LET US HOLD THE GREAT LEADER IN HIGH ESTEEM FOREVER AND ACCOMPLISH HIS CAUSE
KIM JONG IL
LET US HOLD THE GREAT LEADER IN HIGH ESTEEM FOREVER AND
ACCOMPLISH HIS CAUSE
Talk to the Senior Officials of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea
October 16, 1994
One hundred days have passed since the death of the great leader Comrade Kim Il Sung. During these days our people have felt even more keenly how great he was and how muchthey were blessed by having him as their leader. We admired him for his greatness in his lifetime, and his greatness becomes even more conspicuous in death.
Comrade Kim Il Sung was the great leader whom our people held in high esteem for the first time in their history of thousands of years, and the sun of humankind who was looked up to by the whole world. Having embarked on the road of revolution in his early years, he devoted his all to the people’s freedom and welfare, overcoming every manner of hardship. And, with the absolute support and trust of our people and of the progressive people the world over he led the revolution to victory, accomplishing immortal exploits that will shine in history. He led our Party and people for half a century after Korea’s liberation, not to mention the period when he led the anti-Japanese revolutionary struggle.
Had he lived one year longer, he would have witnessed the celebration of the 50th anniversaries of Korea’s liberation and the founding of the Workers’ Party of Korea. No leader anywhere in the world has led his party, state and people for 50 years and created such shining achievements as Comrade Kim Il Sung did. His immortal exploits in achieving the victory of the cause of the independence of the masses, the cause of socialism, constitute the greatest achievements inthe history of humankind and the international communist movement. He was truly a great philosopher, statesman, military strategist and artist of leadership, who glorified modern history with his outstanding ideas and theories and wise leadership. We must feel very proud that we were led by such a great man.
Comrade Kim Il Sung was also an outstanding revolutionary, a great man and the benevolent father of the people. He trained our people into excellent people, established our advantageous socialist system and worked energetically to the last moment of his life to provide our people with still greater happiness. He treasured the people, regarding them as his God, and had everything honourable named after the “people”–the names of the state, of the armed forces, of a palace of culture, of a study house and of hospitals.
He was infinitely gracious and humble. On July 6, he telephoned me and told me about the problems arising in north- south relations, and asked me the Party’s opinion. When I answered that the Party would do as he resolved, he said he would act in the belief that he had the Party’s approval. That was the last time he called me. He completed all his work before his death, as if he had foreseen what was to happen.
Although he was in his eighties, he has in recent years met all the surviving veterans of the anti-Japanese revolution and the orphaned sons and daughters of the martyrs of the southKorean revolution and other martyrs. When writing his memoirs, he recalled everyone who had been associated with his revolutionary struggle, and met not only those in the country but also those who live abroad. Whenever he met the bereaved sons and daughters of revolutionary martyrs and those associated with his career, he would say that he owed his good health to me and asked them to support me loyally. He presented them with wrist watches and showed them everymanner of affection and kindness. He posed for souvenir photographs on numerous occasions.
This year alone he posed with the participants in the National Meeting of Agriculture and the National Meeting of Workers in the Coal-Mining Industry, as well as with numerous otherworking people.
This year he met officials in various sectors and gave them valuable instructions. On April 25, he met commanding officers of the Korean People’s Army and gave them instructions for strengthening the armed forces. It was his last behest to the army. That day he said that the army should loyally support its Supreme Commander. This year he presided over several consultative meetings of leading agricultural officials, and on July 5 and 6, just before his death, heconvened a consultative meeting of senior officials in the economic sector and gave them instructions to be strictly followed in socialist economic construction. This year he conducted energetic activities in the external field, meeting many foreigners; he met former US President Jimmy Carter and created favourable conditions for us in the DPRK-USA talks.
In his lifetime, he brought every problem to a perfect solution, with the exception of that of national reunification. Even so, he laid down solid foundations for the early resolution of the problem of national reunification. He said that the Korean nation, though divided at present, would lead a happy life in a reunified country before long.
Thus he died after completing his work in all spheres and leaving a lingering influence in the hearts of the Korean people and of the revolutionary people the world over. No other leader in the world has ever completed all his work prior to his death. Comrade Kim Il Sung died of heart disease. He had suffered from heart disease for several years, but we kept the 3state of his health from the people, lest they should worry about him. This year, he was suffering from eye trouble, so he readthe manuscript of his New Year Address with difficulty. He underwent an eye operation. Even a young man must rest for at least a month after such an operation. However, a few days
after the operation, he met Son Won Thae, and had a photograph taken with the participants in the Fifth Congress of the Children’s Union of Korea. Subsequently he met Carter and other foreign dignitaries on their visit to our country. He was working to a tight schedule, formulating the political and economic issues our side would present at the north-south summit, going over the many documents that were submitted to him and giving on-the-spot guidance to farms in OnchonCounty and on the outskirts of Pyongyang. Although he had been suffering from heart disease for several years, he never stopped working. Because he worked with such a superhumaneffort even at the advanced age of 80-plus, his condition went from bad to worse. There can have been no other leader in the world who worked so dynamically even in his eighties right upuntil his death, as he did. Since he worked so hard for the benefit of the people right up until his sudden death, our people feel even more heartbroken.
He worked with vigour for the Party and the revolution, the country and his fellow people until he died in his office. He died at his post. He is the only leader in the world who completed his work through energetic activities right up until the last moment of his life. In view of this, he was thegreatest of great men. He was a great leader, a great revolutionary and a great man beyond comparison with all other great men.
His great traits and great image, characterized by his brilliant ideas and theories, his unexcelled leadership, his noble virtues, his outstanding personality, his informal manner and his frugal life, have moved the world’s people and presented to them the image of the most outstanding manin history. As the days go by, we feel more keenly that he was inherently a great man. We must have many books about his greatness written to inform our contemporaries and posterity about it.
Our people’s boundless loyalty to and reverence for him has been more evident since his death. They have, by displaying their noble spiritual and moral traits to the full, conveyed thefeeling that they will not forget the gratitude they owe him for providing them with genuine happiness.
In bitter grief over his death and with an earnest longing for him, our people have visited statues of him by day and at night. They have all mourned him and paid great tribute to his memory with full honour. A few days after his death, while I was touring Pyongyang, I drove to his statue onMansu Hill. There I saw numerous citizens, in spite of the rain, extending their condolences to the deceased in the concourse in front of the statue, and many others awaiting their turn at the foot of the steps leading up to the concourse. Among them were five university students who were waiting their turn to lay a wreath of flowers; although they were soaked to the skin, they were covering the wreath with their shirts to keep it from getting wet. I gazed at them for a while, and shed tears; all I could think was, these are the students of the new generation.
Today on my way back from the meeting of the Political Bureau of the Party Central Committee after the national memorial service on the occasion of the 100 th day followingComrade Kim Il Sung’s death, I saw some housewives who had attended the ceremony, requesting to be allowed into the Kumsusan Assembly Hall. They apparently were doing so out of their unquenchable desire to see the late leader. Last night when I went to Mansu Hill during my tour of Pyongyang, I saw endless crowds of people visiting the leader’s statue, in spite of the rain. I was so sorry to see them exposed to the cold rain that I called an official and told him to dissuade the people from doing so. During the mourning period, our people demonstrated their high moral standards to the world. I was greatly moved by the noble morality of our people in holding their deceased leader in such high esteem. Our people are truly a noble people who are incomparable to any other people in the world with regard to the ideological, spiritual and moral qualities with which they support their leader. They are highly laudable. The world will never know another people as excellent as ours.
Our people are our blessing. It is because we have these excellent people that we can defend socialism in confrontation with the allied forces of imperialism. Even our enemy, not to mention the progressive people of the world, express admiration at the loyalty and filial devotion withwhich our people follow their leader. Some businessmen and specialists from a capitalist country, who had been in our country during the mourning period, were interviewed by journalists upon their return home. In the interview, they said that all the Korean people cherished unqualified
reverence for the late President Kim Il Sung and wailed with bitterest grief over his death, and that they had never seen such people anywhere else. CNN International and NHK broadcast the scenes of the Korean people expressing their heartfelt regret and indescribable grief over thePresident’s death. Now, the world is speaking highly of our people’s spiritual and moral qualities.
6The enemy, when they see the noble ideological and spiritual qualities of our people who are unfailingly faithful to the Party and the leader, are afraid of us because we have such excellent people. In the documentary film The Great Leader Comrade Kim Il Sung Is Immortal, the enemy can see not only images of Korean people in their grief but also the might of their single-hearted unity. The might of the single-hearted unity of our people is greater than that of an atomic bomb. Noenemy, however formidable, and no weaponry, however advanced, will prevail over such people as ours who are infinitely loyal to the Party and the leader. Our people are a great people. We should use the adjective “great” in describing our people. I am very grateful to our people for expressing their condolences over the passing of the late leader with such bitter grief.
That we are blessed with such people is thanks to Comrade Kim Il Sung. He placed great political trust in us and appointed us to important posts of the Party and the state. He edified our people and brought them up to be an excellent people with a proper attitude towards their leader and Party. Always mindful of his achievements in this, and with a sense of great pride and honour in having such an excellent people, we should serve them more faithfully.
We should conduct education among cadres, Party members and other working people so that they consummate the revolutionary cause of the great leader Comrade Kim Il Sung in the belief that he is always with us. Although his heart has stopped beating, he is with our people as ever. As the brain of the unity of the leader, the Party and the masses and as the sun of the nation, he is immortal. Itcan be said that his history will continue as the country grows prosperous, as he wished in his lifetime.
We should hold him in high esteem through the ages and undertake all work as he did. The founder of our nation was Tangun, and the founder of socialist Korea was Comrade Kim Il Sung. Without him, we could not conceive of Korea today, shining over the world, or of the great dignity, honourand pride of the Korean nation. He is the great father of the nation; under his leadership the Korean nation has become the most dignified and happiest nation in the world. Overseas Koreans call their nation Kim Il Sung’s nation. We should work with greater devotion to enhance the dignity of the nation that is named after him. Without this national dignity, we may repeat the history of worshipping big countries and suffering humiliation. We should ensure that all cadres, Party members and other working people give fuller play to the Korean-nation-first spirit, taking pride in having built the most advantageous people-centred, Korean-style socialism under his leadership.
We should add eternal glory to Comrade Kim Il Sung’s great ideology, cause and undying exploits by displaying a noble moral outlook.
The moral quality of communists finds concentrated expression in holding their leader in high regard. Some people are of the opinion that new Party and state leadership bodies should be formed right away, now that the President has passed away, but this cannot and need not be done. In view of the noble moral outlook with which we hold him in high esteem, we cannot rush such a reorganization. As you can see in the documentary The Great Life in 1994, Comrade Kim Il Sung vigorously conducted his last revolutionary activities in 1994, refusing to rest even for a moment. In view of this, we should make the rest of the year a mourning period. In olden times, our ancestors mourned a death for a period of 100 days or a year or three years. We should form the newleadership after the work has been completed of preserving his body. It is not appropriate for new Party and state leadership bodies to be formed and hailed while the people, in their grief, are still lamenting at his bier.
Since our political system is based on the single-hearted unity of the leader, the Party and the masses, it will never waver. The People’s Army is boundlessly loyal to its Supreme Commander, and the people are also demonstrating undivided loyalty to their leader. Our people, who are more solidly rallied behind the Party without the slightest vacillation since Comrade Kim Il Sung’s death, are persevering to consummate the revolutionary cause of Juche that he pioneered. In the
mourning period the solid single-hearted unity of the leader, the Party and the masses fully demonstrated its solidity; the creation of this unity is one of the great achievements of Comrade Kim Il Sung. If he had not built up the driving force of the revolution and constructed socialism of the Korean style by realizing this unity, we would not have been able to surmount the current difficulties. Because the People’s Army is boundlessly loyal to its Supreme Commander, the Partymaintains a harmonious whole with the masses and the leadership system of the Party is firm, we need not hurry over forming new leadership bodies. Instead of concerning ourselves with the formation of a new leadership, we should think about how to safeguard the revolutionary cause of Juche pioneered by Comrade Kim Il Sung and carry it forward successfully. We must follow only the road of revolution that he travelled and concentrate all our efforts on carrying out his cause.
A communist should seek satisfaction in waging the revolution regardless of his post.Comrade Kim Il Sung did not have in mind the posts of party general secretary and head ofstate after Korea’s liberation when he was leading the anti- Japanese revolution in his early years at the head of the Korean revolution. He waged the bloody anti-Japanese revolution for some 20 years simply to liberate the country and provide the people with freedom and happiness.
I have always considered myself to be one of his men. I will carry forward his revolutionary cause as his loyal man as I did in his lifetime. Our pledge after his demise cannot differ from the one we made in his lifetime; we must remain true to our noble moral obligations as his revolutionary fighters.
As the days go by, our people are longing for him more eagerly, visiting his statues to lay wreaths and flowers and to pay tribute to him. I ensured that the mourning period was prolongedin line with the people’s wishes, so that they could continue to extend their condolences. In the mourning period our people have nurtured the conviction that Comrade Kim Il Sung isalways with them. We must ensure that they hold him in high esteem forever and remain faithful to his will. If we undertake the work of holding him in high esteem for eternity, we can exert a significant influence on establishing a true communist moral outlook in the international communist movement. Communist morality is pure, noble and genuine. The core of communist morality isloyalty to the leader. In the past revisionists such as Khrushchev who appeared in the international communist movement, seriously undermined communist morality. Khrushchev, by slandering Stalin, gave the negative impression to the world that communists were ignorant of their forerunners in the revolution and fought one another. Lenin, the founder of the first socialist state, is today slandered by the renegade socialists, seventy years after his death. Similar phenomena have been witnessed in other parties in the international communist movement. As a result, the communists lost the people’s trust and support, and this ended with the collapse of socialism in several countries. By holding Comrade Kim Il Sung in high esteem forever, even more so than we did in his lifetime, we should demonstrate to the world the outlook on morality with whichcommunists support their leaders. Thus we can actively contribute to safeguarding and adding glory to the noblest communist morality and to its worldwide rehabilitation, after it was marred by the revisionists and renegades of socialism.
Those who took the floor at today’s national memorial service pledged to carry forward as ever the revolutionary cause of Juche that was pioneered by Comrade Kim Il Sung. The armed forces and the people should struggle vigorously in pursuance of this pledge. We should safeguard and glorifyhis great revolutionary exploits as we did in his lifetime and carry out the revolution and construction at all times as he intended and as he did. By faithfully carrying forward the socialist cause, the revolutionary cause of Juche that he hewed out, we will demonstrate the Korean communists’ noble moral outlook. At the same time as we are setting fine examples for therevolutionary people of the world in political, ideological, moral and all other fields, we must produce a lot of literature on the subject. I am currently writing a treatise, titled, Socialism Is a Science. I intend to publish it in November or December this year. We must not only defend and develop socialism of our own style, but also intensify our theoretical information work so as to offer encouragement to the people who aspire after socialism.
Edification through documentary films should be conducted in an effective manner. Documentaries are an effective means of ideological education. Such films help Party members and other workingpeople recognize the greatness of their leader. Recently, several documentaries, including parts one, two and three of The Great Leader Comrade Kim Il Sung Is Immortal, and The Great Lifein 1994 were produced. We should make arrangements for these films to be shown for educational purposes. When The Great Leader Comrade Kim Il Sung Is Immortal was produced, the officials concerned proposed organizing showings of the three parts of the film. I ensured that the firstpart was shown initially, and that the second and third parts were shown on the occasion of the memorial service marking the 100 th day after his death. Showing the film in such a wayhas proved effective in educating Party members and other working people. When the documentary The Great Life in 1994 was in the production stage, I ensured that the voice of Comrade Kim Il Sung was inserted in the scene in which he is speaking at a consultative meeting of senior officials in the economic sector on July 6, 1994. This is the first documentary in which his voice appears. I was told that cadres, Party members and other working people were very moved to hear
his voice when they watched the film. This shows that documentaries serve as a powerful means of educating Party members and other working people. The first and second parts of the documentary President Kim Il Sung Meets Foreign Heads of State and Prominent Figures have been produced. The subsequent parts will also be produced. From the day of Korea’s liberation until his deathComrade Kim Il Sung met over 70 000 foreign figures,including heads of state. No other leader in the world has ever met so many foreign figures. How good it would have been if we had produced the documentary in his lifetime so that he could see it! We should make arrangements for thesedocumentaries to be shown to cadres, Party members and other working people so that they fully realize his greatness and hold him in high esteem through the ages. The documentary President Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il Were Always Together on the Road for the Well-Being of the People contains scenes of Comrade Kim Il Sung and myself working together. In the film there is a scene in which Comrade Kim Il Sung sings Nostalgia. It is a song he used to sing in the days of the anti-Japanese revolutionary struggle. Once he sang a Chinese song, Song of Su Wu, which he also used to sing in those days. In his memoirs With the Century he recollected that song with deep emotion. The song reflects the patriotic sentiments of the Chinese people. After Korea’s liberation he sought out the text of the song, and he finally obtained it just a few years ago. He was so delighted that he sang it. I have a tape recording of him singing Nostalgia and Song of Su Wu; it issomething to treasure. It will be good if the scene of him singing Song of Su Wu is inserted in a documentary. Our people will be greatly moved to see him singing the song. Although it is a Chinese song, it will be all right to broadcast the scene because he was a great internationalist.
The Pochonbo Electronic Ensemble produced the song We Pledge after Comrade Kim Il Sung’s demise. I had it broadcast on the occasion of the 100 th day after his death. The text of thesong is clear and simple. The song sings about the will of our people to remain faithful to the Party’s cause to the last and make their country ever more prosperous, true to ComradeKim Il Sung’s last behest. As the song says, we must make our country more prosperous by remaining faithful to his last will. Only by making our country more prosperous can we add lustreto our socialism and hasten national reunification.
In order to safeguard Comrade Kim Il Sung’s revolutionary cause and accomplish it, we must strengthen the Party and consolidate the single-hearted unity of the leader, the Party and the masses.The Party is the destiny of the country, the nation and the people. The decisive guarantee of victory in the revolution lies in strengthening the Party and enhancing its leadership role. We should continue to direct great efforts to building up the Party organizationally and ideologically and thus make it invincible.
We should, first of all, build up the Party ranks and cement its unity and cohesion centred on the leader by conducting effective organizational work. We should prevent any alien element from infiltrating our Party ranks and any negative factor, however negligible, from undermining its unity and cohesion. Along with organizational work, Party ideological work should be conducted in a substantial manner. Education in the Juche idea constitutes the essence of ideological education
among Party members and other working people. The Juche idea is the only ideology guiding our revolution and construction, and it is the lifeline of the Korean people. If our people are truly to exist, they must firmly equip themselves with the Juche idea and follow the road indicated by it. Byconducting education in the Juche idea in a more effective manner, we can ensure that all Party members and other working people arm themselves firmly with the idea, accept it as their unshakable conviction and make positive efforts to apply it in practice.It is important in strengthening the Party and enhancing its leadership role to establish the leadership system of the Party. The development of the Party and the victorious advance of
the revolution and construction are inconceivable apart from the system in which the entire Party, all the people and the whole army move as one under the unified guidance of the Party Central Committee. We should consolidate the monolithic leadership system of the Party and create in theentire Party and the whole society a revolutionary habit of accepting and carrying out the Party’s lines and policies unreservedly.
We should continue to develop the single-hearted unity of the leader, the Party and the masses, a weapon with which we will emerge victorious in the confrontation with the enemy. This unity will make us a match for any enemy, however formidable, and enable us to surmount any trial and emerge victorious. We should continue to develop this unity in depth, so as to rally all the people more firmly around the Party and the leader and by dint of this unity overcome the trials on the road of revolution.
We should channel great efforts into economic work. Although nearly a year has passed since a new revolutionary economic strategy was adopted at the 21 st Plenary Meeting of the Sixth Central Committee of the Party, economic work is not being conducted with the vigour that the Party demands. The revolutionary economic strategy of the Party is, in essence, a strategy for developing agriculture and light industry, and for improving the people’s standard of living. The most conspicuous shortcoming in the implementation of this strategy is the failure to grasp the main link in the whole chain, and this is due to efforts being dispersed and too many construction projects being undertaken. Comrade Kim Il Sung worried about economic work until the last moment of his life. We should implement the Party’s economic strategy by any means and put his lifetime wish into reality. We should, by strictly adhering to this strategy, carry out the agriculture-first policy, light-industry-first policy and foreign-trade-first policy and thus rapidly improve the people’s
standard of living. The commissions and ministries of the Administration Council and the departments of the Party Central Committee should orient their work to carrying outthese tasks and, in particular, focus their efforts on agriculture and light industry.
The Administration Council and the State Planning Commission should reexamine the overall national economic plan and amend it to facilitate the implementation of the economic strategy. The plan should be mapped out along the line of concentrating all our efforts on agriculture and lightindustry in reflection of the main targets and requirements of the economic strategy, so as to improve the people’s standard of living radically. Without focusing on agriculture and lightindustry, we can neither improve the people’s standard of living quickly nor maintain our existence. In order to support agriculture and light industry, we should also direct efforts to the vanguard sectors in the national economy, principally the power industry. Without electricity, we can neither produce fertilizer nor farm well nor run our light-industry factories at full capacity. And, based on a feasibility study of the projects that are now under construction, we should suspend theinfeasible ones and divert the equipment, materials and funds to agriculture and light industry.
In order to implement the revolutionary economic strategy of the Party, the Administration Council should enhance its role. The Administration Council is the economic headquarters 16that organizes and commands the overall economic work of the country in a unified manner; it is answerable to the Party on economic matters. Success in economic work depends on how the Administration Council works. The Party has established a system by which the Administration Council assumes fullresponsibility for economic affairs and performs the central role in the economic sphere, and has created favourable conditions for it to do its work so that it can undertake economic work as the economic headquarters of the country. The Administration Council, fully aware of the Party’sintention, must apply the system thoroughly and organize and command the country’s economic work with a high sense of responsibility. All economic bodies, including the commissionsand ministries of the Administration Council, should bring any problems that arise in economic work to the attention of the Administration Council and solve them under its unified
command. If a fresh upsurge is to be achieved in economic work, officials must give full play to the revolutionary spirit of self- reliance and fortitude. It is true that there are some difficultiesin economic work, but they can be surmounted if officials work hard in the revolutionary spirit of self-reliance and fortitude. One thing Comrade Kim Il Sung used to emphasize in his lifetime was the revolutionary spirit of self-reliance and fortitude. I ensured that, during the mourning period, officials inspected the cooperative farms on the Yonbaek Plain, the Jonchon County Commercial Management Agency and Maengsan County as a way of encouraging them to implement the Party’s revolutionary economic strategy thoroughly and perform the work of their own units well bydisplaying the revolutionary spirit of self-reliance and fortitude. The Jonchon County Commercial Management Agency and Maengsan County are model units; they have been working well, in the spirit of self-reliance and fortitude. The provinces should strive to emulate the example ofMaengsan County, and in the commercial field the Jong Chun Sil movement, which aims at following the example of the Jonchon County Commercial Management Agency, should beconducted more vigorously. In view of the great importance of officials displaying the revolutionary spirit of self-reliance and fortitude, I emphasized it at today’s meeting of the Political Bureau of the Party Central Committee. Leading economic officials in every sector and at every unit should,based on a clear understanding of the Party’s intention, fulfil the economic tasks assigned to them by displaying the revolutionary spirit of self-reliance and fortitude.
We should strengthen the People’s Army and create a climate in which prominence is given to military affairs throughout society. We are waging a revolution in direct confrontation with theUS imperialists, the chieftain of the world’s reactionaries, and have yet to accomplish national reunification. The road of our revolution is beset with many trials and obstacles, and the USimperialists and reactionaries are intensifying their moves of aggression and war against our country. In these circumstances, if we are to overcome all the trials and hardships facing us andsafeguard and advance the socialist cause, we must resolutely strengthen the army as well as the Party. Without strengthening the army, we cannot defend the gains of the revolution, step upsocialist construction or accomplish the reunification of the country. What is important in strengthening the army at present is to make it boundlessly loyal to the cause of the Party. OurPeople’s Army is the army of the Party. The People’s Army as the army of the Party must hold high the red flag, the flag of the Workers’ Party of Korea. That it fights bravely and in defiance of death for the cause of the Party constitutes the essential feature and is the source of the invincibility of the People’s Army. The army must remain loyal to the cause of the Party, whatever the adversity, and establish the revolutionary trait of sharing destiny with the Party. For the sake of victory in the revolutionary struggle, the Party and the army should form an integral whole. Both areinseparably linked to each other; a party that fails to command the army cannot display its might, and an army that does not enjoy the party’s leadership cannot be a strong combat force.An army that is separated from the leadership of a party cannot win a revolutionary war. The military command system can bring the army into action but it cannot mobilize the civilianmasses. It is the party that mobilizes broad sections of the masses. Only when the party and the army form an integral whole can the entire party, all the people and the whole army move as one. The revolutionary party, when the army defends it by force of arms, remains invincible; and the revolutionary army, when the revolutionary party guides it and enlists the masses, can display its formidable might. If the party and the army pool their strength they can defeat any enemy and emerge victorious in the revolutionary struggle. In this sense, it can be said that in our country today the Party is the army and the army is the Party. The People’s Army should create a revolutionary climate within itself, based on the climate within the Party. The People’s Army should staunchly defend the Party, be loyal to its leadership and defend its cause by force of arms. We should ensure that relations between the army and the people are good, since they are a key link in the preparedness for combat. Unless they are united in one mind and one will, they cannot defeat the enemy. We must give free rein to the traditional traits of unity between the army and the people sothat in times of emergency they will defeat the aggressors and defend the socialist homeland, united in one mind and one will. We should create a climate in which prominence is given tomilitary affairs throughout society. By doing so, we can ensure that all the people love and support the army and make the country a “porcupine” by placing all the people under arms andfortifying the whole country. Combat sports should be developed. As our country is indirect confrontation with the enemy, we must develop such sports as shooting and boxing.
Achieving national reunification is of great importance in accomplishing Comrade Kim Il Sung’s cause and implementing his last will. He, more than anyone else, grieved over the nation’sdivision, and he directed unremitting efforts to the cause of national reunification. He wished for reunification with such fervour, but he died before its realization. One of his last wishes was national reunification; he wanted to see the whole nation enjoying a harmonious life in a reunified country. We should achieve, at any cost, the historic cause of national reunificationfor which he wished so fervently, and thus fulfil his desire. We must continue the struggle to bring back the unconverted long-term prisoners from south Korea. Because of the country’s division, many people are undergoing hardship in the south. The unconverted long-term prisoners in the south are waging an active struggle to return to the north. We should, come what may, bring back the many unconverted long-term prisoners from the south.
In order to safeguard and consummate the revolutionary cause of Comrade Kim Il Sung, we should hold fast to the principle of independence. Political independence is a major hallmark of a sovereign state, and adhering to the principle of independence is the main guarantee for winning victoryin the revolution. It is because we have firmly adhered to our independence that we have been able to defend socialism without the slightest vacillation under the difficult and complex situation created by the continuing vicious moves by the imperialists and reactionaries. Lack ofindependence leads a country to ruin. The Eastern European socialist countries imploded because, lacking political independence, they acted according to the dictates of big countries. Just as we did in the past, so in the future, too, we should strictly adhere to independence in all spheres ofParty and state activities. We must hold fast to the independent foreign policy of our Party.
In the whole course of leading the revolution and construction, Comrade Kim Il Sung always followed an independent foreign policy. In the past, big-power chauvinists tried to pressure our country into joining the Warsaw Pact and the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA).Comrade Kim Il Sung, however, did not bow to the pressure, and instead adhered to independence. Our country was absolutely right to have refused to join the Warsaw Pact and the CMEA. If we had joined these organizations, there is no knowing what disaster might have befallen us.
Comrade Kim Il Sung was, indeed, a remarkably far-sighted leader of the revolution andconstruction. We should, in the future, too, adhere to an independent and principled foreign policy, true to his will, and thus defend our national dignity and consolidate international solidarity with our revolution. Long ago, the Party proclaimed the slogans “Let us live our own way!” and “Let us give fuller play to the Korean-nation- first spirit!” No other slogans could be more readily acceptedby us. We should, by holding higher the banner of the Juche idea, adhere to the principle of independence, and at all times live our own way.