as the cause for the move to military-first politics. When Kim Il-sung died, he left leadership of North Korea to his son, Kim Jong-il. At the time of his father's death, the most important position held by Kim Jong-il in the North Korean government was military, specifically second in command of the military. Additionally, in order to keep control of the government Kim Jong-il would need to secure his support base within the Korean People's Army. This line of argument points out that Kim Jong-il deliberately chose to sideline other aspects of the government in order to assert the primacy of the Korean People's Army. This included abolishing the , the state presidency and sidelining the North Korean Administration Council. Political implications One implication of policies is that they not only worked with , the self-reliance ideal promoted by Kim Il-sung, but it also replaced it as the central state ideology as Kim Jong-il consolidated his power. The ascendency of the Korean People's Army concerns South Korea and ties into the debate over the Sunshine Policy, its most recent vision of Korean reunification. Given North Korea's insistence that Songun will facilitate reunification, it is difficult to tell what they expect in the future from South Korea, whose government is not at all supportive of policies, going so far as to outlaw websites within South Korea that promote North Korea's military-first ideas. politics have also thrived on the ongoing nuclear crisis. For the United States, given that its primary concern is the denuclearisation of the peninsula, the concept of military-first politics and ideology is a troubling one. also seems to fit very well with the possession of nuclear weapons and can be seen as a way of making such weapons central to the government's guiding ideology of self-governance. This leads to the concern that the longer military-first ideology guides the North Korean government, the less likely it will be that the United States will be able to convince North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons programme. A similar concern is that North Korea could perceive attempts at denuclearisation and normalisation of affairs with the United States as a threat to the primacy of the military within North Korea and thus a threat to ideology, a fear which puts into doubt the idea that North Korea may become willing to give up its nuclear weapons programme. Economic implications "Military-first politics" originated