The great liberator of the Korean people, Kim Il-sung, opposed the imperialist exploitation of his country at the age of seven. No wonder, then, that in his teens he chaired many mass organizations ... Or at least that's what the (absurd) propaganda says! What else is "known" about his childhood?
Kim Il-sung was born on April 15, 1912 in Mangyondae, a small village near the current capital of North Korea - Pyongyang. His father, Kim Hyong Jik, was an elementary school teacher. That's the story, because according to propaganda he was the son of ... a poor peasant. More - a peasant actively participating in the national liberation act and active in thriving conspiratorial organizations, about which ... we will not read anywhere except North Korean sources.
According to North Korean propaganda, Kim Il-sung had sucked revolutionary tendencies with his mother's milk.
His mother, Kang Pan Sŏk, came from the poorest social class - this is the official historiography, although in the 1960s it could be found that her father was the headmaster of the school (interestingly, it was an institution run by Presbyterian Christians). Currently in North Korea, Kang Pan Sŏk is portrayed as the ideal of a woman, wife and mother. Her strengths are supporting her husband (especially in his underground activities) and running her own mass organization - Anti-Japanese Women's Union. This institution was to be based primarily on activating and making Korean women aware of the necessity to start a revolution. Unfortunately, this organization is also not mentioned in the archives of the Republic of Korea or Japanese intelligence.
Kim Ir Sen. The youngest revolutionist
Due to such a wonderful, revolutionary lineage, Kim Il-sung was actually doomed to become the great liberator of the Korean nation. He started his fight by taking an active part in the events of March 1919. This is how the Great Chief recalled this event:
I, a boy of seven at the time, joined the ranks of the demonstrators and walked with my worn, straw paws moving in the dense stream of people […]. The adults kept shouting "Long live independence." Among that collective, powerful shout was my voice as well.
In the following years, the Kim family moved to the outskirts of Korea, probably wanting to improve their economic situation. However, Kim Il-sung's father - through his liberation activities (conducted according to North Korean propaganda on a scale almost equal to that of Kim Il-sung later) - was placed on the list of disobeying Koreans and became one of the "first-class people under surveillance."
Remaking Kim Il-sen's childhood into a revolutionary fashion was an important element of propaganda efforts.
As befits a true revolutionist, he took his feet by his belt and fled with his family abroad, or - as the "improved" version of the story says - did not run away, but left to continue his national liberation activities. In his (propaganda) Diaries Kim Il-sung described the emotions of leaving his homeland in him:
People experience different sorrows throughout their lives. But the most dreadful sadness is the loss of the Motherland. Especially as a refugee without a state of its own.
But is it possible for such a young child to understand the nationality issues that little Kim (according to North Korean historiography) lamented so much? Well, that's doubtful at least…
"Who was born in Korea should know Korea well"
Life in Manchuria turned out to be quite enjoyable for the future leader. Kim Hyong Jik opened a medical practice, and little Kim Il-sung played with other children. Everything changed in 1923. It was then that Kim Il-sung's father decided that his son would return to Korea to continue his education there. He stated that:"Who was born in Korea - should know Korea well," so he sent the eleven-year-old boy on a lonely journey of 1000 li or about 400 km!
How much truth is there and how many hoaxes? We will probably never know this again. According to Diaries Kim Il-sung returned to his hometown of Mangyondae and began his studies. Seeing poverty in the surrounding villages, teenage Kim decided to organize a school for poor children whose families could not afford to educate their children . This detail is one of the most absurd and unrealistic ideas of North Korean propaganda - even with a large dose of goodwill, it is hard to believe that a 12-year-old would run a school on his own.
The idyll in his hometown did not last long, because in 1926 Kim Il-sen received the news of his father's arrest. The boy decided to go to Manchuria to help the family in such a difficult period. As he crossed the Amnokkan River, which was the border between Manchuria and Korea, he was to wonder:"... when will I be able to ascend this land again, when I can return to my homeland, where I grew up and where the ashes of my ancestors rest?" And he added that his "heart was unable to contain the sadness".
Kim - according to the official version - traveled the same way for the second time and found his family. However, the happiness of the meeting was short-lived. Reportedly shortly after Kim Il-sung's arrival in Manchuria, his father died, leaving a very specific wish for his son's further education. Surprisingly, the young boy (as the deceased wished) was sent to a school with nationalist roots - not communist ones, as you might suppose.
Perhaps it is a deliberate propaganda effort to show that Kim Il-sung has never been dependent on ideological influences, and that he reached the thought of communism as the best solution for the Korean nation by reading the works of Marx and Engels. Although these works at that time had not yet been translated into Korean or Chinese - just a minor oversight.
A new method of fighting imperialism
At school, Kim Il-sung - although he was the youngest student - successfully promoted communist ideas and explained complex issues to his friends. It was then that he was about to found his first and most important mass organization, the Union to Overthrow Imperialism.
Kim Il-sung with his first wife and son, Kim Jong-il.
The mere fact that a fourteen-year-old would establish such an organization and popularize any kind of ideology seems quite unlikely, but the propagandists went even further. According to their version of the Great Commander's biography, this activity brought the teenager so much fun that he decided to start new unions and associations.
Within two years (1926–1927), on his initiative, the Pioneer Senal Union (New Day), the Korean Communist Youth Union, the Girian Association of Korean Pioneers, and the Girian Association of Strangers Learners were established. Reports on the activities of these organizations would be an interesting reading. but none survived - what an intriguing coincidence.
At the age of sixteen, Kim Il-sung was to realize that secret, brilliant revolutionary organizations alone would not be enough to defeat Japanese imperialism. So he started using strikes as a new weapon. The first of them was directed against reactionary teachers - the undertaking turned out to be a great triumph. It is a pity that there is no information about him other than those mentioned in propaganda magazines!
A bright future for a young leader
With the successes of Kim Il-sung in the fall of 1928, he decided to follow the blow and organize a strike of a much greater extent and on a much more important issue - the construction of the Japanese railroad to Manchuria, through which these horrible imperialists would take control of the state. As usual in the life of the future Chief described by the North Korean propaganda, this initiative was a success.
The strikes created additional opportunities for Kim. One of them was getting to know other Korean leaders - and exposing their true face:
Most of them, calling themselves the "leaders" of the communist and national movement of the time, were without exception factionists or hard-line nationalists who had no support from the masses , they only gathered a small handful of people from their group, organizing sectarian quarrels for "hegemony" or engaged in leftist or right-wing phraseological chatter, with no relation to the specific reality of our country.
According to North Korean historiography, Kim Il-sung was arrested several times for his activities. It is known that he was in fact once in prison, but was released from it due to the low harmfulness of the act and his young age. This completely contradicts the great achievements of the great leader which are described in his official biography. Meanwhile, after his release, Kim Il-sung began a new stage in his revolutionary struggle - but that is a completely different story.