North Korea’s new leader inherited a large standing conventional military. Shortly after taking over, he succeeded in launching a rocket and testing a nuclear device. His actions were likely primarily driven by domestic concerns. North Korea’s governance system seems to seek strong domestic support in part by being able to demonstrate a set of strong external forces allied against the nation, which helps to make acceptable the consolidation of decision power under one charismatic leader and justifies diverting a larger portion of the populace away from the civilian sector of the economy and into the military than is the case in any other country. This large standing conventional force demands a surprisingly modest proportion of North Korea’s overall energy usage (though a much larger fraction of the DPRK’s limited petroleum fuels supplies) indicating a large, but not particularly active military. Despite increased tensions in recent years, it is not clear that North Korea’s military has actually increased its overall energy demand. North Korean military energy usage seems more or less static over the years and is consistent with observations that North Korean rhetoric regarding potential military actions has increased, but that the actual actions of the DPRK’s conventional military remain muted.