FE Files: Lot 55D275
Memorandum by the Central Intelligence Agency*
secret
[Washington,] 19 June 1950.
Current Capabilities of the Northern Korean Regime
estimate of current capabilities
The “Democratic People’s Republic” of northern Korea is a firmly controlled
Soviet Satellite that exercises no independent initiative and
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depends entirely on the support of
the USSR for existence. At the present time there is no serious internal
threat to the regime’s stability, and, barring an outbreak of general
hostilities, the Communists will continue to make progress toward their
ultimate domestic goals. The Communist regime in northern Korea suffers from
a shortage of skilled administrative personnel and from weaknesses in its
economy and its official Party organizations. There is widespread, although
passive, popular discontent with the Communist government. Despite these
weaknesses, however, the regime has, with Soviet assistance, clearly
demonstrated an ability to continue its control and development of northern
Korea along predetermined political, economic, and social lines.
The northern Korean regime is also capable, in pursuit of its major external
aim of extending control over southern Korea, of continuing and increasing
its support of the present program of propaganda, infiltration, sabotage,
subversion, and guerrilla operations against southern Korea. This program
will not be sufficient in itself, however, to cause a collapse of the
southern Korean regime and the extension of Communist control over the south
so long as US economic and military aid to southern Korea is not
substantially reduced or seriously dissipated.
At the same time the capability of the northern Korean armed forces for both
short-and long-term overt military operations is being further developed.
Although the northern and southern forces are nearly equal in terms of
combat effectives, training, and leadership, the northern Koreans possess a
superiority in armor, heavy artillery, and aircraft. Thus, northern Korea’s
armed forces, even as presently constituted and supported, have a capability
for attaining limited objectives in short-term military operations against
southern Korea, including the capture of Seoul.
Northern Korea’s capability for long-term military operations is dependent
upon increased logistical support from the USSR. If the foreign supporters
of each faction were called upon for increased assistance, there is no
reason to believe that Soviet support would be withheld and consideration of
proximity and availability of such assistance would greatly favor the
northern Korean regime. Soviet assistance to northern Korea, however,
probably would not be in the form of direct participation of regular Soviet
or Chinese Communist military units except as a last resort. The USSR would
be restrained from using its troops by the fear of general war; and its
suspected desire to restrict and control Chinese influence in northern Korea
would militate against sanctioning the use of regular Chinese Communist
units in Korea.
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Despite the apparent military superiority of northern over southern Korea, it
is not certain that the northern regime, lacking the active participation of
Soviet and Chinese Communist military units, would be able to gain effective
control over all of southern Korea. The key factors which would hinder
Communist attempts to extend effective control under these circumstances
are: (1) the anti-Communist attitude of the southern Koreans; (2) a
continuing will to resist on the part of southern troops; (3) the Communist
regime’s lack of popular support; and (4) the regime’s lack of trained
administrators and technicians.
Annex A
Soviet Position in Northern Korea
The USSR’s fundamental strategic concern with Korea is positional.
Northern Korea has a short common border with Soviet territory, flanks
sea and land communication lines between Vladivostok and Port Arthur,
and shares a long, common frontier with Manchuria. Control of northern
Korea provides the USSR with an advance fringe of secondary air and
naval bases beyond the boundaries of the Soviet Far East. In addition,
northern Korea provides a base for eventual extension of Soviet control
over southern Korea, which, if accomplished, would give the Soviet Union
a further strategic advantage in its positional relationship with Japan
and consequently enhance the position of the USSR vis-à-vis the US in
the Far East. Of increasing importance at the present time is the area’s
economic potential, which, although limited, can make valuable
contributions to the economy of the Soviet Far East.
To assure continued control and to protect and advance strategic and
economic interests in northern Korea, the Soviet Union since 1945 has
concentrated on the following objectives: (1) the establishment of a
strong, effective, and obedient Communist government and society; (2)
the exploitation of economic and human resources, with simultaneous
development of a self-supporting, expanding economy within northern
Korea; and (3) the exploitation of northern Korea as a base for the
penetration and subversion of southern Korea.
Since the establishment of the “Democratic People’s Republic” (September
1948) and the withdrawal of Soviet troops (December 1948), the Soviet
Union has maintained the fiction of northern Korean independence and has
exercised its control through the medium of the Communist-dominated
Korean Government and associated political organizations. The Soviet
Embassy at the “capital city” of Pyongyang is headquarters for the
four-to five-thousand-man Soviet mission in
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northern Korea. The Soviet mission, infiltrated as
advisers throughout the government, economy, and political
organizations, serves as a guarantee of northern Korean subservience and
a source of technical assistance.
Annex B
Current Political Situation
1. Indigenous Leadership.
The “Democratic People’s Republic” is under the immediate control of a
small group of Korean Communist leaders whose primary qualification for
high office is loyalty to the USSR and willingness to accept a
subordinate role within the pattern of Soviet control. Thus, Koreans
with a Soviet background appear to have been given positions superior to
those held by either native-trained Communists or Koreans who received
Communist indoctrination in Yenan and Manchuria, and this Soviet-trained
leadership appears to be well knit. The intensity of Soviet control, the
leaders’ lack of strong personal followings among the Korean people, and
the composition of the present southern Korean Government which makes it
unpalatable to possible northern “nationalist deviationists” as an
alternative prevents either significant deviations or disruptive
factionalism.
Except for their loyalty and subservience to the USSR, northern Korea’s
leaders possess few qualifications for the responsibility of high
government and party office. They have gained no popular support and
despite four years in office they still lack requisite administrative
and technical skills. Although these weaknesses lower the regime’s
efficiency and decrease its popular appeal, they do not materially
affect the stability of the “People’s Republic,” since experienced
Soviet advisers adequately maintain government efficiency at the top
level and the police effectively control the populace.
2. Government Organization.
The Government of northern Korea closely resembles that of all other
“people’s democracies” and a democratic facade obscures its basic
totalitarian pattern. Constitutional provisions for a popularly elected
representative assembly, a responsible cabinet—actually the key organ in
the government—civil liberties and other rights and institutions
normally associated with democratic government, are intended to develop
popular support for the “People’s Republic” not only in northern Korea
but in southern Korea as well. Changes gradually being made in the
institutions established by the Constitution, however, point to the
transformation of the “People’s Democracy” into an “orthodox” socialist
state of the Soviet type.
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3. Party Organization.
The organization of the Communist Party (officially known as the North
Korea Labor Party) (NKLP), which parallels the hierarchical government
structure, is similar to the Party in the USSR. Top government positions
are all held by NKLP members, and the Party’s. Politbureau is the
regime’s major policy-making body. Most of the government’s bureaucrats
are drawn from the Party ranks. The Party is intended to be the activist
element among the politically passive northern Koreans, is responsible
for political activities—including elections, demonstrations, and the
dissemination of propaganda—and is the nucleus for what will eventually
be a one-party system. In the interim, however, the fiction of a
multi-party system is maintained. The Front and its organizations,
manipulated and controlled by the NKLP leadership, and designed to
include every segment of society, support and assist internal
indoctrination and control programs and play an even more important role
in operations against southern Korea.
Membership in the NKLP is estimated at between five and six hundred
thousand, an unusually high percentage of the total population. The
Party is controlled by a group of about a hundred, who provide the
indigenous leadership in the state apparatus and who subject the several
thousand petty officials, intellectuals, and professional men in the
middle bracket of the Party (generally less thoroughly indoctrinated
Marxists) to the most stringent Party discipline.
The remainder of the Party’s membership is four-fifths peasant and
one-fifth urban and industrial workers. The support of this vast
majority of the Party’s members is maintained through preferential
treatment and strict discipline. Devotion and loyalty to the Party’s
leadership, rather than intellectual adherence to Marxism, is required
from this Party majority that serves fundamentally as a large base with
a vested interest in perpetuation of the regime, rather than as a mature
activist element.
4. Methods of Control.
Both the state organization and the regimentation of Korean society
depend on firm control of the people and the maintenance of internal
security. The police force is the instrument of primary control.
Exclusive of the para-military border constabulary which is still under
the Minister of Interior, there are some thirty to forty thousand police
agents and uniformed police. The former maintain a constant check on
public attitudes and seek out dissident elements. Groups such as former
landlords, businessmen, property owners, intellectuals and Christians in
the north Korean population are singled out by the
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police (as dissident or potentially
dissident elements) and are subject to particularly rigid police
controls.
As a long-range source of stability, Korea’s Communist regime has sought
popular support through the use of persuasive techniques, principally
propaganda and the conferring of material benefits. Propaganda,
disseminated through a wide variety of media, reaches every element of
the Korean population. Its main effort is directed at concealing the
dictatorial nature of the government, the extent of Soviet domination
and similar aspects of Communism in Korea, while creating, on the other
hand, the illusion of national independence, representative government,
equality with the Soviet Union, and other favorable stereotypes.
Material benefits designed to recruit mass support include: reforms
purported to correct deep-seated inequities in the Korean social and
economic system; the provision of social and public services on much
larger scale than under the Japanese; and specific state actions—such as
the release of extra consumer goods—timed to counteract public
discontent over new economic regulations.
5. Effectiveness of the Political
System.
The “Democratic People’s Republic” has established firm control over the
northern Korean people. Despite weaknesses, the Communist regime is
progressing toward its ultimate domestic objectives of establishing a
stable, fully socialized state. Its strength and stability are mainly
attributable to: (1) rigid direction exercised through Soviet advisers
and loyal Korean Communists; (2) Soviet material aid and technical
advice in all fields; (3) comprehensive and highly organized state
regulation of political, economic, and social activity, maintained both
through government controls and through the actions of
Communist-controlled mass organizations; (4) effective police control,
supplemented by techniques of persuasion and psychologically bolstered
by the proximity of Soviet forces; (5) cohesiveness and loyalty to both
the government and the Soviet Union on the part of northern Korea’s
indigenous leaders, the bureaucracy, the police, the North Korea Labor
Party and the more skilled technicians and workers; and (6) the
achievement, since 1946, of substantial increases in production, which
have raised living standards in northern Korea to a minimum subsistence
level.
Despite the strength and stability of the “People’s Republic” the regime
has a number of important weaknesses to overcome, major among them
being: (1) a lack of experienced and competent leaders, Administrators,
technicians, and dynamic activist strength in the NKLP; (2) the regime’s
narrow base of popular support, which results from the relatively
widespread popular discontent; (3) Soviet
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interference and exploitation, which offends
Korean desires for complete independence and contributes to the low
standard of living, which is a basic cause for popular discontent and a
factor contributing to low labor productivity.
The Communist system, itself inherently incompatible with traditional
social, economic, and political forms in Korea, assures the existence of
discontented groups under the northern regime. In the brief period of
Communist control, nearly two million northern Korean refugees have
moved to the south; the great mass of the northerners have not yet
appeared receptive to a Communist, Soviet-oriented state, and
indoctrination in Marxian ideology remains extremely limited. There is
believed to be widespread discontent and dissatisfaction among farmers,
for example, particularly among those who formerly owned large or
medium-sized farms. The forced labor required on community projects, as
well as the government’s collection of large special crop taxes,
moreover, has incurred the resentment of former landless tenant farmers,
whose support was actively solicited by means of the 1946 “land reform.”
The 100,000 or more Christians are strongly anti-Communist, and
considerable discontent also exists among the pre-liberation middle
classes. This popular discontent appears to be largely passive, however,
and in the few known attempts to organize the opposition for action, the
groups were quickly broken up by the police.
The low standard of living, although primarily an economic problem, has
its political ramifications. The problem is a difficult one because the
low standard arises directly and indirectly from other weaknesses in the
system and cannot be resolved completely so long as the Soviet Union
continues the economic exploitation of northern Korea.
None of these problems, however, is sufficiently critical at present
either to threaten the USSR’s control over northern Korea or to
challenge the northern Korean regime’s ability to maintain itself.
Northern Korean internal security forces are fully capable of
maintaining the regime in power during the period required for the
reduction of current weaknesses in administration, leadership and
production, and the progressive development of more advanced Communist
political forms. Barring a period of internal disorganization, or crises
arising from external military pressures, the Communist regime’s present
lack of popular support does not represent a serious problem. In the
long run, living standards probably will be somewhat improved, and the
regime’s persuasive tactics are likely to gain additional recruits among
the younger generation. On the other hand, while these weaknesses do not
seriously impair the Communists’ ability to control and develop northern
Korea, they do materially reduce that regime’s current ability to extend
and maintain control over southern Korea.
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Annex C
Current Economic Situation
1. Organization of the Economy.
Koreans were almost completely excluded from ownership and management
when Korea’s economic system was under Japanese rule. As a consequence,
the USSR’s introduction of a socialized economy in northern Korea after
1945 proceeded with little internal opposition. The principal Soviet
economic objective in northern Korea has been the gearing of the economy
to the requirements of the Soviet Far East while developing northern
Korean resources to provide the maximum of self-support. The USSR has
fostered the development of those industries producing exports required
by its economy and has also sought to overcome the existing shortages in
consumer goods production and other items presently obtained from
external sources. These plans, if successful, would ensure a viable,
although low level, economy in northern Korea and would also insure
increasing returns to the USSR in their exploitation of the northern
Korean economy.
Effective Soviet direction of the northern Korean economy is insured
through: (1) the placement of Soviet advisers and Koreans loyal to the
USSR in all key positions controlling the economy; (2) the use of Soviet
advisers and engineers in all key Korean installations; and (3) the
existence of “joint” Soviet-Korean control over northern Korea’s foreign
trade.
All major economic undertakings in northern Korea are planned, financed,
and directed by the responsible government ministries, which are under
intensive Soviet supervision. Private ownership is confined to small
commercial establishments and trading companies, some mining activities,
and agriculture. Even in agriculture, legal title to the land
distributed by the Communist regime in the Land Reform Program of
19461 still rests with the state, and there is a
considerable degree of state control over agricultural production.
2. Production and Trade.
By the end of 1946, a combination of Japan’s wartime abuses of Korea’s
arable land and industrial plant, and subsequent Soviet looting and
Korean neglect, had reduced northern Korea’s economy to a state of near
chaos. Recovery has been slow, but by 1949 the industrial plant had
achieved a significant level of activity. Today, to judge by the
northern Korean regime’s published two-year production plan (1949–1950)
and by scattered intelligence reports, heavy industrial plant
production, while it has increased significantly over 1946, it is still
15–30 percent below the peak 1944 level.
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Postwar production plans have reflected a reduction in the production of
some finished heavy industrial items, such as pig iron and aluminum,
which formerly was geared to Japanese rather than to domestic absorption
capacity. Emphasis has been shifted, instead, to the construction and
expansion of plants producing basic and end-use equipment and consumer
goods.
The current production of iron and steel, non-ferrous metals,
fertilizers, industrial chemicals, and cement is still in excess of the
Korean economy’s capacity to process and absorb. The resultant surplus
is exported both to meet Soviet demands and to obtain needed imports of
basic equipment and consumer goods. Although only spotty information is
available concerning the degree of recovery in the fields of
agriculture, forestry, and fisheries, these too have apparently revived
to such an extent that selected exports are practicable. As a result of
the possession of some industrial and agricultural surplus, and the need
for basic and end-use equipment, a relatively large volume of foreign
trade is both possible and necessary for the maintenance of the northern
Korean economy. Additionally, the area’s lack of petroleum and
bituminous coal forces the importation of both.
It is believed that northern Korea’s balance of payments is unfavorable.
This unfavorable balance probably arises largely from Soviet pricing
policies which underprice Korean exports and overprice Soviet exports.
Exports to the USSR, northern Korea’s principal postwar trading partner,
are, for the most part, iron and steel, non-ferrous metals and ores,
chemicals, lumber, marine products, and grain. Imports are machinery,
armaments, coal, and petroleum.
Hong Kong is northern Korea’s principal non-Communist trading partner,
and a wide variety of imports are sought on that market. Chief among
these are textiles, basic machinery, pharmaceuticals, and selected
industrial chemicals. Korean exports to Hong Kong consist of cattle
fodder, marine products, grains, fats and oils, and chemicals. Less
important trade relations are conducted directly with Manchuria, North
China, Southeast Asia, and—clandestinely—with Japan and southern
Korea.
3. Standards of Living.
The living standard of the great majority of northern Koreans has shown a
significant increase from the below-subsistence level which immediately
followed World War II. Rationing of all foods and basic necessities,
which has ensured the meeting of the population’s minimum requirements,
has been a factor in preventing development of the widespread discontent
into active resistance.
The shortage of housing in urban areas, harsh working conditions, low
wages, the high cost of consumer goods, and the high taxes on
agricultural production are all major problems which remain to be
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overcome before the present
subsistence level of living can be raised. Attempts to this end are
evident in the Communist regime’s current plans for expansion of
consumer goods industries, as well as in the volume of consumer goods
imported from Hong Kong in 1949. While Soviet exploitation of the
northern Korean economy continues, however, any substantial improvement
in living standards will be inhibited.
4. Limitations on the Economy.
Several problems will continue to hamper the Communist regime’s progress
toward self-support. The most important among these arises from the fact
that the USSR will continue to support and assist the development of the
northern Korean economy only to the ultimate benefit of the Soviet
economy. So long as the importation of bituminous coal and petroleum and
the operation of the northern Korean merchant marine is under Soviet
control, the operation of Korea’s economy will remain almost completely
dependent on the USSR. A further major problem faced by the northern
Korean regime is the internal one of the Korean people’s low level of
productivity. Since there is a shortage of both skilled and unskilled
manpower in the north, low productivity can be expected to continue
despite the Communist regime’s efforts to improve the situation.
Annex D
Current Military Situation
Northern Korea’s military forces are still being expanded. So far as the
ground forces are concerned, this process involves the integration into
the “People’s Army” of local recruits and of Korean troops that have
seen service under the Chinese Communists in Manchuria, as well as the
equipping of this force with small arms, artillery, vehicles, aircraft,
and armor from the USSR.
Trained and equipped units of the Communist “People’s Army” are being
deployed southward in the area of the 38th Parallel. “People’s Army” and
Border Constabulary units there equal or surpass the strength of
southern Korean army units similarly deployed. Tanks and heavy artillery
have also been moved close to the Parallel in recent months.
1. Army.
Current estimates place the strength of the “People’s Army” (PA) at
66,000 men (including 16,000 ex-Manchurian troops) organized into at
least three infantry divisions and an independent brigade. The PA’s
critical arms include: (1) an armored unit, estimated to possess 65
Soviet T–34 tanks; (2) divisional artillery units equipped with 76 mm
guns and 122 mm howitzers; and (3) anti-aircraft Units in the border
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regions. The 20,500-man Border
Constabulary (BC), which is also being expanded with ex-Manchurian
levies, is nominally a paramilitary police force and was previously
armed with Japanese weapons. The BC has been trained to infantry
standards, however, and has now been re-equipped with Soviet
weapons.
2. Air Force.
According to current accepted estimates, the “People’s Army Air Force”
(PAAF) consists of an air regiment of 1,500 men, including 150 pilots,
equipped with 35 YAK–9 and/or IL–10 fighters, 3 twin-engine bombers, 2
twin-engine transports, and 35 Japanese or Soviet training planes. This
estimate may be subject to an upward revision in the near future.
3. Navy.
The northern Korean navy performs mainly as a coast guard force. Present
navy strength is estimated at 5,100 men. A marine unit, whose exact
functions are as yet undetermined, numbers approximately 5,400 men.
Northern Korean navy shore installations and ships are of little
consequence.
4. Logistics and Manpower.
The northern Korean armed forces depend almost wholly on the USSR for
logistic support. Recent reports have indicated, however, that limited
quantities of Soviet-type small arms, munitions, and uniforms are being
locally manufactured.
A large segment of the domestic economy is as yet uncommitted to the
logistic support of the armed forces and could provide further manpower
for expansion of the military machine. However, the Communist regime’s
military machine already constitutes a drain on the undermanned northern
Korean economy. An additional sixty to seventy thousand Koreans who have
seen service with the Chinese Communists, furthermore, are believed to
be available in Manchuria if needed for integration in or loan to the
“People’s Army.”
5. Training.
The northern Korean military forces are entirely the product of Soviet
planning, and depend heavily on the large Soviet military mission for
training at higher command levels and for tactical advice down to the
battalion level. The PA’s state of training is comparable to that of the
southern Korean Army. Air training is probably still in a basic stage,
however, and there is no indication that the Air Regiment has attained
operational status. The navy has received less Soviet attention.
There is evidence of a continuing program of sending small numbers of
ground and air officers to the USSR for advanced training. Soviet
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advisers to the PA are
believed to number at least 2,000; to the PAAF, 70; and to the Navy, 33.
An additional 2,000 Soviet naval personnel are reported to be stationed
in major northern Korean ports, to service Soviet naval units and to
control port facilities.
6. Morale.
The morale of the northern Korean military forces generally appears to be
good, and, although factions exist, factionalism is not a significant
problem. Troops are subject to continuous indoctrination and
surveillance, and their loyalty is further induced by above-average food
rations, good wages, and special privileges. At the present time, the
northern Korean armed forces are probably psychologically prepared to
fight wholeheartedly against southern Korean troops. Their loyalty to
the Communist regime and their fighting spirit, however, would vary
inversely with the strength of the opposition and the duration of the
struggle. In contrast, the ex-Manchurian Koreans, whose loyalty was
indicated by the fact of their transfer to the PA, now form a
significant percentage of that force. These troops possibly have less
feeling of kinship for southern Koreans and therefore may provide a firm
backbone for the PA in the event of military operations.
Annex E
Current Operations Against Southern Korea
The ultimate local objective of the Soviet Union and of the northern
Korean regime is the elimination of the southern Republic of Korea and
the unification of the Korean peninsula under Communist domination. To
this end, an open invasion of the Republic by northern Korean military
forces has thus far been delayed in favor of a coordinated campaign
involving political pressure within southern Korea, subversion,
propaganda, intimidation, economic pressure, and military actions by
infiltration of guerrilla forces.
To date, this campaign has succeeded in damaging south Korea’s economy to
a serious extent. The withholding of northern Korean power fertilizer,
coal, iron, and steel from the southern Republic has been offset only in
part by large-scale US economic aid. In turn, the Communist-trained
guerrillas operating in south Korea, while they have not been successful
in developing large concentrations or seriously threatening the
Republic’s internal stability, have forced the Republic to expend large
sums of money in “suppression campaigns,” and thus have contributed
materially to the dangerous inflationary situation in south Korea.
Anti-guerrilla activity, moreover, has prevented the deployment of some
Republican Army units along the strategic corridors adjacent to the 38th
Parallel.
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Communist propaganda, especially that which reiterates the theme of
unification, probably has little present appeal to the southern Korean
people, since they are basically anti-Communist. The Republic’s
anti-Communist program has also materially reduced the Communists’
ability to infiltrate southern Korean governmental and political
organizations.
Although Communist operations against the southern Republic of Korea have
not thus far produced decisive results, the Republic has been forced to
make serious political and economic sacrifices in order to counter the
ever-present Communist threat. At the same time, the cost to the
Communists has been relatively slight, and their ability to continue the
campaign far exceeds the Republic’s capability to continue effective
resistance without US aid.
