Cho Man-sik

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Cho Man-sik (Korean: 조만식, pen-name Ko-Dang) (1 February 1883 – 15 October 1950) was an activist in Korea's nationalist movement. He became involved in the power struggle that enveloped Korea in the months following the Japanese surrender after World War II, but was eventually forced from power by the Soviet-backed communists in the north. Placed under house arrest in 1946, he was finally executed in a prison camp in 1950.

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[edit] Independence movement

Cho was born in Kangsŏ-gun, South P'yŏngan Province, now in North Korea. In his youth he was an activist within Korea's Christian community,[1] but from 1910 with Japan's annexation of Korea he became increasingly involved with his country's independence movement. His participation in the 1919 Sam-Il protest marches led to his arrest and detention, along with tens of thousands of other Koreans. After his release, he dedicated himself to non-violent resistance to the occupation, a stance which earned him the epithet "The Gandhi of Korea".[2] He advocated a principle of self-sufficiency for the nation, and formed a number of commercial enterprises intended to encourage Koreans to buy home-produced goods and so instil a sense of nationalism.[3]

[edit] Activism post World War II

In August 1945, with Japanese surrender imminent, Cho was approached by the Japanese governor of Pyongyang and asked to organise a committee to maintain stability in the power vacuum that would inevitably follow.[1] He agreed to co-operate, and formed governing councils throughout the north; they generally being composed of right-wing nationalists opposed to communism.[4] The Soviet Union arrived in Pyongyang in the days following the Japanese surrender, bringing with them the Korean communist Kim Il-sung, who had trained in the Soviet army for ten years, rising to the rank of captain. Under Soviet pressure, Cho was obliged to reorganise his party, and accept more communists onto the councils.[5] Unsurprisingly, the opposing ideologies of Kim and Cho led to a clash between the two men, and the forced power-sharing failed to sit well with either of them.

The 1945 Moscow Conference between the victorious Allied powers discussed the statehood of Korea, proposing a four-power trusteeship for a period of five years, after which Korea would become an independent state. For Cho, this would result in excessive foreign, and particularly communist, influence over his country, and he refused to co-operate.[6] On 8 February 1946 he was forced to resign from his position of Chairman of the Provisional People's Committee for the Five Provinces, and was placed under house arrest by the Soviets.[7] For some time he was kept under comfortable conditions at the Koryo Hotel, from which position he continued to vocally oppose the communists. He stood in the 1948 vice-presidency election, but was unsuccessful, receiving only 10 votes from the National Assembly. Later transferred to a prison in Pyongyang, he was executed on 15 October 1950, shortly before the city was captured by UN forces during the Korean War. Cho's removal opened the way for Kim Il-sung to consolidate his power in the north, a position he was able to hold for 48 years until his death in 1994.

In 1970, Cho's deeds gained posthumous recognition when he was awarded the Order of Merit for National Foundation and the Republic of Korea medal by the South Korean government.

[edit] Taekwondo

The taekwondo form Ko-Dang was named in honour of Cho Man-sik, though it was replaced in a controversial move by the form Juche in the early 1980s.

[edit] References

  1. ^ a b Kim, The History of Korea, p142
  2. ^ “Not Slave, Not Free”, Time, 1945-10-08, <http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,776256-1,00.html> 
  3. ^ Armstrong, The North Korean Revolution, p55
  4. ^ Lee, The Partition of Korea, p133
  5. ^ Lee, The Partition of Korea, p135
  6. ^ Lee, The Partition of Korea, p145
  7. ^ Oliver, Leadership in Asia, p219

[edit] Bibliography

  • Armstrong, Charles (2004), The North Korean Revolution, 1945-1950, Cornell University Press, ISBN 0801489148 
  • Lee, Jong-soo (2006), The Partition of Korea after World War II, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, ISBN 1-4039-6982-5 
  • Kim, Chun-gil (2005), The History of Korea, London: Greenwood, ISBN 0-3133-3296-7 
  • Oliver, Robert (1989), Leadership in Asia: Persuasive Communication in the Making of Nations, 1850-1950, University of Delaware Press, ISBN 087413353X