On the Occasion of 78th Anniversary of Korea’s Liberation: DPRK

-Immortal Feats of National Liberation

 August 15 this year marks the 78^th anniversary of the day when President Kim Il Sung accomplished the historic cause of national liberation.

 Greeting this day, our people pay their highest tribute and present the greatest glory to President Kim Il Sung while looking back with deep emotion on his immortal feats of gaining victory in the arduous great anti-Japanese war to win back the country and building on this land a genuine country of the people, the invincible socialist state.

 President Kim Il Sung accomplished the national-historic cause of national liberation by waging bloody battles against the Japanese imperialists. This was a noteworthy event which opened up a new era of socialist Korea and created a worldwide example of anti-colonial struggle for national independence.

 Since then, our people could gain a reputation as the most dignified and mighty people, and our country could vigorously advance along the road of independence.

 President Kim Il Sung put forward an independent revolutionary line and consistently maintained the revolutionary principle and mode of struggle of national independence and independence by our own efforts during the whole period of the anti-Japanese revolution. This is the first factor in the brilliant implementation of the historic cause of national liberation.

 During those days, he put forward Juche-oriented lines and published immortal classic works including “The Path of the Korean Revolution” and “The Tasks of Korean Communists”, which are permeated with the idea of strong independent spirit and independence by our own efforts that the Korean people are the masters of the Korean revolution and the country’s independence must be achieved by the efforts of our nation itself.

 “The Ten-Point Program of the Association for the Restoration of the Fatherland” set forth by President Kim Il Sung is a program of great national unity that strongly rallied into a single force all the anti-Japanese patriotic forces including conscientious national capitalists and religious people, to say nothing of workers and peasants.

 He also clearly defined the character and mission of the Korean revolution and comprehensively clarified from a Juche-oriented standpoint all the problems arising in the building of the Party and revolutionary armed forces, thus advancing the anti-Japanese revolutionary struggle towards victory.

 Thanks to his unique line and wise leadership, an epochal example of national unity could be set and the Korean people could defeat the Japanese imperialists by their own efforts and achieve the historic cause of national liberation.

 President Kim Il Sung organized and led armed struggle to a victory. This is another factor in the brilliant implementation of the great historic cause of national liberation

With the strong belief that military power is the guarantee for national liberation and victory of revolution, he founded the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army (KPRA) – the first revolutionary armed force of Juche type, and strengthened and developed it into an invincible one armed with indomitable revolutionary spirit and military tactics of our own style.

 His firm faith in sure victory, iron will, matchless courage and pluck were the KPRA’s source of unfathomable might. His protean tactics of guerrilla warfare employed in the vast plains and hills of Mt. Paektu were stimulants that restored our people’s faith in sure victory, while dealing a heavy blow to the Japanese imperialists.

 President Kim Il Sung formulated grand plans to achieve national liberation by waging a general offensive of the KPRA combined with a nationwide uprising and joint operations in the rear, and wisely led the struggle to this end.

 Accordingly, numerous secret bases were established and armed units organized all across the country, and the preparations for all-people resistance were stepped up on a nationwide scale.

 President Kim Il Sung led the great anti-Japanese war to victory by relying on all-people resistance with the KPRA as the hard core. As a result, the historic cause of national liberation came to be finally accomplished.

 He liberated the country by defeating the Japanese imperialist invaders with his independent revolutionary line and active armed struggle and his exploits will shine forth for all ages to come.

 The socialist fatherland – founded by President Kim Il Sung, and built into a people’s paradise and handed down by Chairman Kim Jong Il – is now displaying its dignity and prestige with respected Comrade Kim Jong Un in the leadership of our revolution.

 True to the patriotic desire to build a powerful country cherished by President Kim Il Sung and Chairman Kim Jong Il, respected Comrade Kim Jong Un laid out and has vigorously implemented the grand plans to make our country the most powerful in the world, possessed of strong national might and eternal prosperity where people lead the happiest life.

 The feats of national liberation achieved by President Kim Il Sung will be immortal with the new history of Juche Korea.

-Anecdotes of the Days of the Anti-Japanese Struggle

 During the days of the arduous anti-Japanese armed struggle in the first half of last century when Korea was under the military occupation of Japan (1905-1945), President Kim Il Sung (1912-1994) always shared weal and woe with the people without expecting any special favour or privilege for himself.

Commander Is also a Son of the People

 One day in early April, 1933, the guerilla unit led by Kim Il Sung was having a rest in front of a farmer’s house in the vicinity of Liangshuiquanzi on the shore of the Tuman River. 

 There was a wounded soldier in the unit. The guerrillas wanted to bring him into a warm room and knocked at the door of the house. But there was no answer.

Kim Il Sung covered the wounded soldier with his overcoat and took an axe to chop firewood.

 Following him, some soldiers swept the yard and others hurried to make fire to prepare a meal.

 Having never seen the guerrillas before, the host of the house and his wife had taken the guerrillas for Japanese soldiers and hid themselves inside the house. But after seeing what the guerrillas were doing, they ran out of the house.

 Kim Il Sung courteously said hello to the old man, offered him a cigarette and asked about the living conditions of his family. 

 He asked why they, apparently old-time farmers, were not raising chickens and could not buy fur caps for their children.

 The man answered that it was because they were ill-starred.

 Kim Il Sung explained that it was all because of the inhuman exploitation and plunder by the Japanese imperialists and landlords that the Koreans and Chinese were living in poverty like his family, and that the only way to be well off was to fight against the Japanese imperialists. 

 Before leaving the house, Kim Il Sung gave some money to the old man.

 It was only at that time when the old man came to know that he was General Kim Il Sung. He was surprised that the commander had chopped firewood himself. 

 With a smile on his face Kim Il Sung said: The commander is also a son of the people; why should I not do what others do?

Price of Potato Paid

 In the second half of April 1933, the food situation in the Wangqing guerrilla zone was very difficult.

 Two guerrillas who had been dispatched on a mission to obtain food had to come back with empty hands for the enemy’s control was strict. After thinking much, they went to a harvested potato field. While digging the frozen earth hoping to collect remaining potatoes, they happened to find a potato cellar.

They could not find the owner of the cellar, so they came back to the guerrilla zone each carrying a sack of potatoes.

 On learning this, Kim Il Sung called the soldiers to him, and said: There is a strict rule in the guerrilla army which should never be violated in any circumstances however harsh they might be; it is the revolutionary discipline with regard to the masses of the people; how can we be called an army for the people and revolution if we lay hand on the people’s property on the excuse that our food situation is difficult; when we founded the Anti-Japanese People’s Guerrilla Army, we named it so in the sense that we should not forget the people even a moment, and put forward the revolutionary slogan “As fish cannot live without water, so the guerrillas cannot live without the people”; we should never put our hands on the property of the people even though we should die of hunger and cold; this is the strict rule of the guerrilla army which is made up of the sons and daughters of the people and fights for the interests of the people.

 As they were remorseful for what they had done, Kim Il Sung told them to find the owner of the potato cellar, apologize to him and generously pay him for the potatoes.

 It took them a long time to find the owner. They apologized to him and offered him a liberal amount of money for the potatoes even though he declined.

Price of an Axe Paid

 It happened when the anti-Japanese guerrilla army was staying for several days in a village called Liangshuiquanzi on the shore of the Tuman River. 

 Kim Il Sung stayed in the house of an old Chinese man. Every morning he would wake up earlier than the host and hostess, clean the house inside and outside, go to the Tuman and bring water from the hole he made on the frozen river.

 One early morning he went to the river to fetch water. It was a very cold day and the water hole was frozen hard. When he had nearly finished making a hole in the ice, the head of the axe slipped from the handle and fell into the hole.

 He raked about for hours with a long pole with hooked prongs on its end, but it was in vain because the river was so deep. Though it had happened while he was doing the host a favour, he did not give up his search.

 His soldiers told him that it would do if they paid the host for the axe.

 Kim Il Sung said to them that no amount of money would be able to make up for the host’s loss of his cherished tool. He continued to search for the axe, but he could not find it.

 Having nothing else to do, he generously paid the host for the axe and apologized to him again.

 In May 1959, he asked a group of visitors to the battlefields of the anti-Japanese armed struggle in northeast China to find the whereabouts of the old man and apologize once again in his place.