Above: a celebration of Kim Il Sung’s birthday in 2022, photo from Korean Central News Agency/Associated Press
I am emphasizing the parallels between Palestine and Korea not just for the sake of anti-imperialist education, but because recognizing these parallels is something that tactically and strategically benefits us. When we remember how dire of a situation the Korean people found themselves in after the war; and how they’ve still been able to carry out massive civilizational accomplishments; then we can see how much hope truly exists for Palestine.
We are approaching an outcome in which Palestine has not just rebuilt itself, but created a thriving society that makes unprecedented human advancements. When Palestine’s full potential is unleashed, amazing things will happen, like they have in Korea. And though all those who the imperialists have murdered can’t be brought back, the forces of reactionary evil won’t be able to kill that future. Knowing these things helps us win the anti-colonial fight because when we have this kind of insight; when we consider the potential for human and societal resilience; this impacts how we operate.
Korea’s story makes it clear that no matter how hard the genocide’s perpetrators try to stop Palestine from fulfilling its historic role, at the end of this liberation struggle there await incredible possibilities. This won’t make the incomprehensible loss and mass generational trauma disappear, anymore than has been the case in Korea. But it will let many new things be constructed on top of that. That’s what the DPRK’s recovery story shows about what happens when a people have been able to defeat a genocidal enemy. This perspective lets us rally people around Palestine in a way which doesn’t just involve the rage, the grief, and the second-hand trauma. The reality of Palestine’s present situation is horrific beyond words, and that reality won’t ever become less real; but neither will the other aspects of this story. The aspects in which Palestine’s people reach spectacular heights of progress, along with the rest of humanity.
When you unlearn imperialism’s lies about the DPRK, you see that this has been the arc of Korea’s people following the genocide the U.S. subjected them to. The loss and trauma from that time are still reflected in Korean society. And within the northern half of Korea that isn’t under U.S. occupation, Korea’s people have been able to make sure everyone is extensively educated on the empire’s crimes. They teach each new generation about these evils, and they have museums that fully do justice to what the Korean people experienced. It’s one part of why the DPRK has always worked to assist Palestine’s liberation struggle with such purposeful determination; the Koreans have a profound kinship with the Palestinians. They’ve been made to share the same story, a story where an aggressor punishes you for existing.
When you look at the statement from General Curtis LeMay about what the U.S. did to the Koreans, it’s so easy to think of Gaza, and of the other places where Zionism is advancing its extermination effort. Admitted LeMay: “We went over there and fought the war and eventually burned down every town in North Korea anyway, some way or another… Over a period of three years or so, we killed off, what, 20 percent of the population?” That number isn’t far off from the highest (and probably most accurate) estimates of how many Gazans the Zionists have murdered. And when you look at John LaForge’s description of how thoroughly the empire demolished Korean civilization, Palestine again comes to mind. As LaForge (drawing from LeMay and the author Robert Neer) has observed about this genocide:
The literal mass destruction of North Korea and today’s threats of more should be considered in the context of the living memory of the older generation. Robert Neer’s 2013 book Napalm (Belknap Press of Harvard Univ. Press), reports that Gen. LeMay, head of 21st Bomber Command, wrote, “We killed off over a million civilian Koreans and drove several million more from their homes…” Eighth Army chemical officer Donald Bode reportedly said, on an “average good day” pilots in the Korean War “dropped 70,000 gallons of napalm: 45,000 from the US Air Force, 10,000-20,000 by its Navy, and 4,000-5,000 by Marines”—who nicknamed the burning jellied gasoline “cooking oil.” Neer reports that more bombs were dropped on Korea than in the whole of the Pacific theater during World War II—635,000 tons, versus 503,000 tons. “Pyongyang, a city of half a million people before 1950, was said to have had only two buildings left intact,” according to Neer.
Yet the Korean people rebuilt, and then achieved things that are in many ways unparalleled. The DPRK is now the most advanced example of socialism, because it’s the country that’s gone the furthest in transitioning away from the capitalist paradigm. Its state has tangibly begun to wither away, with the position of president having been abolished after Kim Il Sung’s death and political power becoming more decentralized over time. It’s been able to keep its socialist system intact, while bypassing the market reforms China has had to implement. It’s abolished the tax system, which represents another step towards the state’s obsolescence. These are the advancements in societal evolution that Juche has allowed the DPRK to experience. They show why Juche’s ideas of national self-reliance, and of the masses being history’s central drivers, are essential for all anti-imperialists to apply.
Shaun Pickford, Secretary General of the British Group for the Study of the Juche Idea, describes how Juche let Korea overcome the country’s apocalyptic experience:
The tasks of rebuilding Korea and stepping up socialist construction in the 1950s and 1960s required a great deal of creativity and originality by the party and people of the DPRK. President Kim IL Sung in his work "On Eliminating Dogmatism And Formalism And Establishing Juche In Ideological Work", on December 28th, 1955, addressed these questions. Throughout the process of building socialism in the DPRK the principles of Juche in ideology, independence in politics, self-sufficiency in the economy and self-reliance in defence were maintained by President Kim IL Sung. In the space of 14 years, the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea became an industrialized socialist state with a mechanized agricultural sector. This fast pace of industrialization in the DPRK was noted by the Economist Doctor Joan Robinson of Cambridge University as being the Korean miracle. The strength of the Juche-based socialist system revealed itself in the fact that the popular masses took part in industrialization with a very high degree of consciousness and creativity.
Will an equivalent type of political situation come about for Palestine following Zionism’s defeat? That’s up to the Palestinian people, who are the only ones which can resolve Palestine’s internal political struggles. For Palestine’s supporters on the outside, though, recognizing Juche’s universality lets us assist Palestine in a much more effective way. When we know about the achievements of Juche, and the universal applicability of its ideas, this allows us to properly wage our revolutionary struggle; which benefits the Palestinians, and all others who have a stake in seeing imperialism defeated.
The same benefits come from recognizing that Palestine’s armed resistance is a legitimate arbiter of liberation struggle, and that Operation Al Aqsa Flood was a strategically correct decision on the part of the resistance. Like Juche Korea, the Palestinian armed coalition has indispensable strategic and tactical lessons for all who are part of the revolutionary fight. And both these forces have been targeted with massive atrocity propaganda, in proportion with how much they threaten the imperial order. Especially in the empire’s core, where my own part of the struggle operates, there is a problem in which well-intentioned people have been convinced of this propaganda.
We must combat these anti-solidarity narratives, and proliferate support for the Palestinian resistance, the DPRK, and all other anti-imperialist allies. Because if we let the enemy define how these forces are viewed, then the pro-Palestine struggle will be hindered in its effectiveness. That’s why education about these things has an inherent practical benefit: it counters the confusion our foes seek to create, inspiring consistent solidarity and getting people to learn from their allies abroad.
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