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A refuse-filled balloon from North Korea was found near the Jamsil Bridge in Seoul after being launched on June 9, 2024. (Yonhap)

By Kim Jong-dae, visiting scholar at Yonsei Institute for North Korean Studies

Are the balloons that North Korea is sending over the border filled with just trash or do they contain excrement? That indeed is the question. Since South Korea resumed its loudspeaker broadcasts across the border on June 9, North Korea has sent over a massive volley of balloons. Unlike the ones launched at the end of last month, the latest round did not contain any excrement. South Korea’s military authorities viewed this as an attempt at de-escalation, and did not conduct additional broadcasts in response. 

The statement that Kim Yo-jong, sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, issued on June 9 did not contain its usual inflammatory rhetoric regarding South Korea. In short, our troops did not respond with broadcasts because balloon launches did not contain any excrement but merely trash —7.5 tons of it. As recently as last month, South Korean military leaders lambasted the balloon launches as “inhumane behavior that violates international law,” and re-installed speakers that had been removed according to prior inter-Korean agreements. The recent lack of response stands in stark contrast to this reactionism. 

This begs the question: Are the balloons considered hostile if they contain excrement, thereby necessitating a response, but considered non-threatening if they only contain trash? The latest round of “non-threatening” balloons included at least three that landed near the presidential office in Seoul’s Yongsan neighborhood. More specifically, they fell on the very road the president takes to work every day. Militarily speaking, this is a violation of the airspace and no-fly zone directly above the president’s quarters. 

What’s notable is that authorities were not even aware of the balloons near the presidential office until they were reported by civilians. Not only did they fail to detect the balloons, but there was also no protocol for how to deal with them. This is a national security blunder that surpasses that when a North Korean drone penetrated the no-fly zone established around the presidential office in Yongsan. 

When the drone entered our airspace, there was at least an effort to intercept it. This time, however, we just sat back and watched as hundreds of balloons entered our no-fly zones. This reveals not only our incompetence when it comes to national security, but calls into question Yoon’s decision to move the executive office from the Blue House to Yongsan. 

To dodge this issue, however, the military has decided to hide behind the question of whether or not the balloons contain excrement — which is the factor that ultimately determined its response. A strange twist in the rules of engagement, indeed. If the presence of “waste,” “feces,” or “excrement,” as opposed to just “trash,” is what determines our military’s response, then the standards and principles behind the resumption of loudspeaker broadcasts are questionable. 

I must admit, I am impressed by the discernment of various journalists who apparently determined whether the fecal matter was from a human or an animal, having the conviction to call it “manure.”     

The presence of North Korean drones and balloons over the head of the president was predicted some two years ago, in March 2021, when Yoon’s presidential transition committee announced the decision to move the executive office to Yongsan. With no natural barriers for protection, it’s vulnerable on all four sides. Its location, smack dab in the middle of a civilian area, rules out the use of any of the military’s defense air weaponry. The reduction in the size of the no-fly zone (P-73) that pertains to the executive office, not to mention the move itself, has resulted in a certain administrative bureaucratic chaos that has yet to settle. 

For whatever reason, Yoon insists on using his personal mobile phone, one that’s no different from the several millions of phones used by civilians, as opposed to a state phone equipped with an anti-bugging device. For a while now, our president has continually made himself vulnerable to the satellite surveillance of powerful countries. 

The US National Security Agency’s system for intercepting and collecting communication signals, known as Echelon, is being operated on a US military base right next to the presidential office. A leak of classified NSA intelligence in the spring of last year revealed recordings of meetings of the presidential Office of National Security. The public still hasn’t been told just how the US, a supposed ally, was spying on our president. 

Moreover, the US has deemed South Korean telecommunications firms to be vulnerable to Chinese surveillance, because a portion of their base transceiver stations contain hardware from Huawei. North Korea’s helium balloons need only a battery and a propeller to travel 20 to 30 km and operate as surveillance apparatuses near the presidential office. 

Considering the determination of North Korea when developing weaponry and military technology, it doesn’t seem far-fetched to think that North Korea’s balloons will one day stop being a mere nuisance and psychological warfare tactic and develop into a legitimate method of surveillance — or even worse, an offensive weapon.

But Korea’s current presidential office and its security service are acting like sitting ducks going que sera, sera, without so much as coming up with concepts to encompass these new types of threats. Perhaps all its bluster about seeking “peace through strength” when it comes to North Korea while keeping hush-hush about the real gravity of the situation may make the administration look strong to outsiders, but it certainly won’t do anything to deter Pyongyang. 

The administration is more than happy to out itself as the most incompetent and reckless in South Korean history, letting not only its own intelligence but those of its neighbors be siphoned off by whoever wants it, but it lacks the wits to realize its own nature. By ditching the Blue House without a second thought, the Yoon administration has willingly walked into the lion’s den. 

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]