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Kcna Via Kns / AFP - Getty Images
North Korea's military chief of staff Ri Yong Ho is shown earlier this year.
SEOUL -- North Korea's military chief, a close ally of the reclusive state's new leader Kim Jong Un, has been relieved of all his posts due to illness, the country's official news media said on Monday.
Ri Yong Ho was relieved of all his political posts in the ruling Workers' Party Korea at a politburo meeting on Sunday, including a powerful position as vice chairman of the Central Military Commission, North Korea's official KCNA news agency said.
Ri, 70, is a career military man who held the rank of vice-marshal, according to South Korean government database.
Ri has been a prominent member of new leader Kim's circle of close political allies. Kim took power after his father Kim Jong-il died last December.
It was not clear who would succeed Ri. North Korea didn't elaborate on Ri's condition or future.
Ri has been at Kim Jong Un's side since the young man emerged as his father Kim Jong Il's successor in 2010, often standing between father and son at major events. That role appeared to deepen after Kim Jong Il's death in December, helping the younger Kim solidify support among the military.
Ri wielded power from his position at the intersection of three crucial institutions: the Korean People's Army, the Central Military Commission of the ruling Workers' Party and the Standing Committee of the party's influential Political Bureau.
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Ri also oversaw an influential Kim Jong Un support group comprising officers in their 50s and 60s whom commanders consider rising stars, according to Ken Gause, a North Korea specialist at CNA, a U.S.-based research organization.
Hong Hyun-ik, an analyst at private Sejong Institute near Seoul, was skeptical about the illness claim, saying that when top North Korean officials do get sick, they typically remain in office while deputies handle their duties. There had been no previous sign that Ri was ill, he added.
Kyodo / Reuters file
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, right, exchanges smiles with the chief of general staff of the Korean People's Army Ri Yong Ho during a military parade in February. Yong was relieved of duties Sunday, the state's news agency reported.
Hong said the change appears aimed at replacing an appointee of Kim's late father with a closer confidant.
"It can be seen as part of a general change," Hong said, adding that he expects similar news on the dismissal of other aging, senior officials will come out in coming weeks.
Animosity on the Korean Peninsula has deepened since a North Korean rocket launch in April that the U.N. called a cover for a banned long-range missile test. North Korea says it was a satellite launch.
North Korea has repeatedly threatened harm to South Korea's president and his supporters in recent months, angry over perceived insults to its leadership and recent U.S.-South Korean military drills that Pyongyang says are a prelude to an invasion.
This article includes reporting by Reuters and The Associated Press.
When North Korea's new young leader spoke in public he surprised his own people and the world. Nothing like that had been seen or heard for years. Kim Jong Un's apparent openness was revolutionary, so too was his promise to end hunger. ITN's Angus Walker reports.
More world news from msnbc.com and NBC News:
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Isolation and starvation are causing problems in N. Korea. If a few more important men shall be "sick", a coup will be coming. The young Kim may have to attack the S. Korea to solidify his position and to get rid of some potential rebels in his army!!!
There is a great article at The Rugged Gent called The Last Bastion of the Cold War about the conflict in Korea. It really opened my eyes to what happend there.
Actually, he drew the short straw last time and they carved him up to restock the freezer last week.
His 'illness' is the result of being fired - not vice versa.
As an old intelligence analyst (North Korean specialist) I can tell you that this sort of change is usually followed by an provocative incident against the South. Such incidents are how the top leaders in North Korea "exercise" the chain of command to ferret out any hesitation, disloyalty or incompetence. My guess is that the ROK military and USA forward-deployed forces are in a high state of intelligence alert (though not necessarily a high state of combat alert.) If this is going to happen it will happen quite soon --- less than 60 days --- after the replacement takes charge. (We may not know who the replacement is or when the slot is actually filled for up to a year.)
OK. The parents (Military Complex) fired the Nanny. Big Deal. The parents will make sure Kim still has enough toys to get him through til the next Nanny is put in place. Kim is just a tool.
So true, just ask any president of the United States.
They are dull pitchforks in the tool shed too.
I can understand the medical complications.
Ever wonder why the beloved, majestic, cool as hell, etc, etc. leaders always look so "healthy"?
Lobster, steak and Twinkies can be bad on great leaders.
Especially when everyone else is starving to death there.
North Korea - NUTS.
Next, who cares?
China will decide who leads the country and how they lead. Ri probably upset the Chinese and was ousted.
China has little to no say in North Korea. The situation is very similar to the relationship between the US and Israel. The situation with countries along China's border is far, far more complex than that.
Relived of Duty.
Otherwise known as DEAD.
That was my thoughts immediately after reading he was relieved of duty.
Sounds like a terminal case of lead poisoning to me.
Who cares about N Korea? Let's have newes of articles about starving USA kids, lack of jobs, families being destroyed for the sake of big corporations, now that's a good subject to place in the newes not North Korea, what a waste of time.
Do say. I live in a low-to-middle-class area of America and I've never heard of a child starving, unless their parents deliberately withheld food. There are more than enough programs and organizations to make sure nobody starves. And the chief reason families are destroyed is because parents cannot get along and break up. The "me-first" society we live in doesn't lend itself well to long term marriages. Broken homes are the biggest driver of poverty today.
Thank you Bernardo, well said.
Think the Vice-Marshal is either DEAD or has been sent to the countryside for "re-education" and to farm for the Supreme, Dear, Ultimate, Magnificent, Glorious,Majestic, Son Of Heaven Leader.
Why the heck are we so scared of these people? They all look like they have the IQ of a flea and need some serious gym time. We should invade and finish the Korean conflict once and for all. I think even China is getting tired of these fat fools.
Call me psychic but I think soon he will have a very bad car accident.
More likely, he will die of malnutrition in a prison camp, unless he is lucky enough to catch and eat enough mice there to satisfy his bodies need for protein.
Unless he has really screwed up, they will just let him retire and collect a rather handsome pension and perks. The problem is that he had lots and lots of connections in the military and the Communist Party and wielded lots of influence. When people like that are replaced, the usual thing is to have lots of public honors and then allow them to retire with grace. If they are "good boys" and do not cause trouble, they are allowed to live out their lives in comfort. Sometimes that are even "rehabilitated." But if they are not good boys, even if their is a tiny suspicion that they are keeping up old connections, they have that fatal heart attack and get buried will full state honors.
Just taking someone like this out and shooting him denies the leadership the chance to fully discover his line of influence and determine who might be allied with him. Shoot him and anyone very closely connected with him may decide that they have nothing to lose and try something such as a coup.
Oversimplifying things like this is a huge mistake. These people have been playing a complex game of brinkmanship since 1953 and they play it very well, mostly because they have all the aces. Every President since Eisenhower has tried to figure out how to gain leverage against the North Koreans and have failed. The only one they have respected all was Clinton, and that respect was small and entirely the admiration of one political game-player for another.
north korea ought to become China's southeastern peninsular glass factory
Illness = Bullet wound to the forehead. Pay close attention to North Korea, because it's the "ideal" for liberals in America. All who don't kneel down and pray to Obama will become "ill".
Looks like your tinfoil is much too tight today, causing interruption of the blood flow to that tiny little thingie between your ears.
LB my being a conservative have to point out that your statement was over the wall stupid.
Hey yo=Ri yong ho if you can't march the goose step without barfing, then get the hell out of here go home
drink some pepto bismal pop some pills.Your sick the big boss don't need ya no more!!
Need to loose weight heres three diet programs ghandie weight loss program,northeast africa diet,and the
North Korean weight loss diet,with the goose step marching workout program!!
we should have let Patton finnish the job over years ago
No a Liberal President sold us out.
Than his V.P. threw our soldiers in there.
After he allowed it to be gutted.
Kinda hard to win, when your troops are green, weapons have been turned into plowshares.
Planes turned into the latest rage, aluminum cans.
And havie no intention of winning.
We would repeat that 8 years later. In a Country few Americans even knew existed.
Gee, wasn't that one started when we had a Democrat in Office???
Ron White 4995253
Err, the job that Patton was doing was in Europe during WW II. Perhaps you are thinking of MacArthur? He was in Korean War as Allied Supreme Commander. He was recalled by Harry Truman when he wanted to press forward North of the 38th Parrallel up to the Chinese Border.
Actually Patton and MacArthur were very similar in that they both believed they were smarter and better than their superior officers. Patton wanted to take on the Red Army after the defeat of Germany and thought that Eisenhower was a weakling. MacArthur wanted to use the atomic bomb on the Korean peninsula and take on the Chinese army. He had no respect for his Commander in Chief, said so publicly, and of course was sacked. Both men (Patton was actually a better General) suffered from dangerously over inflated egos.
@RonWhite?
Patton???? What the heck would Patton have done? He died before he even left Europe after WWII and was headed for retirement. Just too high maintenance to be a good peacetime general. Getting killed in a car wreck was the best thing he ever did in terms of his image.
You probably mean Dougout Doug MacArthur. MacArthur hated Eisenhower with all his heart. Hated Truman. Hated Nimitz. And was a really cowardly and crappy general during WWII. (Remember that he was run out of the Philippines by a force 1/4 his size.) That's why he was never made Supreme Commander in the Pacific as Eisenhower was in Europe. The only thing that he did in his whole career that could have been considered "brilliant" was the Inchon landing. And the Inchon landing was a huge success more in spite of MacArthur than because of him. The guy was an ego-ridden politico who made his "breakout" rank by riding down American protesters in Washington during the Depression. At the time his adjutant also made "breakout" rank --- Eisenhower. MacArthur always hated that he was in Ike's shadow and it drove many of his decisions. Truman was asked later if he did wrong in firing MacArthur --- and he said, yes that he should have fired him as his first act as President.
If MacArthur had his way, he would have gotton the Chinese fully mobilized against US and when we started losing badly would have used nukes. Unfortunately nukes are not a particularly good weapon against massed troops --- they work better against urban areas and specific fixed targets. Troops would simply "button up" and wait for bad weather to attack. Most people don't realize that nukes are almost completely ineffective against troop concentrations in the rain --- even in a heavy fog. MacArthur would have started WWIII if he had been allowed.
Read some of the biographies of people who worked for him. He was a deceitful and self-serving tyrant whose ego was said by George Marshal to be so "big as to block out the sun." This was a man who died without a single friend in the world. Sad.
Chris--It is indeed a pleasure to know that at least some Americans have a grasp of true American history. A fine post.
And the house cleaning begins.
This could get ugly as they lose the old guard who remember the devastation of conflict. To a younger group who only know the hate but know nothing of the result's of takeing the wrong action. Their heads are full of the so called power of NK.
I have stood on the DMZ and looked into their faces, those people hate us more than you can imagine. Eventually the situtation between North Korea and the world will have to be resolved and I think LuvHeat had it right - a big glass factory. Unfortunately parts of South Korea will become glass as well. Just my opinion, I could be wrong.
"Yes, he became sick very suddenly, in fact he will die tomorrow at 7:15 PM." This is the type of statement that North Korea could put out and actually expect the rest of the world to believe. They are so used to their idiotic propaganda that they start to believe their own garbage.
Whatever.
For those of you who think North Korea, its military and its intentions are not important or newsworthy, I would remind you that we have 28,000 American soldiers on the front line there.
Not enough men to stop the North from invading, of course. But enough to die in the first wave and insure that America will become involved in Korean War II.
To me, those 28,000 are important. They are our men. I would prefer that they are not forced to sacrifice themselves.
We should have a public agreement with China. If the North invades, we are allowed to counterstrike and move to the Yalu river. I think the Chinese would find that a united South Korea would be a better neighbor (and trading partner) than North Korea ever was.
The dumb A$% US government makes china stronger every day giving away the US military technology. the biggest enemy that the US has is US greed
i think you may be surprise what that 28,000 could do and the fire power north Korea would not over run the border. if so would be a kill rate 5 to 1 for the north, i sure there would be some daisy cutters, coming down on there heads. like we saw in Iraq. you will be surprise the new tricks the US would love to test on humans. the US has more in the arsenal than NUKS
Kim Jing Jong Un will probably replace this puppet with one of Jongs 12 year old playmates.
Yer Pal Always,
Thee