| Chapter 1: | The Culture and Ideology of the DPRK |
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Korean leaders who were incapable of preserving national independence and political sovereignty. He argued, as did many others, that Koreans must fight to win back their nation through promoting combat capability and spiritual solidarity against the militarily stronger Japanese soldiers. In fact, the formation of Kim Il Sung’s charisma began with the theme that he sacrificed his personal well-being for the noble cause of saving the country from Japanese colonialism. Even as a boy at the age of twelve, it was said, he had been preoccupied with the aspiration of national independence.3 Because the liberation of the country from Japanese control was the most important policy goal, the country naturally advanced the popular theme of anticolonialism. At this stage, the term juche meant little more than antagonist sentiment against a specific target. In this sense, juche was not yet established as even a rudimentary form of ideology.
In this initial stage of the ideological evolution, North Korea could not afford to look beyond its immediate and comfortable ideological allies: the Soviet Union, the Eastern European states, the People’s Republic of China, Vietnam, and Cuba.
Juche as Antihegemonistic (Mid-1950s to mid-1960s)
Following the Korean War (1950–1953), North Korea found a new enemy that helped South Korea and destroyed much of the northern half of the country with massive air strikes: the United States of America. During the war the city of Pyongyang was practically leveled, leaving no physical structures and millions of people dead or wounded.4 Since the war there has been genuine fear among North Korean residents that American forces might renew hostilities.5 That US forces have been stationed continuously in the South, routinely performing military exercises, often jointly with South Korean armed forces, has always made North Korea uneasy and apprehensive. Since the adoption of the armistice agreement in 1953, Pyongyang has persistently demanded the withdrawal of US troops from the Korean Peninsula. North Koreans were