DPRK National Liberation Achieved by All-People Resistance

The liberation of Korea was a historic victory achieved by the general mobilization of all the Korean people along with the active armed struggle of the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army under the leadership of Commander Kim Il Sung.

From the early days of the anti-Japanese revolution, Kim Il Sung set forth the original line of all-people resistance to liberate the country through the anti-Japanese war involving the whole country and the entire nation, and successfully embodied it.

In his reminiscences With the Century, Kim Il Sung wrote:

“From the day we started the anti-Japanese revolution we consistently asserted the importance of resistance by the whole people. By this resistance we meant the general mobilization of the entire nation for the anti-Japanese revolution by training them along revolutionary lines. In other words, we meant to liberate the country by means of the organized and active resistance of all the people throughout the country against the Japanese.”

The basic idea of the line of all-people resistance advocated by Kim Il Sung was that the 20 million Korean people should be mobilized to fight the Japanese imperialist aggressors with arms in hand, and this was the only way to save the country and achieve national liberation.

When expanding the ranks of the anti-Japanese guerrillas in the guerrilla bases, Kim Il Sung established there organizations of the party, Young Communist League, Anti-Imperialist Union, Peasants’ Association, Anti-Japanese Women’s Association, Children’s Corps, Red Guards and Children’s Vanguard, rallying the people of various sections in paramilitary and other organizations, in preparation for resistance struggle involving all the people.

In particular, the Ten-Point Programme of the Association for the Restoration of the Fatherland, proclaimed on May 5, Juche 25 (1936), called for each of the Koreans to contribute his or her all–money, provisions, skill and wisdom–so as to achieve national liberation through the general mobilization of the entire Korean nation; this was, in effect, a declaration of an all-people resistance.

In the appeal to the compatriots throughout Korea, issued in September Juche 26 (1937) to cope with the prevailing situation, Kim Il Sung, rousing all the people to the anti-Japanese struggle more vigorously, clarified the strategic ways to this end. It is etched in the history of the anti-Japanese armed struggle and the history of all-people resistance as an appeal calling for an all-people resistance to achieve national liberation.

Kim Il Sung stressed again the need for an all-people resistance at meetings in the Paektusan secret camp, Caoshuitan and the Sinhung area, and gave consistent instructions on it in the period of advance into the homeland and small-unit actions, and took positive measures to this end.

When he met the leading members of revolutionary organizations, he taught them about winning over the masses, and organized military and political training on several occasions to bring up the guerrillas as the hard core capable of skilfully leading all-people resistance in the future.

He also ensured that the movement of the ARF, under the guidance of the Party Committee of the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army, the central leadership body of the anti-Japanese revolution, was combined with an all-people resistance movement to turn all the organizations into all-people resistance organizations.

As a result, party, ARF and resistance organizations were formed in different parts at home and abroad.

While expanding their ranks, the all-people resistance organizations pushed ahead with the work of selecting bases of activities for all-people resistance, securing strategic materials and preparing and training resistance fighters politically and militarily there.

He worked out an operations plan for the final battle against the Japanese imperialists as required by the developing revolution, in which the all-people resistance forces were firmly prepared and the public sentiments were oriented towards the ruin of Japanese imperialism and national liberation.

The gist of the operations plan was that the main force of the KPRA would make a rapid advance into the homeland and occupy all the provinces, fighting there on the one hand, and on the other issuing appeals to the whole nation in order to rouse the workers, peasants, and youth and students who were hiding in the mountains to rally around armed organizations and join the armed popular uprising to destroy the enemy and liberate the country.

After Kim Il Sung issued an order to launch the final attack for the country’s liberation, the enemy’s ruling system crumbled so quickly in Korea. It was because many all-people resistance organizations rose up in all parts of the country and fought bravely along with the general offensive of the KPRA.

The Japanese imperialists, who were given fatal blows in all parts of Korea by the KPRA’s powerful attacks and the all-people armed resistance, could not but declare their unconditional surrender on August 15, Juche 34 (1945), less than a week after the final attack was launched.

Under the wise leadership of Kim Il Sung, the Korean people finally put an end to the 40-year-long Japanese imperialists’ vicious military rule and achieved the liberation of their country and national independence.

Yang Ryon Hui

2023-08-15