Kim Il Sung was influenced as much by the Chinese as he was by the Soviets. He took to wearing "mao suits," those style-less, sack-like tunics in dark drab colors. He mandated the use of simplified written system just as Mao did. In Kim's case, it was an easier process since Korea did have its own simple alphabet. There were many other things that he did that were more or less copy of what Mao did in China - the cult of the personality was one them. At the same time he tried to enforce a system similar to what Stalin had in the Soviet Union. In short, he tried to be like Mao in some ways, but leaned more towards Stalin's way of ruling! He was a Stalinist-Maoist!
In late June of 1950, Kim's People's Army, the Inmin-gun invaded South Korea. The Inmin-gun were almost an exact copy of the Soviet Red Army. Most of the officer corps and senior NCOs were World War Two veterans, former Soviet Red Army soldiers. The Chief of Staff of North Korean Army, General Nam Il was a Russian born, former Soviet Red Army General, a World War Two hero and a graduate of Smolensk Military Academy! Thus, the North Korean Army was a smaller version of the Soviet Red Army. However, Kim insisted on maintaining a large unconventional (Special Forces) army, patterned after the guerrilla forces with which he fought for so many years in Manchuria and China against the Japanese. These forces were given a Russian name of partizan (partisan) which the Koreans pronounced as palchisan.
The Soviets actually planned every detail of the invasion! They were essentially using Kim and his army as a test case, to test the ability and the will of South Korea and the U.S. to defend the southern part of the country. Kim was more than glad to have the opportunity to conquer the entire peninsula and become the supreme leader of the unified country. Stalin, on the other hand, told him bluntly that if he failed, the Soviet Union was not going to step-in to bail him out! Stalin just didn't trust anyone! The invasion was launched and in the first couple of weeks the Inmin-gun cut through South Korean and token U.S. defenses like a hot knife through butter. However, by July the invasion was stalled at Naktong River where the U.S. and South Korea set up the Pusan Perimeter.
By September the Inchon landing was made and Seoul retaken. In late October Kim Il Sung and his family had fled to China! By Thanksgiving the UN Forces (they may have been called UN forces, but they were mostly U.S. and South Korean troops with only a small international contingent) were at the Manchurian border by Yalu River! As Stalin warned Kim, the Soviet Union did not step-in. However, Mao became very nervous as the U.S. and South Korean troops came near and when they reached Yalu, he sent his famous 8th Route Army across the border. The rest is history. The war was fought to a standstill and a ceasefire agreement was signed at Panmunjum. To this day, there is no real "peace" treaty, just a cease fire agreement between the warring parties. The state of war still exists, that is why the DMZ in Korea is still one of the most dangerous places in the world!
Mao and the Chinese People's Liberation Army saved Kim Il Sung's bacon! He felt betrayed by the Soviets, although the Soviets did help out during the remainder of the war with material and "advisors" who supposedly did not participate in combat but in fact actually did! They flew MIG 15s with Chinese or North Korean markings and participated in ground combat as well. Advisors always participate, so don't believe what they say about our current advisors in Iraq and Afghanistan not being in combat, they are in harms way!
Kim's hatred for the U.S. grew. Without U.S. intervention in the Korean War, he would have easily conquered the entire peninsula by the end of the summer of 1950! The U.S. not only ruined his conquest plans but embarrassed him by chasing him across the border into China! As he rebuilt the almost completely ruined North Korea, he constantly reminded his people that the U.S.was at the root of all their problems. It was the U.S. planes that bombed and killed their loved ones and destroyed their homes. It was because of the U.S. that they were experiencing hardship. At the same time, it was he who was going to make things better. He was going to raise North Korea from the ashes. He was going build a country that was going to be strong and would protect itself.
In this way, for the next couple of decades, the Kim Il Sung regime existed in the north. They received economic and military help from China, and economic help from the Soviet Union. His relations with the Soviet Union had cooled considerably, to a point that even the Soviets began to consider him a nut case. Then something happened that changed everything that made North Korea even more extreme, more suspicious of everyone. Henry Kissinger made a trip to China in 1971 and engaged in a dialogue with Chou En Lai, the second in command in China. The following year, 1972, President Nixon made a trip to China and toasted drinks with Mao! The U.S. had normalized its relations with China! The country that took the hardest hit on this turn of events was Taiwan, the Republic of China. Only a few years earlier we had vowed to never abandon them, yet, seemingly overnight, they were cast aside! But the Republic of China in Taiwan, although small in size, was a wealthy country, it had many trading partners, so despite the shift in its political status, it was going to survive. In fact it not only survived, but prospered. North Korea was a different matter, without China, they would really suffer!
In 1972 Kim Il Sung announced that North Korea henceforth would live by the code of juche (self reliance). Everywhere the word juche was heard in North Korea. There were huge signs, posters, proclaiming that North Korea was going to immerse itself in practice of juche, they didn't need foreign help! What this did was further isolate North Korea from everyone else in the world! They were already probably the most isolated country in the world at the time. With the introduction of juche, they became even more so! They began to attempt to produce everything on their own. At first there were many failures, but gradually they began to produce copies of military hardware that was given to them by the Soviets and the Chinese. Within a decade they were producing much of their own needs in military armament, although it was outdated! By the 1980s they were selling some of the hardware to generate hard currency. North Korean made SCUD missiles were a very popular item with many third world countries, especially the Arab world!
Through all this, Kim Il Sung was constantly portrayed to the population as the benevolent great leader, the savior of the country, etc. His smiling, chubby, rosy cheeked portrait hung in every household and children began their daily lessons by first singing songs that glorified and gave thanks to their great leader. By the late 1980s, two generations of North Koreans grew up constantly bombarded with propaganda about the great, benevolent leader, Kim Il Sung. With that type of exposure and constant indoctrination, no doubt, at least some had become believers!
Kim was more of a CEO than an "on hands" dictator. He relied on his cronies, trusted friends to provide him with advice on how to handle situations. Make no mistake about it, he was an absolute ruler. But, unlike Stalin, he was more like Mao, who relied on the advice of Chou En Lai and Deng Shiao Ping for advice. What most people didn't know was that much of the extreme stuff that was carried out by North Korea during this period was not done at his orders. It was his mercuric, violence prone son Kim Jong Il that carried out those acts, like the suicide attack on the Presidential Blue House in Seoul, South Korea by North Korean Special Forces, the ax murders of U.S. soldiers at Panmunjum, the bombing in Rangoon, the kidnapping of South Korea's leading movie director and leading actress. All of these seemingly crazy acts and attacks were carried out at Kim Jong Il's orders, not Kim Il Sung's! Kim Il Sung died in 1994, and unfortunately for everyone, for North Korea and the rest of the world, the crazy, murderous Kim Jong Il became his successor!
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