In May of last year, I made a couple of posts about how the accusations of the DPRK counterfeiting US dollars was bogus (here and here).
Now a McClatchy news investigation has found no evidence that to support these allegations (Bush lying, what a surprise).
If you look at my old articles, I finger the US intelligence services as being the most likely people to do this. They have the means, and opportunity, and as to motive, it allows them to hand out a suitcase full of cash without it appearing on budget.
Klaus Bender, the author of a book on the subject, “Moneymakers: The Secret World of Banknote Printing,” said that the phony $100 bill is “not a fake anymore. It’s an illegal parallel print of a genuine note.”
“It goes way beyond what normal counterfeiters are able to do,” said Bender, whose book first spotlighted the improbability of North Korean supernotes. “And it is so elaborate (and expensive) it doesn’t pay for the counterfeiting anymore.”
Bender claims that the supernotes are of such high quality and are updated so frequently that they could be produced only by a U.S. government agency such as the CIA.
As unsubstantiated as the allegation is, there is a precedent. In his new book on the history of the CIA, journalist Tim Weiner detailed how the agency tried to undermine the Soviet Union’s economy by counterfeiting its currency.