Answer: Being caught using a forged passport while attempting to visit Tokyo Disneyland
Kim Jong-nam’s downfall is one of those stories that feels almost surreal, like something out of a spy novel—except it happened in the opaque, paranoia-fueled world of North Korean politics.
In 2001, Kim Jong-nam, the eldest son of Kim Jong Il and the presumed heir to the North Korean leadership, made a critical error. He was caught using a forged Dominican Republic passport while trying to enter Japan to visit Tokyo Disneyland.
At face value, it seems like a bizarre and almost whimsical mistake for someone of his standing, but the consequences were anything but. The arrest, while seemingly trivial, embarrassed the regime on an international stage and, more importantly, his father, Kim Jong Il.
This was the moment when Kim Jong-nam went from the golden child to the exiled son, sent away from the future he was groomed for. The trip to Tokyo wasn’t just a personal misstep; it symbolized everything the North Korean regime feared—openness, curiosity about the outside world, and the potential for vulnerability. Imagine for a moment what it must have been like for Kim Jong Il. He had carefully crafted this facade of an invulnerable North Korean regime, only to have his son caught indulging in what the regime would consider Western frivolities. The embarrassment was magnified by Kim Jong-nam’s use of a fake passport, revealing that even the dictator’s son needed to break international law to satisfy his desires.
But there’s a deeper layer to this incident. Kim Jong-nam himself later claimed that his loss of favor had little to do with Disneyland. He argued that his true crime was advocating for reform, for opening up North Korea’s economy, for following the model of China, which had begun to integrate with the global economy while retaining its authoritarian grip. This notion—that the son of Kim Jong Il had developed capitalist leanings—was unthinkable in a regime built on isolation and state control. The Disneyland incident became a convenient excuse, a tipping point, but the seeds of disfavor had been sown long before, through Jong-nam’s dangerous ideas of modernization.
And here’s where the story veers into classic tragedy. Kim Jong-nam wasn’t just exiled; he became a symbol of what could have been—a North Korea led by a man educated in Switzerland, a man who might have been able to bring the country into the 21st century, had things played out differently. Instead, his half-brother, Kim Jong Un, rose to power, and Jong-nam lived his later years as a nomad, constantly looking over his shoulder. He avoided North Korea at all costs, knowing that his existence was a threat to the regime’s stability.
This sense of paranoia was not unfounded. In February 2017, while at Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia, Kim Jong-nam’s life came to a sudden and violent end. Two women approached him and smeared a lethal nerve agent, VX, on his face. VX is a deadly chemical weapon, and within moments, Kim Jong-nam was in agony. He collapsed and died shortly after. The assassination was a bold move, carried out in public, in broad daylight, using a banned chemical weapon in a crowded airport. Although the North Korean government denied any involvement, it is widely believed that Kim Jong Un ordered the killing. Kim Jong-nam had been a potential threat to Kim Jong Un’s regime, not because he sought power, but because his very existence posed a challenge to the North Korean leadership’s stability.
The two women who carried out the attack, an Indonesian named Siti Aisyah and a Vietnamese woman named Đoàn Thị Hương, claimed they believed they were participating in a prank for a television show and were unaware of the deadly nature of the substance they were handling. They were initially charged with murder but were eventually released after their charges were reduced. For Kim Jong-nam, the assassination was the final chapter in a life that started with promise and ended with betrayal and brutality, emblematic of the harsh realities of North Korean politics.
