Author's note: The following constitutes my reflections of a trip to North
Korea, after which, as a social scientist and social critic, I came home with
more questions than answers about this controversial "Hermit Kingdom". Orthodox
socialists may not like my critical reflections, but I hope they can learn from
them.
With the recent establishment of full diplomatic relations with North Korea
last October 25, 2000, Filipinos can now finally, have a better glimpse of our
isolated neighbor and one-time enemy. But I cannot but help to mention that the
Philippines finally formalized this long-overdue diplomatic initiative a day
after U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright concluded her unprecedented
two-day visit to North Korea. Another "follow the leader act", perhaps? In the
early 1950s, the Philippine Expeditionary Force to Korea(PEFTOK) was dispatched
to fight side by side with the United States and South Korea against North
Korea, a socialist country which was assisted by its ally, the People's Republic
of China.
Imagine if the Republic of the Philippines was sliced horizontally and
divided into two hostile countries with different political and economic
systems. Despite blood relatives residing on both sides, there is not
visitation allowed, until recently, no postal and telecommunications link,
whatsoever. And, they were placed in a state of konfrontasi and warfooting
against each other, though the country has one history, one culture and
tradition, one currency(the Korean Won), and only one Korean language. This has
been the situation for the past five decades in the Korean peninsula which is
still divided into North and South Korea.
Surreal is the memory that I remember after a brief visit to Pyongyang, the
capital city of what Western scholars have branded the "Hermit Kingdom" of North
Korea, officially called the Democratic People's Republic of Korea(DPRK). That
derogatory name by outsiders may soon be a thing of the past as the two Koreas
and two KIMS(South Korean Pres. Kim Dae Jung and North Korean Pres. Kim Jong IL)
initiated the historic inter-Korean summit meeting in Pyongyang a year ago(last
June 2000). The two Koreas also did an unthinkable thing during the 2000
Olympics in Sydney, Australia. Their country delegations proudly marched under
one flag during the opening ceremonies! North Korea has also recently joined
the annual ASEAN Regional Forum(ARF).
Korea today stands at the crossroads for the final break with the cold war
system that has long divided the world, an era which had been offically declared
ended in the early 1990s. The Korean peninsula remains today the only country
still partitioned by the ideological divide and legacy of the Cold War. But the
wall of confrontation and division may soon be broken down, eased recently with
the June 2000 inter-Korean summit,and the Pyongyang visit last October 2000 of
U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. The 38th parallel divides North and
South Korea. It remains the relic and symbol of the cold war era and perhaps
remains also as one of the most highly militarized zones in the world after the
Cold War. But new thinking, hope, excitement and euphoria is touching most
Koreans these days. It is an emotional feeling that only Koreans in the north
and south, naturally will fully understand.
Most visitors to Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, will be told that the
Korean people "will achieve national liberation, class liberation and human
emancipation by themselves." What are the prospects for reunification of the two
Koreas", I asked, to which I got a smiling nod.
Revolutionary change and revolutionary culture are themes that will be
observed when one switches on the TV and radio in Pyongyang. Carefully selected
"politically-corect" local and foreign programs, films as well as music to raise
the level of culture and art willmake one literally experience what a friend
once told us that "taste cannot be democratized!" Foreign music for them, if it
is not revolutionary, must be the classical music of Mozart, Strauss,
Rachmaninoff or Beethoven, to which they are exposed. But this is a country
where ordinary people including university graduates of North Korea don't know
who the Beatles are or haven't heard their music. They are so insulated that
they have not even heard of the "bourgeois music" of the Carpenters or Madonna.
Welcome to the "Hermit Kingdom". As one foreign observer wrote, "There is no
place like it, and it may be the last of its kind on earth like it."
But let us go back to the more surreal, which is the world I found as our
Russian-made passenger jet, Aeroflot, landed us in Pyongyang. My tour book says
that Pyongyang was a very ancient city, in fact, the capital of the Choson
Kingdom in the 3rd century, B.C.. On the way to the Koryu Hotel from the
airport, I immediately noticed that there were two special dotted yellow lines
parallel to each other right smack in the middle of all of Pyongyang's roads
which are wide, two lane avenues. I asked my guide and interpreter what those
extra yello parallel lines were for, because they were not the usual white lines
that usually partition road lanes into half, and the answer was that those were
for the car of "The Great Leader" when he travels.
Even as a socialist-academic, I find it hard to believe, but it is true,
that North Korea is the only country in the world where people do not pay taxes
which were abolished in 1972. Health care and education at all levels are free
to all citizens of North Korea. Peasants live in four-storey Bliss-type state
housing in the countryside. Industrial workers live in high-rise condominium
buildings comparable to those in Ortigas complex or Makati, renting 2-3 bedroom
apartments from the state for less than 1% of their monthly income.
Indeed, I was surprised to learn that despite the protracted economic
embargo imposed by the U.S. and its allies against this country, the socialist
state has still been able to give priority to meeting the essential needs and
basic services of the people. There has been little luxury consumption, or no
local luxury production, as a rule.
Even during its leanest years, the DPRK has placed a high priority on
meeting the people's basic needs, and burdens seem to have been shared rather
equally. Income disparities are reportedly on a scale of 1 to 4, which is very
low, and wages are determined not by position, but by actual work. In addition
to the extraordinarily low rents for state housing, education and medical care
are free and clothing and food are inexpensive. For working mothers, babies and
pre-school children are cared for in a system of nurseries and kindergarten
fully subsidized by the state. These perhaps are the best defenses of DPRK's
socialist system which no amount of anti-socialist propaganda can dismantle.
Most men in Pyongyang wear light or dark grey suits while women either wear
their peach or pink dresses or work clothes of light colored material. Children,
mostly members of the Young Pioneers, wear their brightened red kerchiefs as
they proudly trudge with martial cadence along Pyongyang's avenues. This is a
revolutionary country where morals are surprisingly generally conservative, for
women still wear maxi-skirts or dresses with high socks!
But the streets of the capital are generally empty except when there are
parades and grand celebrations. This is because no one loiters or loafs around
in the streets, parks or public places. Everyone seems to be busy working in the
factories, fields, sweeping the streets or studying indoors. This is because
unemployment is unheard of, and the crime rate is almost down to nil. There are
also very few cars, except the distinctively black or dark blue Toyotas,
Nissans, or Mercedes Benz sedans used as official cars by the government
bureaucrats, top echelon of the military establishment or the visiting
dignitaries and members of the diplomatic corps. It is literally so clean and
clear on the streets except for a few bicycles. I could swear that the concrete
streets of Pyongyang are as clean as a hotel lobby.
There is no question that today, North Korea is in dire economic straits,
because of the isolation imposed by the economic and trade embargo by the United
States and its allies. Droughts and other natural calamities have hit the
northern part of the Korean peninsula that food shortages and hunger have been
reported by international aid agencies which have managed to overcome the
economic embargo of the West. Pyongyang's almost two million population has
recently been plagued with power and energy failures due to shortages in oil and
gas, though North Korea is supposed to have coal resources. This could have
adverse effects on Pyongyang which is the largest North Korean city that is also
a major industrial center producing iron, steel, machinery and textiles.
Pyongyang, as observed by this author, has been rebuilt into a beautiful
and modern city. It has very impressive, first class and European-styled
infrastructure, even its own 'Arc de Triumph' to commemorate the "victories of
the Korean people". It was once declared as a "dead city" by an American
general right after the 1950-53 Korean War and as " a city which could never
rise in a hundred years" after the carpet-bombing by American planes. Employing
the tactics of "scorch-earth policy", the U.S. conducted indiscriminate bombing
and shelling on the 78 cities and towns of north Korea. Its cities, especially
Pyongyang, were razed to the ground, and most of the buildings were levelled.
It is said that in 1952, 1,000 bombs were dropped per square kilometer in
Pyongyang alone which covered 52 square kilometers. During the three years of
the Korean war, the U.S.bombed Pyongyang on 1,431 occasions and dropped over
428,000 bombs or one bomb for every citizen.
Armed with the "Juche idea"(self-reliance philosophy), the DPRK has risen
Phoenix-like from the ruins of the war and has become a showcase for socialist
construction said to be at the speed of Chollima, the Korean legendary winged
horse that is said to travel a thousand ri(4,000 km.) a day. Indeed, the entire
nation and its people are single-mindedly and fully regimented toward socialist
construction(and war preparedness, if necessary). This was a phenomenon that I
could not help but notice when I observed the precision-like discipline of the
people who held and at a given signal turned their colored flashcards at
Pyongyang's colossal stadium to display revolutionary themes.
In essence, according to Li Mong Ho, chairperson of the DPRK Committee for
Cultural Relations, the "Juche idea defines that the master of a country is its
own people." It is this principle that allowed North Korea to assert
independence in political and economic affairs in dealing with both the former
Soviet Union and China in the past. Unlike the south where more than 37,000 U.S.
troops were stationed, there were no foreign troops or foreign bases allowed in
the DPRK. Over the years, north Korea has played a skillful balancing act
between the Soviet Union and China, maintaining relations with both while
remaining independent.
In the post-Korean war period, North Korea's land reform program was
decisively implemented so that even the usually-hostile American anti-communist
scholar like Robert Scalapino made the following observation about the country
he has long been calling 'the Stalinist totalitarianism' or a re-creation of
Orwell's classic Animal Farm: " So far as the great majority of peasants were
concerned, the land reform was beneficial." A CIA study reported in the
mid-1980s: "Pyongyang's self-reliance policy has put a premium on rural
investment. Agriculture is quite heavily mechanized, fertilizer application is
among the highestin the world and irrigation projects are extensive...."
Pyongyang, the North Korean capital, is a city with sprawling, well-planned
parks, with the Taedong River gracefully running through the city's very heart.
Colossal fountains and marble monuments and sculptures decorate the city's
strategic places and parks. If you are an environmentalist, you'll find
solitude in this city-park free from pollution. This is so because the major
transportation system is the subway system which is 150 meters underground and
whose station platforms are lighted with impressive chandeliers. Escalators lead
passengers to platforms where, while waiting for your train, you can hear
piped-in revolutionary music. These also serve as underground bomb shelters
should war break out.
But let me forwarn you -- this country is not a shopping paradise, or for
mall goers -- just a workers' paradise in a revolutionary country. Ask for a
good shopping area in Pyongyang and you will be directed to Number One
Department Store near Kim IL Sung Square where you will find cheap but may I
warn you -- North Korean products from handicrafts, watches and ginseng wine.
I bought an authentic North Korean wrist-watch as pasalubong(arrial present) for
my mother-in-law. I was so embarrassed when my mother in law told me that the
watch I gave her broke down after a week! But at least, the deterimination is
there to produce their own local products and to build their own industries. So,
just buy the colored, round KIM IL Sung or KIM Jong IL pins, to be safe, as
souvenir, which your friends and relatives back home will surely appreciate.
These portraits of the "great leaders" will surely not be defective.
North Korea may indeed be the most orthodox socialist state where, from its
heavy industry to its agriculture, everything is 100% collectivized! And, the
Department of Agrarian Reform(DAR) should hear this: in North Korea, agrarian
reform was fully implemented and completed in just three weeks time. 11,500
rural committees composed of poor peasants were mobilized to confiscate and
distribute more than one million hectares of land to over 726,000 peasant
households who were then organized into cooperatives.
But the biggest let down for me was not the personality cult revolving
around Kim IL Sung before and now, Kim Jong IL(or Kim Chong IL in Korean) with
men, women and children wearing pins with the images of their father-son
leaders. Giant portraits of the late Kim IL Sung or Kim Jong IL are displayed
everywhere instead of commercial billboard ads.
There is a Kim IL Sung University , a Kim IL Sung Avenue, a Kim IL Sung
Square, etc. A chair at the KIM IL Sung University library where Kim IL Sung
sat when he made a visit was decorated with trimmings with a marker, as if
everything that he touched is made sacred. There are more than enough towering
statues of Kim IL Sung all over Pyongyang.
I can respect and recognize this Asian leader's achievements in providing
leadership to both the sucessful anti-Japanese resistance movement and the
post-war socialist reconstruction of Korea. He is their national hero and
symbol of socialist construction. But the biggest turn off for me was the
repetitious and monotonous use of lavish descriptions such as "the great leader,
heroic and magnificent leader and dear leader" to describe the current head of
state who inherited the position from his father, Kim IL Sung. Kim Jong IL has
not only succeeded the position of his father, Kim IL Sung as State President,
Korean Workers' Party General Secretary and Chairman of National Defense. He
has also succeeded the personality cult long enjoyed by his "Great and
Magnificent" father. If there is such a thing as monarchical socialism, this is
it.
Indeed, all evidences point to the fact that there is a megalomanic
personality cult surrounding Kim IL Sung in the DPRK. Through statues,
monuments, and portraits, his image is displayed in schools, factories and homes
all over the country. He is described in DPRK publications in words normally
reserved for a deity or god. Nearly all achievements (except disasters or
misfortunes) in the country have been attributed to the "wise leadership" of
either KIM IL Sung or Kim Jong IL. While most people in North Korea do appear
to have genuine, and as this author observed, even delirious affection for their
wise, great and dear leaders, it is a contradiction that a country which claims
to believe that ordinary people have the power to shape history to place such an
emphasis on one person. Now, his son who succeeded him as head of state, has
also been given similar projection.
On the other hand, there is no evidence to suggest that North Korea's
leaders make irrational decisions. It has in the past shown no abrupt swings in
domestic and international policies. In fact, the country has been remarkably
consistent--rhetorically and in practice-- in its attacks against U.S.
imperialism, and in following its puritanical objectivies for socialist economic
development, national independence and the reunification of the two Koreas.
The one-million strong Korean People's Liberation Army(KPLA) in a
population of 23 million people makes this country one of the world's most
militarized economies and still on war-footing. 65% of this army are said to be
deployed near and around Panmunjom, the symbol of continuing confrontation, that
famous DMZ or demilitarized zone, a UN-controlled truce village where an
armistice was signed in 1953 after the Korean War.
But the North Korean army is also engaged in infrastructure development and
construction. It built the 8-kilometer long West Sea Barrage that connected
the East and West seas using the Taedong and Kunya Rivers, where 30,000 Korean
People's Liberation Army soldiers were mobilized for five years to build. The
West Sea Barrage was designed and constructed wholly by the Korean People's
Liberation Army.
For a Filipino visitor in Pyongyang, there was an interesting detail in a
peculiar museum where all state gifts given to the late revered leader Kim IL
Sung are displayed. Large glass panels enclose and protect state gifts from
Josef Stalin, MaoZeDung, Jawaharlal Nehru, Marshall Tito, etc. in a large
building in the outskirts of Pyongyang. And there it was -- the only gift from
the Philippines for the great leader: a miniature bamboo house presented by the
"Chairman, Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Philippines."
But there is also a funny incident I would like to relate. If you are a
book collector or an avid reader of books, be ready for the surprise of your
life. Ask a bookshop for their collection of books for sale in Pyongyang or
even in the big hotels, and they will ask you, which one, by Kim IL Sung or Kim
Jong IL? You will find works of these two in so many foreign languages, but
they are actually the only known authors in Pyongyang or in North Korea! Not
even the works of known Marxist theoreticians(Marx, Engels, Lenin, Mao,etc.) are
available. And when I showed a little interest in the theoretical writings of
"The Great Leader" by asking questions, I was gifted by my hosts with 35 volumes
of KIM IL Sung's complete writings to bring back home.
What really impresses me about North Koreans is their strong sense of
patriotism and vigilance proudly rooted in their ancestors' history and
traditions. They are proud and confident that, as they enter the new millenium,
they can finally reunify the two Korean states and peoples, with the perspective
that the resolution of the current division is an internal affair for the Korean
people. At least, this is the sentiment given to this author. It is my hope
that the next time I do get to visit Pyongyang, what I will be visiting will
just be a northern city of one united Korea, distinguished as a geographic north
Korean city, not a political entity separated from the southern cities of the
peninsula.
If a nation consists of a people, there is only one Korea.
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