North Korean House of Cards

conscious and able to function. Given the growing suspicion surrounding Jang, the
decision was made—either by Kim Kyong-hui, Kim Jong-un, or both—to place
him under surveillance. Since Jang was a senior Party member, the KWP OGD was
tasked with this operation. 136
For the next several months, Jang Song-taek’s activities were tracked and
examined. From the outside perspective, Jang maintained his busy public profile. As
December came around, he topped the list of cadres accompanying Kim Jong-un,
attending 100 out of 143 events. 137 Earlier in the year, Kim introduced Jang as his
“closest revolutionary comrade.” 138
In March 2013, the KWP OGD presented its findings to Kim Kyong-hui.
Not surprisingly, the report revealed his infidelity, a long-standing problem that had
plagued the marriage for decades. The report noted that he had allegedly been seeing
seven women. 139 According to defector reporting, Kim Kyong-hui was outraged by
the report and vowed to carry out her brother’s wishes to ensure a smooth power
consolidation for Kim Jong-un. 140 This presumably included agreeing to remove Jang
Song-taek from the political scene. 141
It reportedly took two months for the Kim family to make the final decision
regarding Jang. Whether the decision included his ultimate fate is unknown, but
it was determined that he could no longer remain in the central leadership. In
May 2013, Kim Jong-un convened a task force composed of elements within his
Personal Secretariat, which presumably included his half-sister, Kim Sol-song, the
136 Ken E. Gause, Coercion, Control, Surveillance, and Punishment: An Examination of the North
Korean Police State, 2nd ed., op. cit. Only the KWP OGD is authorized to investigate senior members of
the Party. Below the central Party level, other investigative organs, such as the SSD and the MPS, have
authority to carry out investigations.
137 “Who Runs N.Korea?” The Chosun Ilbo, December 18, 2012.
138 Ibid.
139 Discussion with a senior-level North Korean defector, May 2014. This report may account for
the insertion of language about Jang’s infidelity into the list of charges made against him.
140 Kim Kyong-hui was the guarantor of the Kim family equities within the regime and had
engineered her nephew’s consolidation up to this point. She established the ideological foundation
through the revision of the “Ten Principles for a Monolithic Ideological System” into the “Ten Principles for
a Monolithic Leader Ideological System,” which strengthened the rationale for continued Kim family rule.
141 “Covert Organization that Holds the Key to Finding Out the Whole Picture of the
Abductions—Study of North Korea’s Ministry of State Security,” Sentaku Magazine, August 2014. If the
OGD did produce a report on Jang Song-taek’s activities, its contents need to be examined with a certain
amount of skepticism. According to other defector reports, members of the military, the OGD, and
the SSD met in Samjiyeon in March to plot the downfall of Jang, the same month that the report was
presented to Kim Jong-un and Kim Kyong-hui. Whether the report was an output of this meeting or an
actual investigation remains unclear. Since that time, this coterie of people from these three organizations
has been known as the “Samjiyeon Group.”
Ken E. Gause
57