Is the North Korean government crazy?
Contrary to the common idea presented in American media and commentary, the North Korean regime is not crazy. On the contrary, the regime is highly focused on the goal of regime survival, and it pursues this goal ruthlessly and calculatedly. The well-being and prosperity of ordinary North Koreans is secondary. Since North Korea is economically and even militarily weaker than its nemesis South Korea, one of the strategies the North Korean government employs is bravado to intimidate its adversaries and to appear heroic to the North Korean people. But the North Korean government has been careful to avoid provoking a war, which it knows would result in the destruction of the regime.
