NORTH KOREAN WAR THREAT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79R00967A001100030036-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 30, 2006
• Sequence Number: 36
• Publication Date: April 10, 1967
• Content Type: NOTES

Approved For Release 2006/11/04: CIA-RDP79R00967AO0 100030036-8
S-E-C-R-E-T
10 April 1967
1. The referenced MIS material is a fair sample of the overt
Pyongyang line on the many shooting incidents in the Korean DMZ
area over the past six months.
2. Why this seeming frenzy of excitement and why the
apparent increase in North Korean violence along the DMZ?
3. There are probably two main reasons: (a) Pyongyang
has decided that some heightening of tension along the DMZ would
provide Hanoi and the Communist World with (relatively riskless
and inexpensive) evidence of North Korean solidarity in the anti-
US struggle in Asia; and, (b) Pyongyang seeks to drive home to
South Koreans -- on the eve of national elections -- the lesson
that the Pak government is leading South Korea toward another civil
war and, at the same time, has jeopardized its defenses by
shipping 50,000 troops to South Vietnam.
We refer to the items on pp. ggg 1-9 of the 7 April "Asia
and Pacific" Daily Report.
GROUP I
Excluded from automatic
Downgrading and
Declassification
 Approved For Release 2006/11/04: CIA-RDP79R00967AQ01100030036-8
4. Pyongyang also sees the heightened tension as useful
in strengthening the arguments of some South Korean leaders and
opposition politicians against further ROK participation in the
Vietnam War. It may also hope to forestall any redeployment of
US troops from Korea to Vietnam (though obviously there are
psychological and other potential advantages for North Korea in
any US troop reduction in the ROK).
5. Another Pyongyang motive, perhaps more important than
we know, is its need to stimulate greater effort on the part of
a disillusioned population on the lagging economic front. Per-
haps too, the North Koreans are inciting a war scare to impress
the Russians with their need for even greater quantities of
military equipment, particularly SAMs and MIG-21s (which now appear
to be maving into North Korea from the'USSR in significant numbers).
To turn the argument about: perhaps the Soviets agreed to provide
such equipment on condition that Pyongyang do its bit along the
DMZ (and provide some MIG-21 pilots for Hanoi -- which it has done).
6. The above is our way of saying that while further North
Korean incursions in the DMZ area are likely to occur, we do not
S-E-C-R-E-T
 Approved For Release 2006/11/04: CIA-RDP79R00967AO01100030036-8
0
expect even a "limited objective" invasion in force of South Korea
by North Korea in the months (or years) ahead. We continue to
estimate that Pyongyang would judge the risks to be unacceptable.