North Korea’s Would-Be Olympics: A Tale of a Cold War Boondoggle

North Korea spent $200 million building its May Day Stadium to host the 1989 World Festival of Youth and Students, which was meant to outdo the Seoul Olympics of 1988.SEOUL, South Korea — During the Cold War, the one-upmanship between North and South Korea was so intense that it extended to the height of the flagpoles at their border. So when the South hosted the Summer Olympics in 1988, it was no surprise that the North tried to do it one better in 1989.

What followed was one of the biggest boondoggles in North Korean history, one that played a part in the economic catastrophe that soon engulfed the country, according to analysts and North Korean defectors.

By some estimates, the North spent…