U.S. bombed in North Korean propaganda video

Please enjoy this North Korean propaganda video, which features dreams of happiness and space travel, a stirring instrumental rendition of We Are The World, and America engulfed in flames. [Video link: LiveLeak]

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gastronaut

OUR SUPREME LEADER WILL CRUSH ENEMY BY BOLD SPACE PLANE AND MIDI GLITTERSHOWER!
- http://codeflow.org/ Florian Bösch
  
  A bit like that: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f37K0hIv3zk
  - SumAnon
    
    I actually find this series kind of interesting to watch. Interesting, and a little depressing, seeing as it’s a show for kids.
    
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ynuh87S_s08
    - has English subtitles
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lB6NqkCBbhs
    -no subtitles yet
http://www.facebook.com/people/Richard-Servello/1338756221 Richard Servello

Its like something a 16 year old would make. Is it supposed to be ironic that they chose an American anthem about world peace and understanding???
- http://www.facebook.com/davejenk1ns Dave Jenkins
  
  I’ve been trying to figure that one out. The only working theory I’ve got is that the Michael Jackson song was translated into Korean, but the lyrics were probably shifted heavily toward “we are the people, let’s all live together (without oppression).” In other words, standard stuff for the oppressive DPRK.
- SamuraiMark
  
  Dog America stole anthem from Glorious Leader, original composer.
- GawainLavers
  
  In the Glorious PRK, irony gets you.
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  North Korea is a fake. We made them up so that even hard-core critics of the US would side with us occasionally.
chellberty

Usa For Africa – We Are The World
They must have never heard the lyrics.
“There are people dying and it’s time to lend a handTo life – the greatest gift of all.?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0d87N9GIW2I
Alan

The Canon camera confused me the most. Wha?
- miasm
  
  Canon, cannon’s shoot, shoot pictures, blow your mind, subliminal messages attacking you through the internet.
  Mwuahahahahaha.
saint242

The burning New York City scene is stolen from the first level of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.
xzzy

Bonus points to anyone who finds the MIDI file they pulled off the internet for the song.

It is a bit curious they featured a Canon camera, which is of Japanese manufacture. They don’t have a home brewed DSLR?
- Jussi Vainionpää
  
  The song is a cover by Richard Clayderman, a French pianist: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xgp4XVmJ7oM
donniebnyc

The best best part is the We Are the World background music. Too funny for words. Reality parodies itself.

Can someone translate the text? I’d love to know what it says.
AdrenalineSleep

As redditor joshuav85 pointed out, the footage is from an American made video game. I find the re-appropriation of Western images/music in the propaganda made by the DPRK to be infinitely fascinating. I wonder if there is any knowledge of the origin of the song in North Korea or if it’s just another piece of evidence for North Korean talent and dominance.

I can only begin to imagine the stories and experiences that would come out of a North Korea if/when the current government ceased to be. Imagine coming out into a world where you see all these things that were explained to you in one way to find out that they came from or mean something else entirely. Would it still be the rest of the planet that was crazy? Or would it finally give you an inkling as to how much the government was just lying/making things up?
jsd

Love 3 dimensional animate for make benefit glorious destruction USAmerica.
Paul Coleman

Perhaps this is Kim Jong Un’s play to join Ahmadinejad in space.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/stefan_e_jones/ Stefan Jones

Ah, North Korea! The only country where a dream about rockets repeatedly lifting off and genocide is thought of as a good thing.
- GawainLavers
  
  If only…
  - http://www.flickr.com/photos/stefan_e_jones/ Stefan Jones
    
    I’m sure you could find, with little work, creepy crappy racist / jingoist stuff on YouTube which makes this DPRK dream video look tame.
    
    But there is a big difference between having a country where there are creeps and cranks who fetishsize destruction and a country where official government organs put out bizarre stuff like this.
    - GawainLavers
      
      No desire to draw a false equivalence between a deeply flawed democracy and an unrelenting nightmare like NK, but in terms of this video only (“It seems that the nest of wickedness is ablaze with the fire started by itself.” is hardly “genocide”), it doesn’t do much more than recap Bush’s bullshit Mars announcement and “Shock and Awe” nonsense.
- vonbobo
  
  “Ah, North Korea! The only country where a dream about rockets repeatedly lifting off and genocide is thought of as a good thing.”
  yeah… glad no one has that false impression about my country! #doh!
TheMudshark

I wonder what Kim Jong Un, having been brought up in the West, thinks about the production values of this video.
GuyInMilwaukee

I’d love to see a translation of the text over the video. It might explain a few things.. or scare the crap out of me further. Anyone?
- joelogs
  
  Some generous soul attempted this on reddit.
  http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/17xe4c/north_korea_poised_to_conduct_a_nuclear_test_any/c89qlf2
Lord Humongous

I started to watch this and then I realized that there is probably some subliminal psychological attack embedded in the video. Luckily I was able to interpret these feelings correctly: loss of essence. The hope of the North Koreans is that this goes viral and then it’s brain haemorrhages everywhere.
- Amber Light
  
  Military uses of a video. Something like military uses of killingly funny jokes
  
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gpjk_MaCGM
- danegeld
  
  Loss of essence, Captain Mandrake. Those dirty commie preverts are floridating my water
duncancreamer

Has anyone translated the text?
Sanjaya Kumar

What’s the story with the dude in the beginning and end who slept through it all? Was it supposed to be his dream?
http://profile.yahoo.com/6CWG4MGNQFRSZI5NGY3PBOO3X4 Alexandros

So miniluf WAS telling the truth!
Eastasia IS at war with Oceania!
Guillaume REMY

I’m confused. Which one is the parody ?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8o8Knf_DkCY
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000084054024 Tim OBrien

Looks like they could use 10,000 psychiatrists over there to work on the crazy.
Dr Boom

I can’t wait for that particular video to turn up on the playlist of my local Karaoke bars
Cowicide

It’s kind of a relief to see there’s somebody out there more batshit crazy than the republican party.
feetleet

FTFY. It was a productive day. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HRu8nTUt9g&feature=youtu.be
CHilke

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/feb/05/north-korea-video-us-city-flames
http://bradhicks.livejournal.com/ J. Brad Hicks

If the translation I saw this morning was accurate (link lost, sorry), then this is less crazy than it is being portrayed. Still crazy, yes, but not all that crazy.

According to the article I saw, the text over the New York in flames footage suggested that the nest of wickedness was in flames /by their own hands./ That suggests to me that the point of the video is this: by the time the North Korean space program reaches the reusable shuttle stage, the US will have collapsed via internal civil war; since (in their opinion) the only thing blocking the peaceful reunification of Korea is that the US military is propping up right-wing regimes in Seoul, then they are predicting that the day that the US military is recalled to fight in its own civil war will be the day that peace comes to Korea.

I don’t share their confidence that North Korea will ever build their own shuttle. I do find their idea that the US could have another civil war terrifyingly plausible, though, and they probably are right that a US civil war would probably result, for them locally, in the fall of South Korea. I think it’s crazy to suggest that the result would be peaceful, jubilant crowds in the former South Korean happily waving the new flag of the reunited peninsula. But it doesn’t strike me as an entirely crazy thing for them to dream about.
s2redux

An update (that no will read): Yup, Reddit called it correctly. Activision served a DMCA takedown for the scenes clipped from Modern Warfare 3 on Tuesday; by Wednesday the NK channel had removed it completely. The Beeb has posted a writeup.