What's going on with North Korea's Kim Jong Un? President Trump throws cold water on reports Kim is gravely ill

President Trump at the Coronavirus briefing. Reuters. 

President Donald Trump said he did not believe reports that Kim Jong Un is gravely ill. Reuters. Trump said that he believes the reports that Kim was ill are incorrect and are based on old documents. The President has not contacted North Korea to confirm Kim Jon Un's health but may do so in the future. Though Kim Jong Un has had some health issues, it is also not out of character for him to be out of public eye. There have been reports that Kim Jong Un had open heart surgery but they have not been confirmed. 

My Comment:

This story broke the other day and I was always a little suspicious about it. The article came from CNN and they have never been a good news organization. They use unconfirmed reports from anonymous sources and in this case the sources were people in the intel community who wouldn't have direct knowledge anyways. 

Does that mean that something happened to Kim Jong Un? I am not sure. The problem is that North Korea is such a secretive state Kim could be dead and we wouldn't know it for sure. We don't have much in the way of human assets in the country and it's very hard to confirm things happening there. 

I do think that the idea that Kim had surgery due to a bad heart is plausible. He is overweight and even though he's in the mid thirties I don't see much evidence that he has taken care of himself. It's very possible that he did indeed have some heart issues. 

The other theory I have heard is that Kim has caught the Coronavirus somehow. Though North Korea isn't really sharing data there about the outbreak it's very possible that he caught the virus from someone. If he did North Korea would want to keep it quite due to the loss of face they would suffer if they admitted that not only did they have the virus but even their leader could catch it. 

Of course all of this is speculation and it is very possible that there is nothing wrong with Kim at all. He has disappeared from the public before and it's not like he doesn't have a very good reason to do so right now. The pandemic is limiting the events of all world leaders so that's enough to explain why he hasn't been around. 

But what happens if Kim Jong Un does die? His sister, Kim Yo Jong is presumed to be next in line. She's already a major advisor and has been seen at many public events with Kim Jong Un. She's be next up if something were to happen to Kim. 

Still, I doubt that anything will come from this story, except maybe another exchange between President Trump and Kim Jong Un. If anything I think it's another example of why you shouldn't trust the news.