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North Korea Expands Retaliatory Loudspeaker Propaganda (yonhapnews.co.kr)

jones_supa writes: North Korea has expanded its own loudspeaker broadcasts along the inter-Korean border as a counteraction to South Korea's retaliatory broadcasts critical of the communist nation, sources said Monday. In retaliation for North's nuclear test last Wednesday, South resumed its anti-Pyongyang broadcast campaign two days later, a form of psychological warfare detested by the communist country, where outside information is tightly blocked out. "The North initially operated its own loudspeakers at two locations and has now expanded to several locations," a government source said. "In fact, the anti-South loudspeaker broadcasts appear to be coming from every location where we are broadcasting." The North Korean broadcasts are not clearly audible from the South Korean side of the border, but mostly deal with internal propaganda messages and music promoting its leader Kim Jong-un. "We are not sure if it's an issue of electric power or the performance of the loudspeakers, but the sound is very weak," another government source said.

24 of 146 comments (clear)

  1. Maximum range of a speaker by ickleberry · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Have the South Koreans made any notable technological advances in increasing the maximum range of a speaker or making highly directional speakers that can reach Pyongyang from across the DMZ?

    1. Re:Maximum range of a speaker by 110010001000 · · Score: 4, Funny

      Yes. Unfortunately the new speakers arrived and the directions were all in Chinese.

    2. Re:Maximum range of a speaker by ickleberry · · Score: 2

      There I was hoping a bunch of young nerds at KAIST had found a way to send a highly directional magnetic field at the Ryugyong hotel or some statue of Kim Il Sung causing it to reverberate to the tune of op, op, oppa Gangnam style...heyyyyy sexy lady and traumatising all loyal Kim dynasty followers within a 4 mile radius

  2. Speakers by DigiShaman · · Score: 2

    THat's when happens when you import reverse engineered jensen speakers. Amateurs.

    Me?? JBLs, Kickers, etc with Ministry and KMFDM blasted to 11!

    --
    Life is not for the lazy.
  3. Re:News for Nerds? by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 4, Funny

    Well, I guess we could discuss the possible reasons why their speakers aren't loud enough? That's nerdy, right?

  4. I can donate a halfstack to the cause! by wkwilley2 · · Score: 2

    Whoever has the highest decibel reading in the center of the DMZ wins the title "Best Korea"

    The south will rise again!!!

    --
    Have you ever fallen asleep at the keybhanusdiog?
  5. the REAL reason for this might surprise you. by nimbius · · Score: 3, Funny

    Sure, a loudspeaker campaign might not seem like the most tactful or appropriate means to an end of nearly half a century of aggression but take for a moment to consider this: Korea, both north and south, has succeeded in creating the worlds only 160 mile long insufferable asian shouting contest. Thats right. while problems like global warming, climate change, systemic poverty, famine, and clean potable drinking water exist around the globe we can all take comfort in knowing Korea, both north and south, have taken the important first step of solving the major global defecit of a 160 mile audible pissing contest.

    --
    Good people go to bed earlier.
    1. Re:the REAL reason for this might surprise you. by Howitzer86 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You've listed: climate change, climate change, poverty, poverty, and poverty.

      Some people care about things you may not care about. Not everyone's hyperbolic about western liberal talking points. Some people are more concerned about local issues, like the hundreds of artillery shells trained on their cities for the past half century by an extremely hostile enemy with nuclear weapons.

    2. Re:the REAL reason for this might surprise you. by gstoddart · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Korea, both north and south, has succeeded in creating the worlds only 160 mile long insufferable asian shouting contest

      Which, arguably, is better than a shooting contest.

      Don't forget, North and South Korea are still technically at war with one another.

      Frankly, I'd rather the pissing contest ... because all of the stuff you say would happen even more so as a result of them resuming open warfare. But, hey, they could go back to killing one another by the thousands if you somehow think that's better.

      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
  6. The pen is mightier than the sword. by SeaFox · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Am I the only one amused the Korean War has come to the point of being a literal shouting match between the two countries?

  7. Re:I can't work out what this would achieve. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They're not doing this to convince the people in the south of anything. They're just drowning out the South Korean propaganda on their own side.
    That's why they don't care that the sound doesn't carry across the border; it just needs to be louder where their own people can hear it.

  8. Re:News for Nerds? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Everyone knows that Asians don't make good drivers.

  9. Re:I can't work out what this would achieve. by epyT-R · · Score: 4, Insightful

    To reenforce the idea that they're just as good, not to the south koreans, but to their own.

  10. Re:Or as Clinton says by shawn2772 · · Score: 4, Funny

    The penis, mightier than the sword.

    My dad's neighbor's Wifi SSID was "penismightier". It surprised me the first time I saw it (this is a pretty conservative Mormon area) until I manged to mentally reparse it. I pointed it out to my dad, who said he'd been laughing about it every time he saw it, ever since they set it up. My mom finally mentioned it to the neighbors one day and they were shocked and horrified. They had never noticed the "phallic" parse, believe it or not. They changed it immediately.

  11. Re: News for Nerds? by WarJolt · · Score: 2

    That's not it. They just don't have enough North Koreans to scream into the other end.

  12. Re:Or as Clinton says by shawn2772 · · Score: 2

    There is a reason the difference between a Moron and a Mormon is a single letter.

    Because Mormons tend not to have dirty minds? I'm a Mormon, BTW.

  13. Re: I can't work out what this would achieve. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    When I toured North Korea a few years ago I once saw (and got a neat video of) a truck driving around with massive loudspeakers blaring propaganda, and that was far from the border.

  14. Re:I can't work out what this would achieve. by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 5, Interesting

    But what do the North Koreans think that they can possibly achieve by broadcasting propaganda to the South?

    You might be surprised. There are a fair number of North Korea sympathizers in South Korea, especially in the Jeonju region, where the Kim family originates. Before and during WW2, Kim Il Sung led the resistance to the Japanese, and many people, North and South, saw him as a national hero. When the Americans occupied South Korea in 1945, they kept the existing government, which consisted entirely of Koreans that had collaborated with the Japanese, and were detested by most Koreans. When the Korean war started in 1950, many southerners rallied to Kim's effort to unify the nation. Following the war, there was still many people in SK that saw NK as the "true" Korea. Also, NK was actually more prosperous than SK until around 1970 or so, and both governments were repressive. After that, the SK economy took off, they became a democracy, and support for NK faded, but it has not entirely disappeared.

  15. Re:News for Nerds? by ClickOnThis · · Score: 2

    What is there to discuss? We know the reason is that the tubes sending the electricity to the speakers isn't wide enough.

    Those poor North Koreans. If only sanctions weren't in place. Then they could purchase speaker cables that are worthy of their Dear Leader's praises:

    http://www.noiseaddicts.com/20...

    On second thought, let's open a window on the sanctions for this. Maybe we could bankrupt them as they trick-out their audio.

    --
    If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
  16. Re:News for Nerds? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Actually, they are probably more than loud enough for the intended audience: North Koreans who are in earshot of the SK propaganda generators.

  17. It's propaganda for their own people by bobbied · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They (the North) are just making noise so their own people cannot hear the propaganda from the south. Is this so hard to understand? EVERYTHING the North does is about how it plays INTERNALLY which is why they come across so nutty to the outside world. NK must carefully control the "truth" as it is commonly understood within their country.

    If the reality of the situation where ever understood by the North Korean masses they would be in open revolt and fleeing their country. If they ever caught on that the majority of the world isn't starving and generally laughs at their "supreme leader" as being a fat slob who keeps his people poor and destitute in his quest for keeping power it would all be over in days. That North Korea is generally considered a joke, and that it's military power, though dangerous, is out matched, out gunned and out manned. That the minefields in the DMZ do more to keep citizens in North Korea than keeping military forces from the south out. That they are starving, only because the "Little Un" must stay in power.

    So they are pointing their speakers the same direction as the South's are. They are all pointed north. Which is why you cannot hear them in the South, because it wouldn't matter and North Korea knows it.

    --
    "File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
  18. Re:I can't work out what this would achieve. by Fire_Wraith · · Score: 2

    That's certainly a part of it. It's a lot easier to believe the propaganda when you're not directly confronted with the truth on a day to day basis. That doesn't make them any less wrong or delusional, but it's not unimaginable. People in general can bring themselves to believe some incredibly insane shit, especially when they've surrounded themselves with a lot of like-minded individuals. Studies have shown that pointing out the truth of the matter just causes them to become even more fervent about it, because by that point, they've made those falsehoods a part of their belief system, and attacks on those beliefs are the same as attacks on their very sense of self.

  19. The contents of the message by MobyDisk · · Score: 2

    If I had control of loudspeakers that could cover a large area like that, I would have it repeat a recording of someone saying "ok google show me silly pictures of Kim Jong-un." Unfortunately, they probably don't have too many smart phones over there.

  20. Is the South really broadcasting "propaganda"? by GPS+Pilot · · Score: 2

    I would like to know the nature of the South's "propaganda" broadcasts. If the South is simply providing factual information about the outside world to residents of the North, "propaganda" is not a good term for it.

    --
    That that is is that that that that is not is not.