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March 23, 2007 is the 90th anniversary of the foundation of the Korean National Association by the indomitable patriotic revolutionary of
Following are the excerpts from President Kim Il Sung?s Reminisces "With the Century". Volume I, Chapter.
President Kim Il Sung's father Kim Hyong Jik
(1894-1926)
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?Jiwon? (Aim High!) was my father?s lifelong motto?.
When I was old enough to understand the world, my father began to teach me how I should love my country, saying that in order to become a patriot I should aim high.
?Aim High!? means what it says.
There is nothing extraordinary about a father who teaches his son to aim high. One cannot succeed in a venture unless one has a noble ideal and a high ambition and works tirelessly.
But ?Aim High!? has nothing in common with worldly preaching about personal glory or a successful career; it implies a revolutionary outlook on life in which genuine happiness is sought in the struggle for one?s country and nation, and an unbreakable revolutionary spirit to liberate the country by fighting through the generations?..
Once my father said to my grandparents, ?What is the use of living if I cannot win my country?s independence? Even if I am to be torn to pieces I must fight and defeat the Japanese. If I fall in battle, my son will continue the fight; if my son cannot accomplish the cause, my grandson must fight until we win our nation?s independence.?
Later, I remembered these words when the anti-Japanese armed struggle, which I had believed we would win in three or four years, dragged on. As I lived through the long years of tragedy caused by national division after liberation, the division that compelled the north and the south to take opposite courses, I reminded myself of my father?s profound words.
What he said always reflected his idea of ?Aim High!?, his conviction and his thought and aspiration for national liberation.
In spite of his family?s poverty, my father went to
Under his guidance a reading circle and a single-hearted friendship association were formed at
During the school holidays my father used to travel around Anju, Kangdong, Sunan, Uiju and other places in North and
The greatest achievement made by my father at
Many of his classmates were not only friends of my father but also ready to take up the common cause with him in order to shape the destiny of the country and nation.
They were all young men with foresight and a high reputation, men of great ability, wide knowledge and outstanding personality?..
My father left Sungsil Middle School early and began to teach at Sunhwa School in Mangyongdae and then at Myongsin School in Kangdong, applying himself to the education of the younger generation and to rallying his comrades. He explained that he had left middle school with a view to concentrating on the practical struggle and to extending the theatre of his revolutionary activities.
During a school holiday in 1916 he toured Jiandao in northeast
My father toured Jiandao and Shanghai to obtain a firsthand knowledge of the independence movement abroad of which he had heard rumors, recruiting new comrades and defining his policies and strategies for the subsequent years?..
The situation in Jiandao reaffirmed my father?s belief that
By that time our family had moved from Mangyongdae to Ponghwa-ri, Kangdong.
There he taught at
Many independence fighters visited my father at Ponghwa-ri. He himself traveled frequently around North and
On the basis of these preparations, he and other patriotic independence fighters such as Jang Il Hwan, Pae Min Su and Paek Se Bin formed the Korean National Association at Ri Po Sik?s house at
The young members of the association cut their fingers and wrote ?
The Korean National Association was a secret organization with the aim of achieving national independence and establishing a truly modern state through the efforts of the unified Korean nation. It was one of the largest anti-Japanese underground revolutionary organizations of Korean patriots at home or abroad at the time of the March First Popular Uprising?..
It was a revolutionary organization that stood firmly against imperialism and for independence. Its manifesto stated that, in view of the clear evidence that European and American forces were heading East and that they would soon rival
As is clear from the manifesto, the Korean National Association, unlike those who pinned their hopes on foreign forces, adopted the independent stand that
The Korean National Association drew up a great plan for sending its members to Jiandao and developing that area into the strategic base for the independence movement.
The association had a closely-knit network of organizations. It admitted to its membership only well-prepared, tested and well-selected patriots, had an organizational system that worked from top to bottom and used code words for communications between its members. Its secret documents were compiled in code.
It planned to hold a general meeting of its members every year on the day of starting a new school year at
The association had a solid mass foundation. It drew its membership from among workers, peasants, teachers, students, soldiers (of the Independence Army), shopkeepers, religious believers and artisans? people from all walks of life.
Its organizational network spread throughout the country and even reached
The Korean National Association was the result of many years of my father?s energetic organizational and propaganda activities at home and abroad after the annexation. He planned to build up the movement on a large scale on the strength of the organization.
But the organization was put down harshly by the Japanese imperialists. In the autumn of 1917 the enemy discovered a clue concerning the organization.
One windy day three policemen fell upon my father as he taught at
From the day following my father?s arrest the Christians living in Ponghwa-ri gathered at
Whenever I asked my mother when father would return, she would answer that he would return soon. One day she took me to the
As she sat on the swing holding me in her arms, she said, ?Jung Son, the ice floes on the River Taedong have melted away and the trees have produced green leaves, but your father hasn?t returned home. He was fighting to win back his country. How can that be a crime? You must grow up quickly and take revenge on the enemy for your father.... You must grow up to be a hero and win back the country.? I answered that I would do so, come what may.
After that she visited the prison many times without my knowledge, but she said nothing about it when she returned home.
One day she took me in the direction of the city, saying that she was going to Phalgol to have her cotton ginned. She left the cotton at her mother?s house at Chilgol on the way, asking her mother to have it ginned, and then took me to
My grandmother told her daughter to go without me, saying that a child too young to understand the world should not see a prison. If I saw my father behind bars, how frightened I should be! She was dead against her taking me to the prison. At that time I was six years old?.
The visitors? room was dim, screened from the sunshine. The air in the room was thick and oppressive.
Even in such an atmosphere my father was smiling as usual. He was delighted to see me, and praised my mother for having taken me with her. The gaunt face of my father who wore prison clothes defied instant recognition. His face, neck, hands, feet and all the rest of his body were scarred and wounded. ?
My visit to my father in prison was a great event for me. I understood why my mother had taken me with her to the prison. The physical wounds to my father made me feel to the marrow of my bones how fiendish was Japanese imperialism. Those wounds gave me a much more real and visual image of Japanese imperialism than the image provided by numerous statesmen and historians through their analysis and assessment of it?.
The wounds remained in my mind throughout the period of my revolutionary struggle against the Japanese. The shock I received on that visit still has a strong effect on me.
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