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Home › Forums › Short Online Seminars › Two Koreas, Summer 2020 › Session 1 (July 9) - 1945-1994: Kim Il Sung
Juana Evink.
cgaoHow did Kim Il Sung establish a communist monarchy? How did the Korean War and Cold War shape the two Koreas through 1994?
Video: The Two Koreas in the Kim Il Sung era (1948-1994): The Korean War and the Cold War
Readings (download below):
Tom MuellerI am going to answer the second question first - First I believe the post-World War II and Korean War played a role. After World War II, the Korean peninsula was “freed” from Japan. Now it was split between US and USSR, however there might have been a belief that they were now independent. Then the Korean War broke out when North Korea invaded the South. The death and destruction of the war on the Korea peninsula was devastating – tens of thousands of Americans, hundreds of thousands of Chinese, millions of Koreans were killed and the landscape, infrastructure, etc. were left in ruins. When the war finally ended, I wonder if Koreans just wanted peace and safety. They wanted to be able to farm their lands without being shelled or walk outside their homes without being killed or captured. The strong governmental control in the North and (at least starting out) South could also play off the fear of the other invading. Also the Korean peninsula was the ultimate chess board between the United States and Soviet Union. This not only kept resources funneling into these countries but also on US and Soviet Union’s radar screen.
In regards to North Korea, when I was younger, I would have stated this is an easy answer, he did it through fear. However as I have researched this topic and with the help of the video and texts, I would say the answer is more complex. Kim II Sung built a name for himself as a guerilla fighter on truths and propaganda. Then through Soviet financing, fear and controlling the public’s every moment, he was able to build his communist monarchy. The propaganda played up his Korean leadership skills and downplayed connections to Chinese communists. The Soviets elevated Kim II Sung to leader, but he worked hard to make his government independent (and nationalistic), even though it relied on Soviet sponsorship for funding, etc. In the beginning, the Soviets also helped by arresting people who opposed the regime. I also remember when my history teacher discussed the Cuban Revolution – as simple as it might sound – Communists could say do you want food on your table, do you want your kids to be educated, do you want health care, etc.- then you should back us. I think if I was a poor farmer and had to fight for next day’s meal, it would seem like a good deal to me. As one of the readings stated, Kim II Sung made sure this communism also followed a nationalist thread – bringing Korea (at least North Korea) together against foreign invaders, etc. Kim ruled with an iron fist, those that opposed him would eventually be sent to camps or die. He also made sure he was not only leader of the Korean Workers Party but also the Korean People Army. Kim also had the power to control the lives of everyday people (background checks of families, banned communication (radios), movement, etc.) and build his cult. Kim II Sung also could play the role of benevolent leader. As we examined in the pictures of Kim, we saw him listening and then helping people ( a very active role) – making their lives better. Finally Kim II Sung made sure he received credit – so that he could become a God.
Meghann SerilWhat I find most fascinating from the video and texts are the ways in which Kim Il Sung was able to spread his origin story and Juche ideology. The use of songs, paintings, and photographs points to the importance and influence of art in cementing Kim Il Sung's title as the "Great Leader." He is depicted as handsome, brave, and stoic in the different artworks included in the Kwon and Chung article. I noted that many of the songs address him as a father-figure from whom all good things come. As a teacher, I was of course struck by embedded examples of the greatness of North Korea and danger of South Korea and America in the children's stories and math problems. Although only 20% of the math problems are presented in word problem format, the messages about Americans and South Koreans as evil and unfortunate comes through clearly. For me, it brought up a question about what biases may be present in our own math texts and the kinds of messages it could be sending to students as they read between the lines to understand the contexts of the math problems. If someone has no other source of information that those provided by the government it is no wonder that Kim Il Sung was successful in uniting North Korea as a dependent family state.
Alyssa YffHow did Kim Il Sung establish a communist monarchy?
I found the videos and the articles really fascinating about Kim Il Sung and how he established his communist monarchy. A few items that I noted was that World War II and really the occupation of Korea/Manchuria by Japan were very important to the rise of Kim Il Sung. In the Lankov reading, there were many passages that spoke about Kim Il Sung and how his time in service to the Soviets as a guerilla fighter and eventual Commander was really important to both his ideology and political rise. As the USSR, developed the socialist state in North Korea they loked to the former guerillas in NE China to fill positions. Likewise, this experience in Manchuria was glofied through propaganda as the single most important and sacred saga in the nation's history. Without their experience with the Soviets in NE China, Kim Il Sung may not have rose to power. Likewise, the second important piece to establishing his Communist Monarchy was creating true devotion and loyalty with the Korean people. This was achieved through a few pieces:
1) The realtive ease of transition with little social disturbances and lack of inequalities (Kwon and Chung, Partisan Family State) allowed the people to feel that their country was heading in the right direction and that the regime had their best interests in mind.
2) The relative success of the initial reforms - both collectivization and social reforms that were implemented generally led to the North Korean "Miracle." Or at least the facade of a "miracle" In this Kim Il Sung used close contact with his people through "On the Spot Guidance" to build relationships. Kwon and Chung state that this was crucial to his rise as a leader and the establishment of his communist monarchy.
3) The emphasis on Filial Piety and Confucian beliefs also seems to have played a really important role in developing the "Family State" where leaders role was similar to the head of the household. We saw in images and songs how the Koreans viewed their leader with absolute authority and wisdom.
There were additional means used by Kim Il Sung as he established a Communist monarchy as well. I noticed that he definitely used methods used by Stalin and Mao like collectivization and reforms to build a communist state. I found many of the practices and the corresponding effects of these reforms of all three nations very intriguing. These articles and videos also clarified just how and why the North Koreans are so dedicated to their form of government. I felt that this was very beneficial to my teaching of the Cold War and North Korea.
How did the Korean War and Cold War shape the two Koreas through 1994?
The Korean War and Cold War played a huge role in the development of the Koreas. As stated in the first question, the Cold War was vital as both the USSR and US backed opposing governments. The USSR role in the development of North Korea is pretty clear when you see the policies of Kim Il Sung's regime. However, the US role was very fascinating and I knew very little about how the United States came into the Korean War and just the level of destruction felt in both North and South Korea. The readings made me realize just how much we do not teach students about the devastation in the Korean war. The fact that the United States dropped more bombs than in the Pacific Theater in WWII and more Napalm than in Vietnam was horrifying. We need to teach our students this information so that they understand how and why our relationship with Korean has developed since the 1950s.
The struggles felt by South Korean through those years were interesting and I knew very little about the struggles they had faced after the Korean War. In the Robinson and Beyond Numbers reading, it became clear that the initial economic devastation and political instability in South Korea really impacted their development. The various political installations almost felt authoritarian as they faced issues with elections and implemented some heavy handed reforms. However, it seemed that the United States allowed for Syngman Rhee to follow some pretty extreme measures - so it felt that we were supporting an authoritarian regime in South Korea.
Jennifer Jung-KimQuick share --Tom Mueller's lesson on North Korea and Nuclear Weapons was chosen as one of the winners of the World History Digital Education Competition. There are also many other lessons on Korea at all levels, so please check them out!
https://www.worldhistoryde.
Tom MuellerMeghann - that is a great point. This helps build the cult of Kim II Sung. It did not matter if students were learning math, literature, etc., if the constant messages that you are getting are Kim is the great leader and South Korea / US are the ultimate evils - then this type of thinking is going to becomes second nature. I remember watching a PBS special (I think) and the reporter asked a North Korean child playing a video game "...who do imagine you are killing in this game?" His response was - Americans, because they are evil. These types of messages are then compounded by North Korea being so isolated (government controls media and information, etc.). Also I remember the messages that I was getting as a young kid (many, many years ago) about the Soviet Union - Evil Empire, Stallone/Chuck Norris/Red Dawn movies. I still remember our math teacher creating word problems (that took shots at the USSR) during the 1980 Olympics, etc. From a personal stance, due to these types of messages, I did not see the USSR as "people" but as unified evil object.
Jane HannonPrior to viewing the lecture, I was vaguely aware that South Korea had evolved from an authoritarian but pro-U.S. form of government to a thriving democracy, but I was not aware of the specifics. I had not previously learned about the extensive student activism or the support of religious groups, including Christians, Buddhists, and Shamans for democracy. My question is really why the desire for democracy was so strong in South Korea during the Cold War? Many countries that became the site of Cold War proxy wars ultimately rejected the United States and much of what it stood for, including Western-style democracy, but grassroots support for democracy persisted in South Korea despite the destructiveness of the Korean War and other Cold War machinations. I am curious as to why this may have been the case?
Laura HuffmanHow did Kim Il Sung establish a communist monarchy?
From the readings and the video lecture, it appears that Kim Il Sung was able to establish a communist dictatorship through the support of the Soviets, and then playing the Chinese and Soviets off of one another, in addition to purging any potential threats to his power. The communist monarchy part is much more fascinating, as it appears he used the filial piety aspect of traditional Confucianism to create support for a kind of neo-Korean emperor; himself, and by extension, created the hereditary monarchy we see in Korea today. I'm intrigued about how this came to fruition in Korea, but not in the birthplace of Confucianism, China. Mao had 10 children, but we don't see the same concept there (no doubt for a multitude of reasons). In addition to presenting himself as a political and military leader, Kim was also able to create, through his cult of personality, a messianic concept for himself - by eliminating religion (a common occurrence in communism) - he could present himself as "the Greatest Man in the Five Thousand Years of Korean History" (Lankov, 53), a uniquely Korean Buddha or Jesus, come to save North Koreans from American democracy and capitalism, but unlike the Buddha or Jesus, he had the added benefit of having progeny to continue after his death, in addition to millions of disciples to his ideology of Juche.
How did the Korean War and Cold War shape the two Koreas through 1994?
To answer this question, I would argue we need to go back even further to the Second World War, for if that hadn't happened, there never would have been two Koreas in the first place. Unlike Germany, Korea was not an adversary during the War but rather the colony of one, Japan. And while Japan was not divided or occupied in 1945, Korea was, creating the 'two Koreas' we now have today. The Korean War was sadly an exercise in futility, the great loss of lives and livelihoods only to essentially wind up where it started, at the 38th parallel. The War sculpted a narrative for the North Koreans of Americans as destroyers of worlds; I was very surprised to see that more napalm was dropped during the relatively three short years of the Korean War than was used in Vietnam, where I think its use was more widely known. One cannot really blame the North Koreans for creating an identity in opposition to the United States, and then using that to fuel the need for authoritarian dictatorship and nuclear weapons. The Cold War clearly hardened this adversarial relationship between the two Koreas, with the Korean War (a 'hot' conflict) establishing North Korean Communism versus South Korean capitalism, if not democracy. Had Korea not been divided at the end of the Second World War, I wonder about the extent to which the United States would have supported a unified Korea as a buffer state against the spread of Chinese Communism to capitalist, democractic Japan. It's fairly clear that the United States supported strongmen like Rhee who committed their own war crimes and atrocities in the name of 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend,' and I suspect declined Chang Myon's request for assistance during the 1961 coup perhaps because they viewed Park as another strongman who would stand up to the threat posed by North Korea only 10 years after the armistice ending the Korean War (although this is just my theory!).
Laura HuffmanTom and Meghann - One of the images of the young Kim Il Sung made me look twice, because it looked so much like Kim Jong Un, who, through his clothing, weight, even haircut, is no doubt trying to emulate his grandfather, and thus adopt some of his (Il Sung's) glory for his own!
Laura HuffmanJane HannonI am embarrassed to say that prior to preparing for this session, I had really only studied or thought about the Korean War through the lens of U.S. History: not a really a war, just a U.N. peace-keeping action, mostly a stalemate, sort of a forgotten year that 21st century American students seem hardly to have heard of. "Beyond the Numbers" really brought home the brutality and the lasting consequences of what occurred: massive civilian deaths (10% of the population), the creation of millions of refugees, and the separation of families. The story of Mrs. Lee, who ventured across the 38th parallel never to see her family again, was stunning and heart-breaking. Reading about the interactions that many Koreans had with Americans during the war makes me again wonder how South Korea has maintained a good relationship with the United States in the aftermath of this.
Jane HannonI struggled a bit with the Kwon and Chung article, but my major take-aways were that several factors contributed to the establishment of a Communist monarchy. As far as establishing Communism, the Korean War seems to have helped by resulting in the relocation of some of those who would have strongly opposed Communism to South Korea. When the North rebuilt following the destruction of the war, Kim Il Sung employed propaganda in a way similar to Stalin and promoted the idea that such economic advancements as occurred were his "gifts" to the people, leading to intense personal loyalty and giving rise to a cult of personality like those of Stalin and Mao. The fact that loyalty to the leader was so highly prized made it the qualifying virtue for Kim Il Sun's successor. Since his son exemplified filial piety, he was more qualified than any other to succeed his father. And those who had fought with Kim Il Sun and the Communists in Manchuria in the 1930s formed a base of support for Kim that continued to buttress his son after his death. The hardships in Manchuria made it possible to provide meaning to the intense famine and suffering of the 1990s, perhaps preventing it from destabilizing the regime and therefore enabling the monarchy to continue.
Jasmine WeeksHow did Kim Il Sung establish a communist monarchy?
Reading about all that Kim II Sung had achieved within a few years of his reign could convince his people to hail him as king: the astounding economical growth, the social reforms, and his "on the spot" guidance approach are all seems to me proving him to be a capable and caring leader besides the fact he already had the history being victorious in fighting off the Japanese earlier on. This is especially foreseeably acceptable when their counterpart, South Korea, was experiencing political upheaval and socio economical instability for a long time until 1988. The stability that Kim II Sung could provide and the rapid modernaztion he performed initially after a war-torn era was a really welcoming sight in the 1950s. I can see that at that time many families were content and easily bought into their leader’s socialist vision and remained pious. Believing in their leader Kim II Sung could also be enhanced by knowing his dream of reuniting the north and the south eventually.
On the other hand, Kim II Sung had invested a lot in his military that his political partisan was unchallengeable. The education was shunned to the outside world, but designed to infiltrate Confucism which values respect to authority and promotes virtue attainment through personal and communal efforts. All these made his demand of the outward expression from the civilan commitment achievable, though not as voluntary later on. The interdependent relationship has secured Kim II Sung's dictatorship as long as it can be.
How did the Korean War and Cold War shape the two Koreas through 1994?
Learnign about the Korean history for the first time, I see that the Korean War divided Korea into two separate countries, North and the South Korea, while the Cold War initiated the involvement of the superpowers and further polarized their politcal ideologies and development. The result of Korean War goes beyond the demarcation on the peninsular along the 38th parallel, there were widespread devastation beyond physical structure and millions of lives lost. Above that is the diaspora of millions of Korean families whose pain and sorrow was difficult to express.
According to Bruce Cummings, the U.S. was unaware and insensitive to the culturs and background history on the Korean peninsular, in particular about the long standing enmity between the leader of North Korea and the leader of Japan. During the American occupation, South Koreans who had sided with the Japanese were recruited to help reconstruct the country. While North Korea does not appreciate the indifference the U.S. has demonstrated, fear of Soviet Union’s power extension into Korean peninsular and later into the Pacific region have caused the U.S. to have drawn the separating line in rash through the treaty, and persisted the animosity between the U.S. and North Korean.
Unlike the American individualistic society, Korean culture values family ties. Through these wars, their identities were challenged with the substantial loss or separation from family members. According to Charles Hanley, many who were killed not only as a result of the Korean War, but thousands of other were innocently killed by the South Korean/U.S. military because of the suspicion of them being a communist infiltrator. Who knows then, which one had killed more lives, the Korean War of the Cold War? It's hard to believe that massacre of refugess and leveling of cities and building without the confirmation of their true identities came out of the "fear of communism". It seems to be such a careless and over reaction. I agree with Charles Hanley and many other scholars who are studying the Korean history that the U.S. foreign policy needs to be examined more carefully.
Jasmine WeeksHi Tom,
It's interesting that you bring out how communisn was established in Cuba because of the needs of the poeple. I see similar trend in Chinese Communist Party's move when China was devoid of food and peace during the Japenese occupation. Coupled with the issues of the exploitation from the West and fallen imperial power, Mao Zedong with his new ideology was able to win many supports from his countrymen to establish his communist rule around the same time as Kim II Sung was rising up. Such united and sacrificial effort of the people has served as a strong garrison that could fence off the attack and bring a quick turn around, especially in the emergnecy state or war time.
Jasmine WeeksHi Laura,
I like your observation of the trend of communist countries in getting rid of all other religions consistently. Truly if there is no other higher entity to give hope, to provide guidance, or/and to be worshipped, a practical hero is next in line to be exalted and revered. Culture is closely tied to religion. Geeting rid of reigions is also an easier way for new ideology and culture to be brought in. On other note, I feel like having the progeny in the succesion line may not always promise the continuous reverance from the people. It would depend on the performance of the succeeding heir, and the needs of the people who may now have different expectations since they are in peaceful time and their basic needs met. Like the monarchy in Europe which eventually collapsed, people will eventually question the existence of the "more privileged" and seek to obtain more power if they could.