KIM IL SUNG
LET US FIRMLY GUARANTEE THE FULFILMENT OF THE REVOLUTIONARY
CAUSE OF JUCHE BY FORCE OF ARMS
Speech at a Banquet to Celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Foundation of
the Korean People’s Army
April 25, 1982
Comrades,
Today we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the foundation of the Korean People’s Army with a sense of dignity and pride at a time when the whole country is full of political excitement and great revolutionary enthusiasm.
Saluting the auspicious revolutionary holiday of the heroic Korean People’s Army, the glorious armed forces of our Party, and of all Korean people, I would like to offer warm congratulations to the officers and men of our valiant People’s Army and People’s Security Forces who are defending the country staunchly and with fervent loyalty to the Party and the revolution.
In the long years of effort since the days of the anti-Japanese revolutionary struggle, we have lost a large number of precious revolutionary comrades. Allow me to pay a high tribute to the anti-Japanese revolutionary forerunners and to the soldiers of the People’s Army who laid down their valuable lives for the independence of the country, for the liberation of the people, and in the cause of the Party and the revolution.
I also extend hearty congratulations to the anti-Japanese revolutionary veterans, the disabled soldiers and the demobilized servicemen, who performed heroic services in the arduous anti-Japanese revolutionary struggle and the great Fatherland Liberation War, and are still nurturing the beautiful flower of the revolution in building socialism.
My warm gratitude also goes to our workers, farmers, and all others who are working hard to build the economy and strengthen our defences. They are wholeheartedly assisting the People’s Army, loving them like their own flesh and blood, in an effort to strengthen the nation’s defence power in accordance with our Party’s military line of self-reliant defence.
Comrades,
Half a century has elapsed since we founded the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army, the first revolutionary armed force of our people, to realize the cause of national liberation under the banner of the Juche idea.
At this great moment when we are celebrating the jubilee of the birth of the Korean People’s Army, I look back with deep emotion upon the glorious road of struggle traversed by our revolutionary armed forces and their immortal achievements.
The formation of the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army was the result of the bloody struggle of the young Korean communists who had devoted all their bloom of youth and lives to raising an army against the Japanese. Braving all difficulties and hardships, they took to heart the bitter lesson taught by the anti-Japanese national-liberation movement in our country, which had undergone setbacks and difficulties because it had no genuinely revolutionary armed force of its own. The foundation of the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army heralded the emergence of a truly revolutionary armed force of a Juche type in our country.
The founding of the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army was a historic event that marked an epochal turn in the development of the anti-Japanese national-liberation struggle of our people and the communist movement. With its formation, our people now had a genuinely revolutionary army for the first time in their history and were able to launch a victorious struggle of a new, higher stage for the independence of the country and the liberation of the people. That was the very beginning of the glorious history of our revolutionary armed forces.
Our revolutionary army, which opened fire in the forests of Paekdu, has advanced on a proud road of victory through the flames of a grim and arduous struggle for half a century, and fought heroically to perform the immortal exploits that will long shine in our history.
As a genuine army of the people and of the revolution, the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army expanded its ranks with the active support and encouragement of the popular masses and grew stronger in the fierce struggle against the enemy. It waged a 15-year-long heroic struggle under the most trying conditions in history, and at last brilliantly won the historic cause of national liberation by defeating the Japanese imperialist aggressors. In the course of an arduous armed struggle against Japanese imperialism, the foundations of the Korean revolution as a whole were firmly laid and the brilliant revolutionary traditions of our Party established on a solid basis.
After liberation, the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army developed into regular armed forces—the Korean People’s Army.
This army displayed mass heroism and unparalleled self-sacrificing spirit in the great Fatherland Liberation War, in which the destiny of the country was at stake. It dealt an ignominious defeat to the US imperialist aggressors, who had boasted of being the “strongest” in the world, and defended the independence of the country and the gains of the revolution with honour. It frustrated the enemy’s ceaseless acts of aggression and armed provocation at every step, defended the security of the country and the people in good faith and firmly guaranteed the victorious advance of the revolution and construction by force of arms. It not only carried out its mission of national defence with credit, but also made a great contribution to the work of construction, for the prosperity of the country and the happiness of the people.
The valuable gains of our revolution and all the victories achieved by our people in the revolution and construction are associated with the memorable exploits of our revolutionary armed forces and are permeated with the blood shed by the anti-Japanese guerrillas and the officers and men of the People’s Army.
The immortal services to the country and its people rendered by the Korean People’s Revolutionary Army and the People’s Army, its direct successor, will shine long in the glorious history of the revolutionary struggle of our Party and people.
During the half century of arduous struggle, our revolutionary armed forces have been trained and tempered politically, ideologically and militarily and have developed into an invincible army which has acquired the Juche-orientated art of war and rich combat experience.
Today the political and moral aspects of our People’s Army are excellent. All the soldiers are well trained in the Juche idea, our Party’s revolutionary idea, and are fired with the resolve to fight to the last for the victory of the revolutionary cause of Juche under the leadership of the Party. The People’s Army is imbued with the Juche idea and the noble traits of revolutionary comradeship, voluntary military discipline, and unity between superiors and subordinates and between army and people. These are the political and moral advantages unique to a genuine people’s army, the revolutionary army, and precisely herein lies the source of our People’s Army’s unbreakable strength, a force capable of defeating any aggressor army.
The military technique and troop composition of the People’s Army are also excellent. It is armed with modern weapons and equipment. Highly trained in military skill and know-how, every soldier handles his weapons and equipment efficiently. Since their foundation, our revolutionary armed forces have experienced guerrilla action and regular and modern warfare. This process has seen the formation of a sizable core of highly experienced revolutionaries. This revolutionary core, trained during the anti-Japanese revolutionary struggle and the Fatherland Liberation War, is the precious treasure of our Party and the great pride of our People’s Army.
The security of our country and the victory of our revolution are firmly guaranteed by the unconquerable Korean People’s Army. This army was founded in the flames of the glorious anti-Japanese revolutionary struggle, tempered in the trials of the great Fatherland Liberation War and the fierce class struggle, and is firmly armed with the Juche idea, modern military science and technology and up-to-date weapons and equipment.
We strove to strengthen the People’s Army and, at the same time, to arm the entire people and fortify the whole country. In this way we set up a solid nationwide defence system, with the People’s Army at the core.
Today we take great pride in saying confidently that we have built up an indestructible self-reliant defence force, capable of destroying aggressors from any quarter and safeguarding the socialist motherland.
Comrades,
Our revolution is not yet over; we must continue our struggle until we accomplish the revolutionary cause of Juche. The enemies of our revolution still survive and we must reunify the country independently and build socialism and communism completely through fierce struggles against the enemies.
As long as forces hostile to the revolution exist, the People’s Army must resolutely resist all their acts of aggression and provocation and staunchly defend the country. It should assist the struggle of our Party and people to reunify the country and model the whole of society on the Juche idea. It is the basic mission of the People’s Army to firmly guarantee the fulfilment of the revolutionary cause of Juche by force of arms.
Today the situation in our country is very strained.
The US imperialists are shipping into south Korea large numbers of aggressive troops and weapons of mass destruction, including nuclear arms, and are instigating the south Korean military fascists to provoke a new war. By drawing in even the Japanese reactionaries, who are watching for a chance to reinvade our country, the US imperialists are building up the military alignment of the United States , Japan and south Korea in an overt attempt to invade our country.
The war exercise “Team Spirit ‘82”, now being staged by the massive aggressive armed forces of the US imperialists and south Korean military fascists, is a “test of war”, designed to attack the northern half of the Republic; it is an undisguised act of provocation against us. Developments in south Korea today show that the moves of the US imperialists and their stooges towards a new war against us have reached a critical stage and brought the situation to the brink of war.
If we are to smash the ever-increasing intrigues of the enemies for a new war, defend the socialist motherland and provide a sure guarantee for the accomplishment of the revolutionary cause of Juche by force of arms, we must strengthen the People’s Army.
The People’s Army is the army of our Party, which is guided by the Juche idea and fights for the triumph of this idea. If we are to strengthen the People’s Army so that it can fulfil its honourable mission as the revolutionary armed force of our Party, we must model the entire force on the Juche idea by training all the soldiers to be true communist revolutionaries of a Juche type and fully applying the Juche idea in all aspects of military affairs and activity. Modelling the whole army on the Juche idea is the law that governs the development of our revolutionary armed force and the general task of the People’s Army at present.
We must work hard to strengthen the People’s Army politically, ideologically and militarily, under the slogan: “Let us model the whole army on the Juche idea!”
First of all, the sole ideological system of the Party must be established more thoroughly in the People’s Army.
Firmly establishing this system provides the basic guarantee for increasing the might of the People’s Army, and is the central task in modelling the whole army on the Juche idea.
Education in the Juche idea should be intensified among the soldiers of the People’s Army, so that all of them will be equipped firmly with our Party’s Juche idea, defend it stoutly, and strive devotedly to realize it fully. Education in Party policy and revolutionary traditions should be promoted so as to induce every soldier to defend and carry out the Party policies unswervingly, and learn from the anti-Japanese revolutionary forerunners’ intense loyalty to the Party and the revolution and from their indomitable revolutionary spirit.
The People’s Army must be infinitely loyal to the Party’s leadership. Without this leadership, it would be impossible to maintain its revolutionary character and succeed in the important mission entrusted to it by the country and the people. It should defend our Party politically, ideologically and at the cost of their own lives and build up the revolutionary habit and work system under which it carries out the Party’s orders and directives unconditionally.
The policy of training the whole army as a cadre army and modernizing it should be fully implemented so as to further reinforce the People’s Army in military technique.
Combat and political training must be stepped up among the soldiers so that every one of them will be well versed in modern weapons and equipment, master the Juche-orientated art of war which suits our actual conditions, and acquire a wealth of combat experience. In this way all, from generals to privates, will be qualified to perform the job higher by at least one grade than they are doing at present. At the same time, military science and technology should be developed rapidly to meet the requirements of modern warfare, and thus the technical equipment of the People’s Army improved steadily.
In order to make the nation’s defence power impregnable we should thoroughly implement the policy of putting all people under arms, building up the whole country into a fortress and strengthen the defence system nationwide.
We must ensure that all the people are under arms and study military affairs in earnest. The entire nation, including the workers and farmers, should not only become distinguished innovators in building socialism, but reliable defenders of the country. The members of the Worker-Peasant Red Guards and the Young Red Guards should intensify combat and political training so that all of them can handle their arms skilfully, and deeply study and acquire the Juche art of war and the experience of war. We must reinforce defences in all parts of the country and make the whole country impregnable.
It is a noble and beautiful tradition of our society that the army and people love each other and help each other actively. The officers and men of the People’s Army should give full play to the laudable tradition of unity between army and people. They should love the people, defend their lives and property, even at the cost of their own lives, and aid them in the struggle for socialist construction. The people should love the soldiers of the People’s Army like their own flesh and blood, assist them heart and soul, and intensify support to the army in all spheres.
We must strengthen unity and solidarity with the international revolutionary forces in the struggle against the aggression of US imperialism and its stooges and for national sovereignty and peace.
Ever since their inception our revolutionary armed forces have strengthened unity and solidarity with the international revolutionary forces, holding fast to an independent stand. Our people and their revolutionary armed forces have struggled, forging unbreakable solidarity with their neighbours and revolutionary peoples around the world and forming united fronts with them. They have thus won victories both in the national-liberation struggle against the Japanese imperialists and the Fatherland Liberation War against the US imperialists.
In the future, too, we will continue to cement unity and militant solidarity with the international revolutionary forces, while carrying out the revolutionary policy of self-reliant defence. We will fight on stoutly to check and frustrate the imperialists’ moves for aggression and war, ensure durable peace and security in the world, and hasten the final victory of the cause of anti-imperialism and independence, in close unity with the peoples of the socialist countries, the non-aligned and other newly-emerging countries and all revolutionary peoples throughout the world.
Comrades,
The People’s Army is entrusted with a very important mission and responsibility in the effort to consummate our Party’s revolutionary cause, pioneered and developed under the banner of the Juche idea. Our Party and people expect a great deal from the army.
I am firmly convinced that all officers and men of the People’s Army who are boundlessly loyal to the Party and the revolution will closely rally around the Party Central Committee in the future too, and perform their honourable mission and tasks satisfactorily and meet the great expectation of our Party and the entire people unfailingly.
Availing myself of this celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Korean People’s Army, I propose a toast: to the strengthening and development of the heroic Korean People’s Army, the glorious revolutionary armed forces of our Party; to the health of the revolutionary core of the People’s Army, including the anti-Japanese revolutionary veterans who, with unswerving loyalty to the Party and the revolution, have devoted their lives to the struggle for national sovereignty and independence and the development of our revolutionary armed forces; to the health of all officers and men of the valiant People’s Army and People’s Security Forces who are carrying our valuable work for national defence and reliably guaranteeing by force of arms our Party’s revolutionary cause of reunifying the country independently and modelling the whole of society on the Juche idea; to the health of the members of the Worker-Peasant Red Guards and Young Red Guards who, together with the People’s Army, are dependably guarding the security of the country and the gains of the revolution; to the health of the workers, farmers and others who are rendering active help to the People’s Army, while stepping up socialist construction under the banner of the three revolutions— ideological, technical and cultural; to the health of the military attaches and diplomatic envoys of many countries of the world present here to celebrate the Korean People’s Army Day; and to the health of the comrades and friends present here.
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