Kim Song-joo, as his real name was, was born on 15 April 1912 in Pyongyang, then Japanese Korea. In 1931 he joined the Korean Communist Party and participated in the armed resistance against the Japanese occupation of his homeland. It was then that he received the revolutionary nickname Kim Il Sung, after an earlier legendary leader of the guerrilla war against the Japanese.
During World War II he served in the Soviet army as a Korean unit commander with the rank of major. When he returned home after its liberation, he participated in the establishment of a communist regime in North Korea (1945) and quickly became the strongman of his country. In 1948, he became prime minister and a year later assumed the presidency of North Korea's powerful and sole party, the Workers' Party.
In 1950, he made an unsuccessful attempt to extend his power to the south of the country and then, with Chinese assistance, repelled an invasion of North Korea by United Nations forces ("Korean War"). Without ceasing to consider himself a representative of the entire Korean people, he concentrated his efforts on creating a socialist state in North Korea and promoted closer relations with the Soviet Union.
In December 1972, he was elected President of North Korea. From this position, he repeatedly proposed the unification of Korea. In 1980, he again proposed the creation of a federation of North and South Korea, on condition, among other things, that US troops stationed in South Korea withdraw. In a policy shift, he declared that his government was willing to re-establish friendly relations with capitalist countries.
Over time, he moved away from both the Soviet Union and Marxism-Leninism. He proclaimed the political ideology of "juche", or national self-sufficiency, according to which a state should be independent and self-sufficient, so as not to be economically, militarily or politically dependent on the great powers. Kim Il-sung believed that the individual is 'master of his own destiny' and the masses of North Korea must act as 'masters of the revolution'. "Juche" is the basic ideology of North Korea, to this day.
In domestic policy, his regime provided cheap housing, free medical care, and eleven years of free compulsory education. However, after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, North Korea's economy collapsed and since then the country has fluctuated between poverty and famine.
Kim Il Sung became the subject of personality cults, the likes of which were unparalleled in the countries of the communist camp. He died of a heart attack on 8 July 1994, at the age of 82. He was succeeded by his eldest son Kim Yong Il (1941-2011), in another novelty of North Korea's peculiar communist regime. Even today, Kim Il Sung is called "Great Leader" and "Eternal President", while his birthday is a public holiday and is called "Sun Day".
Source: sansimera
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