Long Live the Heroic Anti-Imperialist Victory of the Korean People!
July 27th 2013 marked the 60th anniversary of the signing of the armistice in Korea, marking the end of the Korean War which ended in a victory for the valiant Korean people.
Long Live the Heroic Anti-Imperialist Victory of the Korean People!
July 27th 2013 marked the 60th anniversary of the signing of the armistice in Korea, marking the end of the Korean War which ended in a victory for the valiant Korean people. It is all the more significant as the Korean people have steadfastly and successfully resisted the continued efforts of US imperialism to subjugate them. On the contrary, the people of Korea have upheld their right to determine their own destiny and to govern themselves according to a political system of their choice.
The Korean War was started by the US imperialists in the wake of the historic victories of the anti-fascist forces led by the Soviet Union in the Second World War. Korea was occupied and ruled by the Japanese monarchists from 1910 till the end of the Second World War. The Korean people waged powerful struggle against Japanese colonialism. At the end of the Second World War, as the fascist forces were being routed by the heroic struggles of the people, the Korean people, like other peoples who had been groaning under the jackboots of the Japanese occupiers, hoped to be liberated and become masters of their own destiny.
At the Teheran Conference of the Allied forces held in November 1943 and at the Yalta conference (February 1945), it was agreed that the Soviet Union would join in the war against Japan and they did so. It was clear that Japan would have to surrender very soon. The Korean national liberation fighters were preparing to take power into their own hands and did indeed do so. At this time, the US military forces occupied the southern part of Korea. They announced the establishment of a US Military administration throughout South Korea and then used this to hold fraudulent elections to establish a pro-US puppet regime. Thus the US imperialists organised the partition of Korea, with the southern part under its jackboots.
The aim of the US imperialists was to control the whole of Korea and use this as a springboard to invade China and Siberia. As part of this strategy, the U.S. imperialists provoked a war of aggression in the Korean peninsula by hurling South Korean puppet units across the 38th parallel on June 25, 1950.
During the course of the war, the US imperialist led forces (consisting of troops from US and 14 of its allies, including Britain) committed innumerable war crimes including massacres of civilians in both parts of Korea, that controlled by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) and that controlled by the US. It is estimated that over 4 million civilians were killed in the course of the three years of war, including three million in the North and one million in the areas under US occupation. During the war the US dropped more than 428,000 bombs over the DPRK capital Pyongyang on 1,400 occasions, destroying industrial establishments, education, health and public service facilities and homes, killing many civilians. When they were forced to retreat from the north, the US imperialist aggressors deployed biological weapons as they withdrew, spreading all kinds of infections including smallpox.
However despite all their most despicable crimes, the US imperialists could not defeat the valiant people of Korea. They were finally forced to sign the Armistice Agreement at the end of July 1953. However, since then the US imperialists have refused to abide by its terms and refused to sign a permanent peace treaty, threatening to commit aggression again and again.
Since that time, the US imperialists and their allies have tried to strangulate the economy of North Korea, to isolate the government and people of North Korea and have indulged in several military provocations against them and even threatened them with nuclear weapons. Unfazed, the government and people of North Korea have reiterated their resolve to fight to the last person to retain their freedom and have rebuffed all acts of aggression to date.
The 60th anniversary of the Armistice signing is not only an occasion for celebration and reiterating the resolve of the Korean people to protect their sovereignty, it is an occasion of celebration for all freedom and independence loving peoples of the world as well. The people of Korea have a great desire to reunite; justice requires that the Korean people in the north and south be permitted to determine their own destiny free from foreign interference and threats of aggression.