North Korea History

In May 2018, former Monty Python stalwart and intrepid globetrotter Michael Palin spent two weeks in the notoriously secretive Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, a cut-off land without internet or phone signal, where the countryside has barely moved beyond a centuries-old peasant economy but where the cities have gleaming skyscrapers and luxurious underground train stations.

Born in 1970s North Korea, Lucia Jang grew up in a typical household - her parents worked in the factories, and the family scraped by on rations. Nightly she bowed to her photo of Kim Il-Sung. It was the beginning of a chaotic period with a decade-long famine. Jang married an abusive man who sold their baby. She left him and went home to help her family by illegally crossing the river to China to trade goods. She was caught and imprisoned twice.

In January of 1965, 24-year-old US Army sergeant Charles Robert Jenkins abandoned his post in South Korea, walked across the DMZ, and surrendered to communist North Korean soldiers standing sentry along the world's most heavily militarized border. He believed his action would get him back to the States and a short jail sentence. Instead he found himself in another sort of prison, where for 40 years he suffered under one of the most brutal and repressive regimes the world has known. This fast-paced, harrowing tale, told plainly and simply by Jenkins (with journalist Jim Frederick).

History didn't end. Democracy didn't triumph. America’s leading role in the world is no longer assured. Instead, authoritarian rule is on the rise, and the global order established after 1945 is under attack. This is the phenomenon Katie Stallard tackles in Dancing on Bones as she examines how the leaders of China, Russia, and North Korea manipulate the past to serve the present and secure the future of authoritarian rule.

Jack Steele survived the first Gulf War, Bosnia, and his time as a UN peacekeeper. As a captain and tank commander, he saw the dark side of war. Two UN officials have gone missing. They were last seen in the Tumen Triangle. A 324-mile river that borders Russia, China, and North Korea, it’s a place few Westerners have heard of or understand. It would be a prize-winning story if he could crack it. Sometimes fate puts a person where they need to be - and then he saw the child fall beneath the ice. When Steele rescued the boy, it was the first domino to fall.

Ian McAllister has searched the world over, hunting for that all-elusive perfect photograph. He finds it on a tourist trip to North Korea when he stumbles upon a young street kid foraging for roots. Unaware that this single act will brand him a spy and cost his freedom, Ian takes the shot. Now, he must pay the penalty.

DIA Report North Korea Military Power - 2021. North Korea is one of the most militarized countries in the world and remains a critical security challenge for the United States, our Northeast Asian allies, and the international community. The Kim regime has seen itself as free to take destabilizing actions to advance its political goals, including attacks on South Korea, development of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles, proliferation of weapons, and cyberattacks against civilian infrastructure worldwide.

In the early 2000s, Adrian Hong was a soft-spoken Yale undergraduate looking for his place in the world. After reading a harrowing account of life inside North Korea, he realized he had found a cause so pressing that he was ready to devote his life to it. Hong journeyed to China, outwitting Chinese security services as he helped ferry asylum-seeking North Korean escapees to safety. The Rebel and the Kingdom is an exhilarating account of a man who turns his back on the status quo—to instead live boldly by his principles.

A searing story of starvation and survival in North Korea, followed by a dramatic escape, rescue by activists and Christian missionaries, and success in the United States thanks to newfound faith and courage.

On April 29, 1992, following the acquittal of four police officers charged with the beating and arrest of Rodney King and the earlier killing of teenager Latasha Harlins, the city of Los Angeles erupted in violence. Many of these events were centered on the city’s Koreatown, where tensions between the Black and Korean American communities had simmered for years, fueled by economic challenges and redlining and enflamed by sensationalized and racist media.

After its successful landing at Inchon and capture of Seoul in September 1950, the U.S. X Corps was joined by Eighth Army, and many people expected the two commands to be combined into one. Instead, General MacArthur ordered the X Corps to load onto ships and travel around the peninsula to northeastern Korea and the port city of Wonsan, which the South Korean I Corps had captured.

With nearly 25 million citizens, a secretive totalitarian dictatorship, and active nuclear and ballistic missile weapons programs, North Korea presents some of the world's most difficult foreign policy challenges. In North Korea and the World, Clemens poses the question, "Can, should, and must we negotiate with a regime we regard as evil?" Weighing the needs of all the stakeholders, he concludes that the answer is yes. After assessing nine other policy options, he makes the case for engagement and negotiation with the regime.

The Korean War is often labeled “the forgotten war”, and though it has received renewed attention in recent years, it still pales compared to others in recent history like the Vietnam War or even the more recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. What’s mostly overlooked is that the Korean War was one of the most intense conflicts the United States fought, and the soldiers who served in it were arguably in greater peril than in any other war over the last 75 years.

Since the regiment’s creation in 1899, the men of the 65th have proudly served the US through multiple wars, despite facing racial discrimination. Their courage, loyalty, and patriotism earned them hundreds of accolades, including the Congressional Gold Medal in 2014.

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of A Kim Jong-Il Production by Paul Fischer, read by Stephen Park. Before becoming the world's most notorious dictator, Kim Jong-Il ran North Korea's film industry. He directed every film made in the country but knew they were nothing compared to Hollywood.

Throughout the late 1970s and early '80s, dozens of Japanese citizens were abducted from coastal Japanese towns by North Korean commandos. In what proved to be part of a global project, North Korea attempted to reeducate the abductees and train them to spy on the state's behalf. When the project faltered, the abductees were hidden in a series of guarded communities known as "Invitation-Only Zones" - the fiction being that these were exclusive enclaves, not prisons.

To say that the so-called "Supreme Commanders" of North Korea have been sticklers for submission would trivialize the more-than-troubling state of affairs that has plagued this precarious place for decades. The fearsome Kim regime, though relatively fresh in comparison to powerful dynasties that lasted for centuries, has become one of history's most controversial bloodlines. Kim Il-sung analyzes the known and unknown about one of the most important leaders of the 20th century.

Despite the fact the border between North Korea and South Korea remains tense, and former President Bill Clinton once branded it the "scariest place on Earth," more than 7.5 million tourists have visited the notorious demilitarized zone for one reason or another. There, they gazed upon a treacherous but evidently intriguing strip of land, guarded by estranged brothers with a chilling array of weapons directed at one another at all times.

When Anna Broinowski learned that fracking had invaded downtown Sydney, she had a brilliant idea: she would seek guidance for a kryptonite-powerful, anti-fracking movie from the world's greatest propaganda factory - apart from Hollywood. After two years of trying, she was allowed to make her case in Pyongyang and was granted full permission to film. She worked closely with the leading lights of North Korean cinema, even playing an American in a military thriller.

A newly married Methodist minister, Larry Zellers, was serving as a missionary and teacher in a small South Korean town near the 38th parallel when he was captured by the North Koreans on June 25, 1950. Until his release in 1953, Zellers endured brutal conditions and inhumane treatment. Through his story, Zellers shows that, despite the opinion that POWs live only for themselves, many in the camps worked to help others and conducted themselves with honor.