austria.
The younger daughter, Kim Yong-ja, is married to a KPA general. Kim Jong Il’s eldest stepbrother,
Kim Pyong Il, has been honorably exiled to serve as the DPRK Ambassador in various
European countries, including Hungary, Finland, and Poland, since the early 1980s. Kim Pyong
Il is not known to have legitimate male children. Besides, he has been overseas for so long that
he has become so out of touch with the prevailing value system and power realities in Pyongyang
that he can hardly mount any successful power transfer campaign of his own without mighty
backing from some very influential force inside the DPRK power system. Everyone in the loop,
however, knows that Kim Jong Il despises his half-brother and that “it is over between them for
life.” Kim Jong Il’s youngest step-brother, Kim Yong-il, is rumored to have a serious drinking
problem and has no official positions.
It goes without saying that all extended family members are protected and watched over
by the ballooning Secret Service (sometimes referred to as the MPAF Guards Command) whose
ranks expanded from a few hundred at the time of the Great Leader’s death in 1994 to allegedly
more than eight thousand a decade later. The Secret Service personnel – bodyguards, cleaning
maids, cooks, technicians, chauffeurs, etc.- guard the Kims’ private residences, take them to
14 Kim Sung-ae, born in 1924, Kim Jong Il’s step-mother, had two sons and two daughters from Kim Il Sung. Kim Il
Sung had lived with Kim Sung-Ae since 1952. They married in the summer of 1963. Kim Song-Ae’s power had
been considerable between 1960 and 1973, when she was made the Chairwoman of the DPRK Democratic
Women’s League. As a typical Korean step-mother, she treated her step-son rather badly, trying to do her best to
disparage Kim Jong Il in the eyes of his father. She is rumored to have scolded him constantly, dressed him badly,
and barely fed him. Kim Sung-Ae is rumored to have hated Kim Jong Il and had tried to position her own son,
Kim Pyong Il, as Kim Il Sung’s successor. She encouraged the development of her own personality cult, by
publishing books, giving “on-the-spot guidance” at public places and factories without Kim Il Sung, appearing on
television next to the Great Leader and alone, greeting dignitaries, and trying to diminish the stature of Kim Jong
Il’s deceased mother, Kim Jong Suk. In the early 1970s, Kim Jong Il vociferously protested to his father about the
growing power of Kim Song-Ae and her brother, by arguing that there must not be different power centers and
that all power must be centralized in the figure of his father Kim Il Sung. Kim Junior prevailed in 1973 when the
Great Leader convened a conference of the WPK Secretaries and proposed the theory of unified Juch’e idea. Kim
Song-Ae was finished and had to retreat back into the “women’s side of the house.” No wonder that at Kim Il
Sung’s funeral, Kim Jong Il and his sister stood at the center of the podium, whereas Kim Song-ae was already
located far away from the other members of the WPK Central Committee.
15 There is a disagreement among Korea observers over whether Kim Jong Il’s second step-brother’s name is Kim
Yong Il or Kim Kyong Il.
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