The video centers around the complex and controversial figure of Kim Jong Un, the leader of North Korea, who has established himself as a significant global adversary. Since assuming power, he has solidified his position by eliminating rivals and significantly expanding North Korea's nuclear capabilities, making his country a severe threat on the world stage. Despite this, North Korea's economy struggles due to longstanding international sanctions, and Kim Jong Un faces the critical challenge of modernizing the nation while maintaining tight control.

Kim Jong Un's relationship with world leaders, particularly Donald Trump, is highlighted to illustrate his strategic acumen and his attempt to rebrand himself as a legitimate and modern global leader. Despite highly publicized summits and meetings, including those in Singapore and Vietnam, negotiations faltered at critical junctures, leading to disappointment and increased domestic pressure on Kim. Still, these interactions allowed him to showcase his leadership style and gain some diplomatic leverage.

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Key Vocabularies and Common Phrases:

1. ruthless [ˈruːθləs] - (adjective) - Having no pity or compassion for others; cruel or merciless. - Synonyms: (merciless, cruel, pitiless)

He is a ruthless dictator hellbent on staying in power.

2. provoke [prəˈvoʊk] - (verb) - To stimulate or incite someone to do or feel something, especially by arousing anger. - Synonyms: (incite, vex, spur)

More provocation from the rogue nation of North Korea as new reports surface that Pyongyang is preparing for its next nuclear test.

3. intercontinental ballistic missile [ˌɪntəɹˈkɒntɪnəntl bəˈlɪstɪk ˈmɪsəl] - (noun phrase) - A missile with a high range, primarily ballistic, designed to deliver nuclear weapons. - Synonyms: (ICBM, long-range missile, strategic missile)

North Korea showing the world its new intercontinental ballistic missile.

4. hermit kingdom [ˈhɜːrmɪt ˈkɪŋdəm] - (noun phrase) - A term used to describe a country, especially a reclusive or isolated one, often used for North Korea. - Synonyms: (isolationist state, reclusive nation, cloistered country)

But opening his secretive hermit kingdom to the outside world carries dangers for Kim Jong Un.

5. sitzfleisch [ˈzɪtsˌflaɪʃ] - (noun) - German term that literally translates to 'sitting meat,' meaning the ability to sit through long periods of inactivity or waiting. - Synonyms: (patience, persistence, endurance)

The Germans have a word for it. They call it sitz fleisch, and it means exactly what it sounds like, that he'd just be prepared to sit there for as long as it took.

6. recalibrate [ˈriːˈkælɪˌbreɪt] - (verb) - To readjust or adapt something to take into account new circumstances or factors. - Synonyms: (modify, adjust, alter)

Kim Jong Un desperately wants and needs the opportunity to meet again with President Trump. Kim Jong Un needed some imagery to tell his people, things are fine.

7. propaganda [ˌprɒpəˈgændə] - (noun) - Information, especially biased or misleading, used to promote a political cause or point of view. - Synonyms: (misinformation, advertisement, indoctrination)

It is part of the propaganda. He's really focused on a particular king, Kim Jong.

8. savvy [ˈsævi] - (adjective) - Having practical understanding or knowledge, particularly in a shrewd or astute manner. - Synonyms: (shrewd, astute, sharp)

During the course of 2018, Kim Jong Un has proven himself to be very savvy and calculating in the way he has dealt with the outside world.

9. impenetrable [ɪmˈpɛnɪtrəbl] - (adjective) - Impossible to pass through or enter; not able to be understood. - Synonyms: (impervious, inaccessible, indecipherable)

In North Korea, the border is not just solid, it is highly impenetrable, except for that joint security area where there is no fence.

10. chronic [ˈkrɒnɪk] - (adjective) - Persisting for a long time or constantly recurring, often used to describe health-related issues or difficult problems. - Synonyms: (persistent, long-term, continual)

This is a country that has a chronic food shortage.

Taking the World Stage (Full Episode) - North Korea - Inside the Mind of a Dictator

Kim Jong Un is the world's most dangerous dictator, boss of a ruthless communist dynasty that has ruled North Korea for 75 years. There is this perception that he is a cartoon character, kind of Dr. Evil villain, right? But Kim Jong Un really is no joke. He is a ruthless dictator hellbent on staying in power. Early in his rule, Kim Jong Un wiped out his enemies, then supercharged his nuclear arsenal. But Kim's greatest challenge lies ahead. The world is changing. To survive, Kim must change with it and bring his country into the modern age. How far can he stray from what his father and his grandfather have created in trying to portray himself as a modern leader without losing control?

More provocation from the rogue nation of North Korea as new reports surface that Pyongyang is preparing for its next nuclear test. North Korea showing the world its new intercontinental ballistic missile. This comes after President Trump said a major conflict with North Korea is possible. Little rocket man. We can't have med men out there shooting rockets all over the place. In 2017, Kim Jong Un achieved his family's longstanding ambition developing a nuclear missile capable of striking North Korea's mortal enemy, the United States.

My name is Jung Pak. I used to work at the CIA on Korea issues. The premier product that we would produce is the President's Daily Brief, which I wrote often. The toughest part is leadership intentions. When it comes to what's in somebody's mind, that is the most difficult part. I spent my entire career trying to crawl inside Kim Jong Un's head. What we learned is that not only was he an apt student of the legacy of his grandfather and father, but that he was also bigger, badder and bolder in terms of how aggressive he was. The missiles and his weapons are now more powerful, more dangerous, more reliable and more mobile. And that's what makes North Korea under Kim Jong Un a much scarier place and a much scarier adversary.

But Kim has a problem. Cut off from the outside world, his country's economy is on its knees. North Korea has been facing US Sanctions since the Korean War, and they've just gotten progressively tougher and tougher. So it's a real struggle, I think, for Kim Jong Un to push his country forward. This is a country that has a chronic food shortage. It's isolated from the outside world. Kim Jong Un knows that in the long run, it's untenable for him to provide for his people. To bring his country into the modern age and maintained his grip on power, Kim must lift the U. S. Led sanctions banning international trade with North Korea.

In 2018. He makes his opening move on June 12th in Singapore. I'll be meeting with Kim Jong Un to pursue a future of peace and security for the world, for the whole world. In 2018, Kim leaves Korea for only the third time as leader for a historic meeting with President Trump in Singapore. The Singapore summit. It really was his big debut internationally. Kim Jong Un's coming out. Those were incredible scenes. I think that's a very telling example of the image that he wants to portray to his people. He's saying, actually, I'm very charming, I'm funny, I'm flexible, I'm spontaneous. And it's completely the reverse of what we may have thought of the North Korean leader in Singapore.

North Korea's reclusive dictator takes his first steps on the world stage. I'm John Bolton. I was National Security Advisor for President Trump. For me, it was almost surreal to think that this was actually happening. A mistake, in my view, but it was a historic first. It was very clear in the meeting that Kim was very much in control. He was observing Trump very carefully. Early in the meeting, Kim asked Trump, what do you think of me? Just testing people like that, that shows a level of confidence. I mean, what do you think of me as an invitation to say, you're a tyrannical dictator oppressing 25 million people, and I don't trust a word you say. That would have been an accurate answer, but it could have been a meeting stopper.

Thank you very much, Everybody. Thank you, Mr. President. How's the meeting going so far, sir? But of course, Trump gave him a very glowing review. He was smart and so on and so forth. Any progress, Mr. President? Excellent relationship. Thank you. Thank you very much. Kim comes prepared with a strategy for dealing with the American president. There's a kind of magic that can happen when these two leaders get together. And I have to say, what I saw, it looked like a bromance.

The North Koreans studied whatever they could to try to understand how President Trump thinks, his psychology, how to flatter him, and actually, the North Koreans know how to do that very, very well. Kim Jong Un sent an envoy with a massive handwritten letter. North Korea is very old school in a sense. They're not going to send email attachments. They're very formal. It was something that charmed President Trump that he got this massive handwritten letter. It was kind of a rambling conversation. I was mostly worried that Trump not give away too much. But there was discussion about joint South Korea and US War games, as Trump called them, which he agreed to give Up. It was a concession to Kim that none of us on the US Side knew was coming.

Okay. It obviously made Kim very happy. Thank you very much. It's fantastic. I was really being tough, and so was he. And we go back and forth, and then we fell in love. Okay. No, really. He wrote me beautiful letters, and they're great letters. We fell in love. Kim has begun to reinvent himself as a legitimate world leader. He returns to his people a conquering hero. The United States States is North Korea's chief adversary. It is the central enemy. So if Kim can stand shoulder to shoulder with the US President, that is of itself a kind of victory. Kim Jong Un can tell his people, we are taken seriously by the most powerful leader in the world.

During the course of 2018, Kim Jong Un has proven himself to be very savvy and calculating in the way he has dealt with the outside world. Luring Donald Trump out, Kim Jong Un kind of set off a race to meet him. Xi Jinping in China. Nobody wanted to be left out. We suddenly saw this huge flurry of summits taking place, and it seemed like all of the leaders wanted to meet with Kim Jong Un. North Korea is a very impoverished country, but it has nuclear weapons. Kim Jong Un can blow up half the planet if he chooses to in a major war. And that's what gives him a huge leverage that otherwise he would never have when he met with Putin in Russia.

Putin is very famous for meeting leaders across the world very, very late. Well, in Vladivostok, it was Putin who waited for Kim Jong Un. He wants to show the world that, you know what, even between friends, we have the upper hand. But opening his secretive hermit kingdom to the outside world carries dangers for Kim Jong Un. At the start of his rule, he encouraged foreigners to set up businesses in special trading zones near the Chinese border. One of the first outsiders to arrive was South Korean born US Citizen Kim Dong Chul. It's believed Kim Dong Chul passed secrets to the CIA for four years before he was betrayed by an informant and arrested.

Kim Jong Un makes a very public example of his captive. The agent was sentenced to 10 years hard labor. He had become a pawn in an international chess game between Kim and the West. Two years later, Kim meets with U.S. hostage negotiators to build on his warming relationship with President Trump. And we do have breaking news right now. President Trump tweeting moments ago that three detained Americans have been released from North Korea. Washington. In releasing his hostages, Kim Jong Un bolsters his image as a modern, civilized leader. And Buys credit with President Trump.

I want to thank Kim Jong Un, who really was excellent to these three incredible people. I really think he wants to do something and bring that country into the real world. February 2019. Kim Jong Un sets out on a 2,500 mile journey. The destination, Vietnam. And a second crucial meeting with President Trump. The prize winning a deal to lift the economic sanctions crippling his country. When he went to Hanoi, I think he felt very confident. He very unusually announced through the state media in North Korea that this summit was going to happen, that he thought this was all going to go very well for him.

You know, the stakes were very, very high from Kim Jong Un's side. He wanted to show his people that, you know what? I will make peace with Donald Trump. I will be the one North Korean leader who shakes hands and signs a deal with the US President. That was the promise Kim Jong Un made as he left the train station in Pyongyang. On the first night of the summit, the two leaders meet for a dinner of North Korean steak, served well done for Trump and rare for Kim. So this was the dinner before the summit, the night before. Kim Jong Un looks very comfortable and confident, and he must have put on a bit of a show. President Trump relayed a story that Kim Jong Un told about how, yeah, he executed his uncle and then displayed his head for the rest to see.

In this day and age, to see that kind of brutality, very much like the heads of those beheaded by Henry VIII were stuck outside the Tower of London. If you could have heard that dialogue, what you would pay for that dialogue, it would be, I think it goes to show that Kim Jong Un, deep inside, wanted to reach out to Donald Trump in a way that no other leader had reached out to Donald Trump, which is, you know what, Mr. President, let's talk about raw power. I will tell you what raw power is. I will give you an example of what I did to my uncle. Donald Trump respects raw power, and that's what Kim Jong Un wanted to emphasize. There are a lot of great ideas being thrown about. I think very importantly, the relationship is, you know, just very strong.

With the dinner table talk out of the way, the two leaders get down to business. Analysts say there is considerable pressure on both Trump and Kim Jong Un to come up with a more substantive deal than the one they struck in Singapore. Kim desperately needs sanctions to be lifted. Trump has got to come back with something more substantive than they got in June. If I'm not willing to do that, I won't be here right now. The North Koreans estimated that President Trump needed a foreign policy victory and that they would sign a deal. Kim Jong Un thought it was a sure thing. So they got down to the nitty gritty of this nuclear deal. But it can quickly go sour. In his opening gambit, Kim offers a limited to shut down North Korea's largest nuclear testing site in return for the complete lifting of all sanctions.

Trump was not prepared to make a partial deal. He was prepared to make only the big deal, which is the complete elimination of North Korea's nuclear weapons program. But Kim kept pressing for his more limited deal. Like many communist negotiators, he's very good at saying the same thing over and over again. The Germans have a word for it. They call it sitz fleisch, and it means exactly what it sounds like, that he'd just be prepared to sit there for as long as it took. So Trump and Kim went around and around. We could see the frustration that Kim felt that he wasn't getting through. So there came a point where kind of silence descended on the room and lasted.

And it was at that point I think everybody realized this meeting is really over. Astonishing. The second summit between the US And North Korea is over. The headline here, no deal. The two leaders, motorcades roared away from the summit site within minutes of each other. Sometimes you have to walk. They literally left a lunch on the table in Hanoi and went off back to their respective capital. So I think it was a miscalculation. Kim Jong Un was very, very sure he could reach a deal in Hanoi. So on the long train ride back to North Korea, Kim Jong Un must have asked himself, who am I going to blame for this failure? Who will be the person who will fall by the sword?

Kim Jong Un was very angry. He lost faith in that. He didn't have a deal he left empty handed. And that has increased the pressure on Kim Jong Un since. Failure to reach a deal with Trump is a major setback in Kim's bid to normalize his regime. At least three of his officials are thought to have been executed or purged as punishment. Kim was returning to the system of terror that has sustained his dynasty for three generations.

In North Korea, the border is not just solid, it is highly impenetrable, except for that joint security area where there is no fence. A North Korean soldier called oh Chung Song, the top soldier in the Korean People's army, stationed right along the 38th parallel. Only the creme de la creme are posted along the border. But he dashed across the line running for his Life. He was shot at by North Korean guards. As the North Korean soldier lies wounded in the demilitarized zone, which separates north and South Korea, troops stage a rescue attempt.

He was miraculously saved. He was then taken by helicopter to a Korean hospital. It was discovered that there were many worms in his body. He was a healthy soldier who got the best treatment in North Korea, but it was still suffering from malnutrition. And this was a shock to many people who were watching what's happening in North Korea.

This particular video must have shown Kim Jong Un that security along the border was paramount because even the most trusted lieutenants were ready to jump ship. I think Kim Jong Un would have been very angry at the generals who allowed this to happen under their watch. And I'm sure they were reprimanded and imprisoned or even, you know, even worse punishment for this. To clamp down on a rising tide of defectors, Kim has increased border security and threatened would be traitors with severe punishments.

But the dictator remains torn between his allegiance to the family dynasty in the pull of his teenage years in the democratic West. Shortly after he took power, he tracked down an old friend in Europe. When you spent your most formative years in a very westernized country studying in Switzerland as a teenager, that will stick with you. Is this nostalgia. He will never be able to have the life back again. But if he invites his childhood friend to come back to North Korea, it's like satisfying a part of his life that he yearns for but he can never replay.

Kim's two meetings with the US President had failed to deliver a deal on North Korea's nuclear arsenal in June 2019. Trump rekindles the bromance. President Trump touching down in South Korea just a short while ago after having extended an apparently impromptu invitation to the leader of North Korea. I just put out a feeler because I don't know where he is right now. He may not be in North Korea, but I said if Chairman Kim would want to meet, I'll be at the border.

I'd certainly. We seem to get along very well. The meeting at the DMZ was entirely impromptu. He tweets an invitation to the North Korean dictator to meet and North Koreans finally do respond. And Donald Trump marveled that apparently Kim Jong Un follows me on Twitter after the breakdown of the talks in Hanoi. Kim Jong Un desperately wants and needs the opportunity to meet again with President Trump. Kim Jong Un needed some imagery to tell his people, things are fine.

We're still friends. I've got it under control. The North Koreans would have loved imagery of Kim Jong Un slowly making his way to the demarcation line. President Trump was there more quickly, clearly more anxious to cross over to the North Korean side. They would have loved that. The idea that an American president wants to step into North Korean territory, propaganda gold. Suddenly, Donald Trump is walking with Kim Jong Un in North Korea. You know, the first American leader to set foot in North Korea.

And then they walk back over to the South Korean side. And we did not know that it was truly going to happen. And it was scene of total chaos. Suddenly it appears that they're going to be going inside this building and the North Koreans actually try to block the American press from going over. Stop, press stop. And so Stephanie Grisham, Donald Trump's press secretary, essentially decked a North Korean security guard who is trying to block the American press from following the two leaders into this room.

You know, this was an extraordinary photo op, but it accomplished absolutely nothing. Beyond the photo op, there's no question today's meeting was an historic first. But after two summits and one impromptu meeting, North Korea's nuclear program remains fully in place with no breakthrough in sight. In the fall of 2019, the Dictator changes course. In a symbolic statement to his people, he makes a pilgrimage to the sacred Mount Paektu, mythical birthplace of the Kim dynasty. It's not just that Kim Jong Un likes riding horses.

There's another purpose here. It is part of the propaganda. He's really focused on a particular king, Kim Jong. And Kim Dong Yong is a warrior who's often shown fighting off foreign influence and bringing the country together on a white horse. And so it's a way to remind his people that I am the successor of that heritage and I have a right to rule. Turning his back on President Trump, Kim threatens to deliver a so called Christmas gift to the United States.

Kim Jong Un was disappointed he could not convince Mr. Trump. I think he realized, okay, if Trump will not negotiate with me, I will make a bigger hammer. So that's a message that I think he wanted to send the world. I will show you how powerful I am. I will show you who's really boss in this neighborhood. And it's me, Kim Jong Un.

October 2020. Kim celebrates three generations of his family's rule. His talks with Trump have failed to remove the sanctions holding back his economy. How long can he maintain the loyalty of his people in allowing the people to see him cry? Kim jong UN on October 10 wanted to show that he's human too. He wanted to show that vulnerability. Yes, I am Almost like a God. And I was born to lead this country. But I'm a father like you.

I care about my children like you. I care about our future like you. So it was designed to be a particular show of humility and to show his personality. But I can't help but think it's also theater. And so we are moving into a phase where we have less access and less information because it's so carefully cultivated. He wants to seem like somebody who actually is in touch with his people. But it's very hard for a to tell whether we can trust it economically. They're in very, very deep trouble. Sanctions, pandemic and floods, all those problems have combined to make North Korea's economy, which was already on its knees, nearly on its deathbed.

And yet Kim Jong Un continues to develop nuclear weapons. I think it's very dangerous because if you are cornered into a position where there really is no exit, then you might look for extreme solutions. In 2020, Kim unveiled the world's largest mobile intercontinental ballistic missile, nicknamed the Monster. Despite his attempts to modernize North Korea and remake his image, Kim Jong Un remains the dictator of a rogue state that is now more dangerous than ever.

You can't prevent irrational regimes, but you can certainly do everything possible to keep the world's most dangerous weapons out of their hands. I think obviously you have to consider the use of force. I don't think the end of North Korea is likely to be pleasant in any circumstances. It's thought Kim now has at least 40 nuclear missiles and is close to completing a new secret weapon that would pose a greater threat to the west than ever before. They're building a new 3,000 ton submarine with the ability to fire ballistic missiles once they reach certain technical metrics.

North Korea can then put one of these ballistic missiles on a submarine. Submarines are very difficult to track. It's basically a roving threat and a moving target. North Korea can then float that submarine out to the Pacific Ocean and scare the crap out of people in Los Angeles. The whole other mess of stuff that keep people up at night.

Global, Politics, Leadership, North Korea, Nuclear Weapons, Diplomacy, National Geographic