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North Korean leader | Kim Il-sung |
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Kim Il-sung (1912~1994) |
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Mangyungdae,
Kim Il-sung’s place of birth, has become
a place of pilgrimage due to his cult
of personality |
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Kim Il-sung was born ‘Kim Sung-ju’ on April 15,
1912 in Nam-ri, Gopyung District of South Pyongan
Province’s Daedong County (currently the Mangyung-dae
area of Pyongyang City) to father Kim Hyung-jik
and mother Kang Ban-suk. Shortly after his birth,
Kim’s family moved to the Jilin Province’s Fu-ssung
City in Manchuria. Kim entered the Yuk-mun middle
school in 1926 but dropped out three years later.
Trained as a special ops agent by Soviet forces,
he returned to North Korea as a major in the Red
Army following the end of WWII.
Fully backed by Soviet forces, Kim grasped power
in the communist party and North Korea government.
He then invaded South Korea in 1950 to start the
Korean War. After the War, he eliminated dissidents
such as the Yon-an, Gapsan, and Soviet-based factions
to solidify a one-man rule system. A cult of personality
bordering on deification developed around Kim since
the late 1960s. Therefore, modern and contemporary
The North Korean history is none other than that of
Kim and his family.
During his later years, North Korea suffered from
political alienation and economic isolation due
to the rift that had formed since the late 1980s
between the two great communist powers - China and
Russia.
Furthermore, the North Korean economy was stagnating
due to its innate problems. Kim Il-sung attempted
to overcome these difficulties through improving
North-South relations. Although he went was far
as pursuing a summit meeting between the two Koreas,
he died of a heart attack on July 8, 1994.
His elder son, Kim Jong-il, was able to succeed
to power, thanks to the painstaking preparations
that had been underway for more than a decade, the
overwhelming cult of personality, and the unique
charisma of Kim Il-sung. Kim Il-sung certainly lives
on after his death in the monolithic thought system
of ‘Juche’. During the three-year transitional period
following his death, the deceased Kim Il-sung ruled
through the ‘bequest rule’. He still ‘reigns’ as
the ‘eternal’ President, even well into the Kim
Jong-il era.
Kim Il-sung’s body is preserved at the Presidential
Palace in Pyongyang. |
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Chronology |
1912 |
Born in Nam-ri, Gopyung
District of South Pyongan Province’s Daedong
County (Apr. 15) |
1929 |
Drops out of Yukmun Middle-school
in Chillin City, joins the ‘Communist Youth
Alliance’ |
1931 |
Joins the Chinese Communist
Party |
1935 |
Changes name to Kim Il-sung
(originally Kim Sung-ju) |
1936 |
Organizes and takes office
as president of the ‘Fatherland Liberation’
clan (according to North Korean sources) |
1937 |
Raids Bocheon-bo in South
Hamgyung Province (the Bocheon-bo Battle) |
1940 |
Weds Kim Jung-sook |
1940 |
Moves from Manchuria to
the Soviet Union |
1945 |
Assigned to the 88th Special
Brigade (Khabarovsk City) of the Soviet Far-East
Command’s Reconnaissance Bureau, promoted
to major |
1945. |
Returns to North Korea |
1945 |
Executive officer and
secretary of the North Korean branch of the
Korean Communist Party |
1946. |
Chairman of the Provisional
North Korean People’s Committee (Feb. 8) |
1946 |
Vice Chairman of the North
Korean Workers’ Party (1st Congress) |
1947 |
Chairman of the North
Korean People’s Committee |
1948 |
Vice Chairman of the North
Korean Workers’ Party (2nd Congress) |
1948 |
Premier of North Korea Cabinet
(1st Cabinet) |
1949 |
Chairman of the KWP Central
Committee |
1950 |
Invades South Korea (June
25), Chairman of the Military Committee, Commander-in-chief
of the KPA |
1953 |
Receives ‘Chairman’ title,
signs ceasefire agreement, receives ‘Hero’
title |
1955 |
Emphasizes ‘Juche’ thought
in ideology project (Dec. 28) |
1962 |
Announces 'Alternative
Projects' |
1966 |
Secretary General of the
KWP Central Committee |
1972 |
Approves the ‘Socialist
Constitution’, takes office as President,
Chairman of the SPA and NDC, announces the
‘7.4 Joint Statement’ |
1980 |
Presents 'Proposal for
a Confederate Republic of Korea’ (6th KWP
Congress) |
1988 |
Proposes joint talks between
North-South leaders (during New Year’s address) |
1990 |
2nd Meeting between high
officials of North and South Korea (ROK Prime
Minister Kang Young-hoon visits North Korea) |
1991 |
Proposes to convene a
‘negotiations forum for reunification’ (during
New Year’s address), issues military-wide
mobilization alert |
1992 |
Ratifies the ‘Fundamental
North-South Agreement’ and ‘Joint Statement
for Denuclearization’ (Feb. 18), teceives
‘Higher Chairman’ title (Apr. 13) |
1993 |
Transfers NDC Chairmanship
to Kim Jong-il |
1994 |
Two meetings with former
U.S. president Carter upon his visit to North Korea (resolves 1st North Korea Nuclear Crisis), dies
from heart failure and myocardial infarction
(2:00a.m. Jul. 8) |
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Kim Il-sung - Who was he? |
There is much debate as to who Kim Il-sung
really was. The traditional cult of personality
surrounding Kim makes one hesitant to follow North
Korea's allegations at face value. Particularly,
while one can track Kim Il-sung’s history after
he returned to North Korea, his earlier years
are shrouded in obscurity.
At the heart of the debate lies the issue of whether
Kim Sung-ju is the same person as the Kim Il-sung
who we know as having ruled North Korea.
This is a sensitive issue, as it touches on his
history of resistance against the Japanese. Kim’s
supposed history as an anti-Japan leader played
a vital role in justifying his initial rise to
power in North Korea. One frequently-mentioned
achievement is the 1937 Bocheon-bo Battle, where
Kim supposedly led resistance forces to victory
over a heavily fortified Japanese police force.
The event was recorded as one that gave hope to
the Koreans and terror to the Japanese colonialists.
Kim’s public debut as a resistance hero was crafted
in 1946 by the Soviet Commander in North Korea,
Romanenko. The man that Romanenko introduced to
the people was ‘Kim Il-sung’, not ‘Kim Sung-ju’.
Therefore, some claim that ‘Kim Il-sung’ was an
alias used by Kim Sung-ju for his resistance activities,
while others believe that Kim Sung-ju had made
fraudulent use of the name of the resistance hero
Kim Il-sung.
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Cult of Personality |
Personal veneration of Kim Il-sung came into
full effect following the mass purge of anti-Kim
factions after the 1953 Korean War. The process
of establishing an unchallenged one-man rule system
was complete by 1958. The cult of personality had
two objectives: solidifying Kim Il-sung’s one-man
rule and facilitating Kim Jong-il’s future ascension
to power. Methods used to instill the cult of personality
included fabricating symbols, creative history,
and indoctrination.
There are two pillars to the veneration process.
First, Kim supposedly came from a lineage of people’s
leaders ever since the time of King Sunjo of the
Chosun Dynasty. Upholding the family tradition,
Kim had become a hero in the anti-Japanese resistance.
Such is the ‘reconfigured’ version of Korean history
used for the process of indoctrination.
Therefore, modern Korean history was focused around
Kim’s lineage while the history of anti-Japanese
resistance recounted the heroic exploits of Kim
Il-sung the revolutionary. The north korean version
of history served to justify the one-man rule regime
under Kim. Second, Kim’s various abilities were
praised to the extreme. Not only was he a resistance
hero, he was also a thinker greater than Marx or
Lenin and a theorist of unfathomable wisdom on all
subjects including politics, economics, society,
culture, and the arts. This is the second pillar
upholding the one-man rule. History and exceptional
individual talent were combined to justify Kim’s
regime.
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The
deification of Kim Il-sung continues
even after his death |
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The most exalted of titles, such as ‘Father Chairman’,
‘Great Chairman’ and ‘Heavenly One’ were used to
address Kim. His name was printed in bold type on
all publications, making it stand out from the rest
of the text. Furthermore, the entirety of North
Korea’s institutional documents, including the constitution,
labor laws, land laws, and educational theses were
authored by Kim. All publications, including newspapers,
magazines, school textbooks, and academic texts,
were prefaced by ‘words of instruction’ from Kim.
All North Koreans were taught at school that they
were clothed, fed, and nurtured in all aspects of
life by the ‘grace of the Chairman’. A portrait
of Kim was to be placed in all homes, while ‘places
of worship’ including 35,000 statues of Kim, were
erected throughout the nation.
The deification continued even after Kim’s death.
His body is preserved ‘for all eternity’ at the
Presidential Palace in Pyongyang, while his authority
remains enshrined through the title ‘Eternal President’,
the supposed apex of the ‘bequest rule’ system.
Thus, Kim Il-sung’s eternal authority serves to
justify Kim Jong-il’s one-man rule. Although it
is arguable that Kim Il-sung’s reign cannot be ‘eternal’
after all, it is still too early to tell for sure. |
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