North Korea’s Propaganda Tactics Mirror Historical Totalitarian Methods, Expert Says

North Korean propaganda continues to employ century-old tactics used by totalitarian regimes to control populations and suppress critical thinking, according to Jihyun Park, a British Korean Conservative politician and North Korean escapee.

The regime’s persistent imagery of leader Kim Jong Un riding a white horse on Mount Paektu—a symbol that recently puzzled a Polish university student—represents more than mere political theater. This imagery directly traces its lineage to Kaiser Wilhelm II’s propaganda techniques of the early 20th century.

“The ‘white horse’ symbol can be traced back a century to the Kaiser’s propaganda,” explains Park. “He was obsessed with visualizing himself as a monarch blessed by divine grace, adorned in splendid military uniforms and mounted on a white horse.”

This symbolism serves a specific purpose: it presents the leader not as someone requiring legitimacy through democratic means, but as a figure “beyond doubt” whose authority is absolute and unquestionable.

The Kim regime has adapted these tactics under the banner of the “Baekdu bloodline,” transforming what might be political legitimacy elsewhere into something resembling religious lineage. This approach eliminates the space where rational judgment might intervene, replacing individual thought with collective obedience.

North Korea’s propaganda machine has also appropriated natural landmarks for political purposes. While Nazi Germany once used the Harz Mountains to inspire national pride, North Korea has gone further by physically altering Mount Paektu itself.

“North Korea has effectively taxidermized the vast natural landscape of Mount Paektu into the private domain of the Kim family,” Park notes. Living trees have been stripped and carved with political slogans as “slogan trees,” while massive rock faces bear inscriptions like “Jong-il Peak”—representing what Park calls a “grotesque culmination of idolization.”

Like all totalitarian propaganda systems, North Korea’s requires external enemies to maintain internal cohesion. The regime routinely directs dehumanizing language toward South Korea and the United States, labeling them with terms like “American running dogs,” “idiots,” and “rabid beasts drenched in blood.”

Former South Korean President Park Geun-hye faced particularly severe personal attacks in North Korean propaganda, including being called a “prostitute,” “comfort woman of the United States,” and “cunning courtesan.” North Korean media also targeted her appearance and unmarried status with terms like “wrinkled old face covered in heavy makeup” and “bizarre old maid.”

These tactics mirror how Nazi propaganda once vilified Winston Churchill and Britain, dehumanizing opponents to justify violence and shift blame for domestic failures onto external enemies.

“When an opponent is depicted not as human, but as a ‘monster,’ all violence becomes justified,” Park explains. “Complex reality is reduced to simple hatred, and human beings are diminished into disposable targets.”

Breaking the grip of such propaganda requires more than counter-information. Park emphasizes that escaping indoctrination begins with “the permission of small doubt” and “contact with reality.” For many North Koreans, this comes through external broadcasts like Voice of America-Korea and Radio Free Asia-Korea.

“They are windows that prove the existence of another world,” Park says of these media outlets. While listeners may not immediately believe what they hear, repeated exposure eventually plants seeds of doubt.

Drawing from her own experience as a two-time escapee from North Korea, Park maintains that individual questioning remains the most powerful antidote to propaganda. “The courage to see nature as nature and history as history, the ability to pause amid a flood of engineered information and think for oneself—these alone can strip Mount Paektu of its chains.”

As propaganda continues to evolve in the digital age, Park warns that sophisticated psychological engineering now extends beyond traditional totalitarian states, with some climate change narratives potentially employing similar techniques of moral authority to control public opinion.

“Propaganda offers you the illusion of community,” Park concludes, “but in return, it demands your critical reason.”