Kim Il Sung Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! === Claims that Kim Il Sung was an imposter === [[File:Kim-Il-sung κΉμΌμ± 19461103election.jpg|thumb|upright|right|Kim during the [[1946 North Korean local elections]] campaign]] Several sources claim the name "Kim Il Sung" had previously been used by a prominent early leader of the [[Korean resistance]], [[Kim Kyung-cheon]].<ref name="Rogue" />{{rp|44}} The Soviet officer [[Grigory Mekler]], who worked with Kim during the [[Soviet occupation of Korea|Soviet occupation]], said that Kim took this name from a former commander who had died.<ref>{{cite news |date=10 January 2003 |title=Soviets groomed Kim Il Sung for leadership |work=Vladivostok News |url=http://vn.vladnews.ru/Arch/2003/ISS345/News/upd10.HTM |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090610172839/http://vn.vladnews.ru/Arch/2003/ISS345/News/upd10.HTM |archive-date=10 June 2009}}</ref> However, historian [[Andrei Lankov]] has argued that this is unlikely to be true. Several witnesses knew Kim before and after his time in the Soviet Union, including his superior, [[Zhou Baozhong]], who dismissed the claim of a "second" Kim in his diaries.<ref name="Lankov" />{{rp|55}} Historian [[Bruce Cumings]] pointed out that Japanese officers from the [[Kwantung Army]] have attested to his fame as a resistance figure.<ref name="Cumings" />{{rp|160β161}} According to the 2019 book ''Surprise, Kill, Vanish'' by investigative journalist [[Annie Jacobsen]], the United States [[Central Intelligence Agency]] (CIA) once concluded that Kim Il Sung was a [[blackmail]]ed imposter operated by the Soviet Union.<ref name=":3">{{Cite book |last=Jacobsen |first=Annie |title=Surprise, Kill, Vanish: The Secret History of CIA Paramilitary Armies, Operators, and Assassins |publisher=[[Little, Brown and Company]] |year=2019 |isbn=978-0-316-44140-7 |location=New York|page=42 |language=en}}</ref> The dossier titled "The Identity of Kim Il Sung" ascribed the leader's true identity to Kim Song-ju, an orphaned child caught stealing money from a classmate who killed his classmate to avoid embarrassment. The dossier alleges Soviet intelligence officers identified the opportunity to blackmail Kim Song-ju into leading the [[North Korean Communist Party]] as a Soviet puppet under the name of the real war hero Kim-Il Sung, whom Stalin had disappeared. Jacobsen also writes that the CIA learned "specific instructions [were] given to the leaders of the regime that there should be no questions raised about Kim [Il Sung]'s identity."<ref name=":3" /> Historians generally accept the view that, while Kim's exploits were exaggerated by the [[North Korean cult of personality|personality cult]] which was built around him, he was a significant guerrilla leader.<ref>{{cite book |last=Buzo |first=Adrian |title=The Making of Modern Korea |publisher=Routledge |year=2002 |isbn=978-0-415-23749-9 |location=London |page=56}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Robinson |first=Michael E |url=https://archive.org/details/koreastwentieth00robi |title=Korea's Twentieth-Century Odyssey |publisher=University of Hawaii Press |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-8248-3174-5 |location=Honolulu |page=[https://archive.org/details/koreastwentieth00robi/page/87 87] |url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Oberdorfer |first1=Don |title=The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History |last2=Carlin |first2=Robert |publisher=Basic Books |year=2014 |isbn=978-0465031238 |pages=13β14}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page