WHO STARTED THE WAR

Foreigners in NK use euros or RMB (none of those Imperialist dollars) but Ri sold us some notes and coins in a way that made me suspicious it was a side line of hers. She came up to our room with brown paper envelopes and we swapped currencies. She casually mentioned not putting it in our purses, just you know because people might see it, so I stuffed it in my rucksack.

Kim Il Sung is not on the money, as one would imagine. This is because money is used and crumpled etc and his mug is too good for that so they use scenes of industry and things. Sara and I got copies of the Pyongyang Times (English language newspaper) and you aren't allowed to bend it where there's a picture of him or Kim 2. Similarly you can't take a picture of just part of his statue. The Pyongyang Times mostly focuses on what the "South Korean Puppets" are up to, problems in the south and how well China is doing. Oh and Kim giving "on-the-spot field guidance". "On-the-stop field guidance" is a special NK thing where he goes and looks at things and gives advice on subjects he doesn't really know anything about to people who do.

Examples here: http://kimjongillookingatthings.tumblr.com/

There is, of course, a War Museum. Or rather the Victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum. This refers to the Korean War. This we went to after another square with statues of groups of people symbolising bits of the war. In NK statues there is always a man at the front surging forwards heroically, a man carrying an injured comrade, and another man looking back urging the followers on.

The NK version of the Korean War holds that the Americans attacked first unprovoked blah blah and after 3 days were driven back and NK proceeded to liberate Seoul happy times celebration and then to gradually liberate more and more of the south until only a corner was left. Success hurrah. Most of the museum is dedicated to this part of the war and glosses over the next. The American Imperialists struck back and cowardly took everthing including Pyongyang itself and then they were so scared of the North Koreans they signed an armistice. No mention was really made of the Chinese volunteers.

I don't really know much about the Korean War and I suspect it is one of those things that a lot needs to be known about. However it is odd for an invading force to launch a surprise attack that they have been preparing for a long time and then be driven back in 3 days and proceed to lose a lot of territory. So maybe North Korea attacked first which tallies with other evidence- particularly that Kim Il Sung had been looking for Stalin and Mao's support for an invasion. The Americans, not wanting a hostile Korea in their little Cold War (how much damage have they caused fighting Communism? And still cause fighting Socialism?) then came in and with their help the South Koreans regrouped and retook ground. The Chinese then got involved and basically saved Kim Il Sung by fighting his war. North Koreans say it was they who avoided defeat, well it was the Chinese. So ranks of Chinese versus ranks of Americans in a country neither was that bothered about caused them to sign an armistice. This armistice NK calls a victory. Which I would quibble with. In their museum they had a letter from a US commander lamenting leaving Korea without a victory and they use this as proof that the Americans admit they lost.

Throughout the tour of the museum I had this urge to point out that the War was not Victorious and the Fatherland was not Liberated. But wasn't sure it would have much effect.

Our guide was a rather cute girl from the army in her vintage uniform. As we progressed through each room her pointing cane got longer and longer.

We watched an introductory video about the war which began with someone declaring in a sonorous tone "WHO STARTED THE WAR?". This then made it rather difficult to keep a straight, respectful face.

Most of the displays are photos and include letters from some moron in Utah writing to Kim to give support as thought he represents the US. The basement is where they keep all the scrap from the war and is full of planes, tanks, weapons and helicopters from the 50s. No jokes about it being state-of-the-art in NK please...

One plane was supposed to be a training plane but the North Koreans used it to drop planes. It was mostly flown by females apparently, which was an interesting tidbit. Another 50s plane seemed to have wet paint.

There's also a tree trunk from a "Hero Tree" which was so big it could shelter Korean supply trucks from bombers.

The odd American spy plane was shot down and they have copies of the pilot's confessions about being very contrite and promising never to do it again and they have wife and children sowwy.

The last exhibit was a 360 degree panorama that has been very cleverly painted. It shows the battle in Dajong from the Korean War, including the capture of the US commander of the 21st Division William Dean. This event was mentioned several times. In the panorama he is depicted as a big nosed ugly git hiding under a tree in an ordinary soldiers uniform cowardly hiding.

Someone asked where the Great Leader Kim Il Sung was in the battle. "There's a picture of him on one of the houses" said the guide brightly.