FREE ESSAY ON KIM IL SUNG

KIM IL SUNG

KIM IL SUNG
AN AUTOCRATIC LEADER
Kim Il Sung was the pseudonym for Kim Song Ju. He was born on April 15, 1912, at
Mangyongdae, Pyongyang, to a poor peasant family. He and his family emigrated to
Manchuria in the 1920's like many Korean families did at the time. His family was a most
patriotic and revolutionary one, and fought for many generations, from the beginning of
the modern revolutionary movement of the Korean people for the independence of the
country. He grew up receiving his revolutionary education at home, and acquiring a
revolutionary outlook on the world through study and revolutionary practice. In
Manchuria, he attended a Chinese school. He rallied young students around revolutionary
organizations, and educated and trained them through struggles against the Japanese. He
organized the Young Communist League of Korea on August 28, 1927, and was arrested and
imprisoned for a year by the Chinese authorities for having done so. After his release
from jail in 1930, he formed the first Party organization at Kalun with young communists
of the new generation whom he had trained, and it was the first organization to be the
glorious origin of the Workers' Party of Korea which were formed later. Afterwards, he
organized the Korean Revolutionary Army, which was the first armed organization of the
Korean communists that fought against the Japanese military. In 1931, he left for the
hills of eastern Manchuria to join a Chinese Communist guerrilla group fighting the
Japanese military in Manchuria. On April 25, 1932, he founded the Korean People's
Revolutionary Army, the first standing revolutionary armed force of the Korean people,
and became its commander. Between the years 1932 to 1941, he led a band of Korean
guerrillas against Japanese positions in Manchuria. It was during this time that he
assumed the pseudonym Kim Il Sung, the name of a legendary resistance fighter that caused
the Japanese a lot of trouble. In 1941, Japanese counterinsurgency forces forced him to
leave Manchuria for the Soviet Union. He remained there, and came back to Korea in 1945.
On August 15, 1945, he achieved national liberation from Japanese colonial rule. Having
received direct Soviet encouragement, he strove to unify Korea into a communism. After
the creation of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea in 1948, not only did he became
the head of the Korean Workers' Party (unified political party of the working masses),
but also became the Premier of the communist state (the Head of State). He made the
fateful decision to launch a major military campaign to unify Korea under force of arms,
and at 4 a.m. on June 25, 1950, he started the Korean War (a war between North Korea and
South Korea). He led postwar economic reconstruction and the laying of the foundations of
socialism with great wisdom. He also effected the agrarian reform, nationalization of
industries and other democratic reforms, and thus victoriously carried out the revolution
in the northern half of Korea in a short period of time. After the war, he continued the
trend towards one-man rule. He succeeded in developing a cult of personality with himself
to strengthen his authority. In the post Korean War years, he developed the idea of
Juche, and ideology of self-reliance blended with Marxism, thus creating a distinct
native Korean communism. And in 1994, at the age of 82, he died.
Kim Il Sung was an autocratic leader in many ways. In order to prepare for a future war,
he made little kids learn military combat skill since they enter elementary school. It
was mandatory for all men to serve the arm forces for ten years. People who had not serve
the arm forces because of some reasons, or people who had not attended Kim Il Sung
University were assigned the most dangerous and hardest jobs. Since no one was allowed to
own a private property, they did not have the motivation to work. In order make people
work, and strengthen the industries and agriculture, he created things called A horse
that can run 1000 Li/hr, and Seeing stars exercise. A horse that can run 1000 Li/hr means
that there is a horse that can run 250km/hr. He told people that this horse can run 1000
Li/hr because it runs with all its strength, and forced them to work intensely with all
their strength. Seeing stars exercise means that you start working when the stars are
out, and stop working until the stars are out again. He forced people to work every early
in the morning when the stars are out till when it was dark again. He also severely
punished or killed people who had religions (Ideology Criminals), people who opposed to
his political opinions (Political Criminals), and people who criticized him. These people
were not allowed to get married, nor have babies. And in many cases, in order to satisfy
their lust, they had sexual intercourse with their family members. Kim Il Sung developed
a system called 5 House Surveillance System. It is a system that families of every five
houses observe each other to see if there is any Ideology Criminal, Political Criminal,
or anyone criticizing him. Any person who reported the Criminal to the authorities was
rewarded, and was given more opportunity to become a member of the Party of Communist.
Kim Il Sung also made people hang his picture in their houses. If his picture was crooked
not dusted, or not hanged, they were accused of being a Political Criminal.
Once a one-man rule of his own was secured, Kim Il Sung also began to develop a
personality cult in order to strengthen his authority. He had to make up stories that his
forefathers were anti-Japanese fighters, and deify himself in order to make North Koreans
believe him to be a man of great personality. In the days of the Japanese colonial rues
of Korea, he never participated in real combats, although he was a Soviet army captain
belonging to the 88 Special Reconnaissance Brigade. Yet, he claimed that for 15 years, he
participated in more than 100,000 battles (over 20 battles a day) and won victories, even
forging mystic stories that he turned sand into rice and crossed rivers on a leaflet as
if he were an almighty deity. To justify his fabricated past, he appointed so-called
revolutionary war sites (7 places) and historic sites (34 places) throughout all North
Korea, and every year he urged all the people to make expeditionary marches to those
places. He even ordered the building of over 40,000 Kim Il Sung's Revolutionary Thought
study rooms for the indoctrination of the people. Furthermore, he had over 70 bronze
statues and over 20,000 plaster busts erected all over the country, and had more than 20
diverse kinds of Kim Il Sung badges manufactured and worn by the people according to
their class. He designated his birthday as the greatest national holiday, and observed
his birthday by spending hundreds of millions of dollars every year. Even after his
death, the North Korean authorities had his body mummified and laid in a coffin at the
super-deluxe Kumsusan Memorial Palace to prolong the personality cult under the pretext
that he is immortal and imperishable.
Moreover, indoctrination programs designed to teach the people to worship him begin from
nursery school. The curriculum of primary schools includes 304 hours of such
indoctrination in two subjects, and that of senior high schools includes 567 hours in
four subjects. Other textbooks such as Korean Language, Geography, and Nature are also
full of contents designed to deify Kim Il Sung: about 40% of the entire content in
primary school textbooks, and 43% of those in senior high schools. About 57% of music
education in primary schools, and 48% of that in senior high schools are devoted music
that promotes the worship of Kim Il Sung. Kim Il Sung University in Pyongyang maintains 6
departments specializing in Kim Il Sung. They include the Department of Kim Il Sung's
Revolutionary History, and the Department of Kim Il Sung's Works.
In conclusion, Kim Il Sung, through his leadership style, was able to rule his country
for over 40 years, but there were also many negative consequences. His leadership was
mostly based on control and surveillance. Although this made him a one-man ruler, there
were many people who escaped to South Korea, and many people who wanted to kill him. Even
the real creator of Juche Ideology ran away to South Korea. I think that this kind of
leadership might work at first, but in the long run, will be disastrous and create
negative consequences.
REFERENCES
Bong, Baik. Kim Il Sung Biography.
Beyrouth: Dar Al-Talia, 1973
Chajusong Self-reliance, 1998
URL: http://www.01.co.za/freedom/default.htm