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Before Kim Jong Un took over leadership in North Korea, his older brother Jong Chul was considered to inherit the position, and he had a brilliant plan to fight terrorism around the world. Namely: 1990s martial arts movie star Jean-Claude Van Damme.
According to a new report from The New Yorker, Jong Chul once penned poem called "My Ideal World" that included the lines, "If I had my ideal world I would not allow weapons and atom bombs anymore. I would destroy all terrorists with the Hollywood star Jean-Claude Van Damme."
The New Yorker reported, using the poem as evidence, that Jong Chul was considered too soft to become the next dictator, and so it fell to Kim Jong Un, who possessed an "inner strength."
It's a silly factoid buried in a very serious and enlightening report about the attitudes in Pyongyang and Washington in the midst of the ever-growing diplomatic crisis. The conclusion from The New Yorker's Evan Osnos, who traveled to North Korea for the story, is that neither side really has any idea what's in the mind of the other, and that is a very, very dangerous thing.
Full Report: The Risk of Nuclear War With North Korea (The New Yorker)
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