North Korea: The Tyrant is Dead, Long Live the Tyrant

A stamp commemorates Kim Jong Il's
meeting with Hu Jintao.

Well, it's been quite a year for departures, has it not. Ben Ali, Mubarak Bin Laden. Berlusconi, Papandreou, Havel. Kim Jong Il, North Korea's beloved, is just the latest leader to vacate his throne. Will North Korea come out of the cold as a result?

I don't have a birth time, so this chart is set for noon on Korean independence day, 9 September 1948.  The Moon is cuspal, although I'd be surprised if it was not in Scorpio which fits so perfectly with N. Korea's isolationism. I've put in the transits for today and you can see that Mars is exactly on the natal Sun, and Jupiter is 2° from opposing natal Mars. I think the South Koreans are right to be on alert. Mars, of course, could be read as the young heir coming to replace the old Sun.


What is more the current transiting Uranus, planet of change, is in hard aspect to the natal Uranus in nationalistic Cancer. Transiting Uranus challenges that nationalism. Will the new leader disappoint? Jupiter, expansion, supports the natal Uranus, so I'd expect to see a huge outpouring of manic nationalistic fervour.

North Korea*

What's interesting is that Mars is spending a long time in Virgo this time around. Mars usually only spends about two and a half months in each sign.

The action planet will pass over that same degree in February and then in June 2012. That could be quite interesting. In February, Neptune (mass consciousness) will trine the natal Uranus (awakening). Both planets are in water signs, with Uranus in the sign of motherland Cancer and Neptune finally returned to its own sign, Pisces.

This is certainly a time of change for the country, but I don't think North Korea will join neatly into the pro-democracy movements that are sweeping the rest of the world. In fact, I think these may be quite dangerous times ahead for the Koreas. China, enormous and powerful, sitting on Korea's northern border, may be waiting for just this opportunity to influence a new young leader, and distract from its own internal problems.

To read my closer examination of the chart and the two Koreas' toxic sibling rivalry, click here.

*Nick Campion in his excellent Book of World Horoscopes suggests September 10 for North Korea, although he's not terribly convinced. That gives Sagittarius Moon, but I think this is the better chart - and it is for the day actually celebrated as independence day, which I feel counts for a lot. For disputed national charts, I always try to use more than one source.