Four years later “The Mole” is still raising questions
4 Years after the groundbreaking documentary came to world, the impact of this film still remains unclear (Image: Piraya Film)
When it came out, the 2020 documentary miniseries “The Mole: Undercover in North Korea” was a revelation, the clearest ever view through the window into arms dealing and sanctions busting of the world’s most brutal dictatorship.
Yet four years later and after the indictment of one of the main characters, it seems that the impact of the film lies more in the questions it raises – about the subjects it depicts as well as its own origins – than in those it attempts to answer. This debate may have important implications for other attempts at the “civilian intelligence” operations aimed at North Korean targets which have become prized among some journalists.
Billed as a real-life undercover thriller, the film uses overt and sometimes hidden recording devices, to chronicle the ten-year ascent of a Danish chef, Ulrich Larsen, through the ranks of the Korean Friendship Association, a pro-North Korean organization run by a Spanish Kim Jong-un advocate, Alejandro Cao de Benós. Larsen and writer-director Mads Brügger successfully use the KFA’s contacts to bait officials in Pyongyang into a convoluted project to sell arms to an invented oil billionaire, also a plant from the production team.
Among North Korea experts, the film’s premise raised immediate questions. University of Vienna academics Ruediger Frank and Peter Ward, writing in the Stimson Center’s 38 North, raised the most obvious one: Is this real? Frank and Ward point out that at least parts of the film are authentic. It really does feature Cao de Benós, for example. He is a well-known figure among international North Korea watchers. Also, at least one of the North Korean officials involved in meetings in the film has been identified as a diplomat.
But other details raise eyebrows. For example, in one key scene, the main characters meet purportedly in a concealed basement conference room in Pyongyang. There, the North Koreans offer the film’s moles a catalog of arms for sale, complete with prices in USD. The officials allow the discussion, as well as the catalog and parts of a contract apparently signed with the oil billionaire committing to the establishment of a third-country munitions factory to be filmed. Why would they do this?
And so begins the first set of questions the film raises. These are questions about those it depicts. Cao de Benós is often the subject of skepticism regarding the extent of his actual connections in DPRK. Some believe he lacks high-level access. But if the scene in the film is genuine, it suggests his claims of closeness to leadership are warranted.
One detail missed by other commentators concerns the brief glimpse of the contract itself. It appears to be an agreement with a UK-incorporated entity called Taga Investment Ltd. There is no record of such an entity ever having existed, a finding consistent with the film’s story of it being a name invented on the spot, but strange given the ready availability of the same records to North Korean operatives doing even the most basic due diligence on their counterpart over the course of several years.
North Korea’s state-sanctioned criminal rings have proven themselves experts in money laundering, using advanced schemes to successfully evade even some of the efforts of the New York Federal Reserve to trace funds. The outright deployment of a UK-incorporated company, with its auditing and public reporting requirements, to engage in an internationally illicit arms deal would surely have raised red flags with criminals having even a passing familiarity with the principles of money laundering.
The question about Cao de Benós, then, seems to sharpen. Undoubtedly, the North Korean regime has officials capable of brokering a complex international weapons sale. Perhaps those individuals were not the ones Cao de Benós could access. At the film’s conclusion, de Benós claimed he had been planning his own counter-sting throughout the decade of filming. While this is unlikely, it seems possible his North Korean contacts intended to scam him and his prospective buyer, taking a down payment and never delivering. The DPRK is no stranger to reneging on contracts (just ask Volvo). This could explain why a lower caliber of operatives were involved with the operation.
The film’s “mole” character Ulrich Larsen, however, suggests his access to North Korean officials really was at the highest level. In a phone interview, he claimed that off camera he came “within eight feet” of Head of State Kim Jong-un.
The explanation espoused by the film’s editorial approach, and defended by its director in an interview, is that the North Koreans involved were just “desperate.” This may well be the case.
In an academic analysis written for The Nonproliferation Review, Daniel Salisbury of King’s College London compared the elements seen in the film to known North Korean arms deals. Though unusual, Salisbury found that direct arms trade through private individuals is not unprecedented for the DPRK, who are known to have brokered a deal with Azerbaijan through British arms mogul Michael Ranger. Those trades were made directly with a subsidiary of a North Korean weapons manufacturer, matching the detail seen in the signature line of the contract shown in the film. Salisbury’s analysis of the prices and technical details of the weapons in the catalog shown in the film suggests these are also reasonable.
For his part, Larsen believes the closeness of the relationship he built with North Korean officials explains their conduct. “Finally, I came with some people that didn’t care about any sanctions and we had the money,” he said. The decoy used as the potential buyer in fact had a real-life record as a high-flying drug dealer, he added.
If desperation and the film crew’s maneuvering are the best explanations for the behavior of the North Korean subjects, what about the Americans?
Frank and Ward wondered how the filmmakers managed to escape US intelligence while ostensibly seeking to arrange an arms deal with North Korean agents and even visiting the United States for advice from a former intelligence operative there during the course of the film. One answer is that perhaps they did not escape.
In 2022, the United States Department of Justice unsealed an indictment of Cao de Benós aimed at potential sanctions violations during a cryptocurrency “conference” junket he arranged for Western experts in Pyongyang. The indictment alleges the conduct began “at least in or about 2018.” Larsen said Cao de Benós approached him about the ill-fated conference, now the subject of multiple US criminal investigations, during his work. He says he declined to assist. Still, this means US federal agencies would have been watching Cao de Benós carefully at precisely the time the mole was working with him. Were US agencies aware of the film that was being produced?
“I’ve been asking myself this several times over the years,” Larsen said. “Maybe they knew what I was doing and actually were sitting on the sideline somehow watching over me for my security.” But he believes the FBI and CIA were not aware of his work until the release of the film. Some level of US intelligence cooperation, though – whether known to individuals on the film’s team or not – could explain how they passed off their ex-drug dealer as a billionaire venturing into weapons manufacturing.
Public response to the film in the international community might be described as muted. Foreign ministers for Sweden and Denmark called on the UN Sanctions Committee to investigate, and its Panel of Experts recorded answers from Cambodia, Uganda, and other states featured in various aspects of the film. This is about as far as consequences seem to have extended.
Asked whether he was approached by intelligence agencies for private debriefing once the film was released, Larsen said he had “no comment.” He did say, however, that he let authorities in Europe know of a scheme he uncovered during filming to move North Korean officials using Chinese passports.
The limited international response to the film may mean that while fascinating to a general viewer, it did not expose conduct that sanctions experts weren’t already aware of. This would point to an important implication for “civilian intelligence” operations.
Many journalists approaching North Korea have tried to dig beneath the surface of curated encounters with the state. Some have had surprising success. In 2011, VICE journalists chased a DPRK logging group around the Russian countryside for unapproved minutes-long interviews with ordinary North Koreans. In 2019, YouTube travel vlogger Anton Lyadov smuggled a genuinely unusual film out after a Pyongyang tour where he analyzed the movements of handlers and others to uncover insights into their lives behind the scenes. While this type of work has undeniable intrigue for a population desperate to look behind the doors of state secrecy, it is uncertain whether it has added much to our understanding of the international players involved. At worst, these projects put lives at risk inside and outside of North Korea.
Given the secrecy filmmakers maintain about their involvement with international authorities behind the scenes, we can’t say much more about the legacy of “The Mole” either. Four years later, the impact and meaning of the film remain uncertain.
Andrew Holzman is a former corporate lawyer who practiced with leading global law firms in London, Sydney and Dubai. He has worked as an advocate on human rights issues internationally, and is currently studying medicine in the United States.
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- Four years later “The Mole” is still raising questions - September 13, 2024