The Korean People's Army (KPA; ) encompasses the combined military forces of North Korea and the armed wing of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK). The KPA consists of five branches: the Ground Force, the Naval Force, the Air Force, the Strategic Force, and the Special Operations Forces. It is commanded by the WPK Central Military Commission, which is chaired by the WPK general secretary, and the president of the State Affairs; both posts are currently headed by Kim Jong Un.
The KPA considers its primary adversaries to be the Republic of Korea Armed Forces and United States Forces Korea, across the Korean Demilitarized Zone, as it has since the Armistice Agreement of July 1953. it is the second largest military organisation in the world, with of the North Korean population actively serving, in reserve, or in a paramilitary capacity.
History
Korean Volunteer Army, 1939–1948 In 1939, the Korean Volunteer Army (KVA), was formed in Yan'an, China.Scobell & Sanford 2007, p. 18. The two individuals responsible for the army were Kim Tu-bong and Mu Chong. At the same time, a school was established near Yan'an for training military and political leaders for a future independent Korea. By 1945, the KVA had grown to approximately 1,000 men, mostly Korean deserters from the Imperial Japanese Army. During this period, the KVA fought alongside the Chinese communist Northeast Anti-Japanese United Army from which it drew its arms and ammunition. After the defeat of the Japanese, the KVA accompanied the Chinese Communist Party forces into eastern Jilin, intending to gain recruits from ethnic Koreans in China, particularly from Yanbian, and then enter Korea.Elleman, Bruce. Beijing's Power and China's Borders: Twenty Neighbors in Asia. Routledge (2014). pp. 116–117
Soviet Korean Units Just after World War II ended and during the Soviet Union's occupation of the part of Korea north of the 38th Parallel, the Soviet 25th Army headquarters in Pyongyang issued a statement ordering all armed resistance groups in the northern part of the peninsula to disband on 12 October 1945. Two thousand Koreans with previous experience in the Soviet Red Army were sent to various locations around the country to organise constabulary forces with permission from Soviet military headquarters, and the force was created on 21 October 1945.Scobell & Sanford 2007, pp. 18–19.
Formation of National Army The headquarters felt a need for a separate unit for security around railways, and the formation of the unit was announced on 11 January 1946. That unit was activated on 15 August of the same year to supervise existing security forces and creation of the national armed forces.Scobell & Sanford 2007, p. 19.
Military institutes such as the Pyongyang Academy (became No. 2 KPA Officers School in Jan. 1949) and the Central Constabulary Academy (became KPA Military Academy in Dec. 1948) soon followed for the education of political and military officers for the new armed forces.
After the military was organised and facilities to educate its new recruits were constructed, the Constabulary Discipline Corps was reorganised into the Korean People's Army General Headquarters. The previously semi-official units became military regulars with the distribution of Soviet uniforms, badges, and weapons that followed the inception of the headquarters.
The State Security Department, a forerunner to the Ministry of People's Defence, was created as part of the Interim People's Committee on 4 February 1948. The formal creation of the Korean People's Army was announced four days later on 8 February, the day after the Fourth Plenary Session of the People's Assembly approved the plan to separate the roles of the military and those of the police,James M. Minnich, The North Korean People's Army, p. 36 seven months before the government of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea was proclaimed on 9 September 1948. In addition, the Ministry of Defence was established, which controlled a central guard battalion, two divisions, and an independent mixed and combined arms brigade.Scobell & Sanford 2007, p. 20.
Conflicts and events
Before the outbreak of the Korean War, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin equipped the KPA with modern armaments. During the opening phases of the Korean War in 1950, the KPA quickly drove South Korean forces south and captured Seoul, only to lose 70,000 of their 100,000-strong army in the autumn after U.S. amphibious landings at the Battle of Incheon and a subsequent drive to the Yalu River. On 4 November, China openly staged a military intervention. The KPA subsequently played a secondary and minor role to the Chinese People's Volunteer Army in the remainder of the conflict. By the time of the Armistice in 1953, the KPA had sustained 290,000 casualties and lost 90,000 men as POWs.
In 1953, the Military Armistice Commission (MAC) was able to oversee and enforce the terms of the armistice. The Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission (NNSC), made up of delegations from Czechoslovakia, Poland, Sweden and Switzerland, carried out inspections to ensure implementation of the terms of the Armistice that prevented reinforcements or new weapons being brought into Korea.
Soviet thinking on the strategic scale was replaced in December 1962 with the Maoist concept of a people's war. Along with the mechanisation of some infantry units, more emphasis was put on light weapons, high-angle indirect fire, night fighting, and sea denial.
In the fall of 2024, amidst the Russo-Ukrainian war, elements of the Korean People's Army were clandestinely sent to Russia to bolster Russian forces fighting against Ukraine in the Kursk offensive. The force, which included Korean People's Army Special Operations Forces, was said to have consisted of 10,000 men fighting in Russian uniforms and under Russian command. Initially denied by both Russia and North Korea, the operation was publicly revealed after Russia claimed the last Ukrainian forces were driven out of Kursk Oblast.
Date of establishment history Until 1977, the official date of establishment of the Korean People's Army was 8 February 1948. In the 1940s, North Korean historiography started to claim that Kim Il Sung established an anti-Japanese guerrilla army, the Korean People's Revolutionary Army, on 25 April 1932. North Korea claims that the KPRA was officially transformed into the People's Army in anticipation of the government's establishment on February 8, 1948. In 1978, April 25 was designated as the "Anniversary of the Founding of the People's Army" and North Korea held large-scale commemorative events. The reason for changing the date of the founding of the People's Army in North Korea is that Kim Il Sung organised the "Anti-Japanese People's Guerrilla Unit", a unit of the Anti-Japanese People's Army, in Ando County, Manchuria, on April 25, 1932, which later developed into the "Korean People's Revolutionary Army" and played a significant role in the anti-Japanese struggle. This is based on the "Kim Il Sung revolutionary tradition." Both of these are celebrated as army days, with decennial anniversaries treated as major celebrations, except from 1978 to 2014 when only the 1932 anniversary was celebrated.See "Puk chuyo'gi'nyŏm'il 5–10 nyŏnmada taegyumo yŏlpyŏngsik" (North Korea Holds Large Military Parades for Anniversaries Every 5–10 years), Chosŏn Ilbo, 25 April 2007; Chang Jun-ik, "Pukhan Inmingundaesa" (History of the North Korean Military), Seoul, Sŏmundang, 1991, pp. 19–88; Kim Kwang-su, "Chosŏninmingun'ŭi ch'angsŏlgwa palchŏn, 1945–1990" (Foundation and Development of the Korean People's Army, 1945–1990), Chapter Two in Kyŏngnam University North Korean Studies Graduate School, Pukhan'gunsamunje'ŭi chaejomyŏng (The Military of North Korea: A New Look), Seoul, Hanul Academy, 2006, pp. 63–78. By 2019, the KPA's date of establishment had been reverted to 8 February 1948.
Organisation
Commission and leadership The charter of the WPK states that the KPA is "the revolutionary armed forces of the Workers' Party of Korea and shall uphold the guidance of the party". The charter also states that the WPK Central Military Commission (CMC) is "the party's supreme institution on military guidance" and has "command over the armed forces of the republic". The CMC is headed by the general secretary of the WPK, who is also CMC chairman ex officio. The state constitution also names the president of the State Affairs as the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, and stipulates that the mission of the armed forces is to "defend unto death the Party Central Committee headed by the great Comrade Kim Jong Un".
Almost all officers of the KPA began their military careers as privates; only very few people are admitted to a military academy without prior service. The result is supposed to be an egalitarian military system where officers are familiar with the life of a military private and "military nobility" is all but nonexistent.
History
Since 1990, numerous and dramatic transformations within North Korea have led to the current command and control structure. The details of the majority of these changes are simply unknown to the world. What little is known indicates that many changes were the natural result of the deaths of the aging leadership including Kim Il Sung (July 1994), Minister of People's Armed Forces O Jin-u (February 1995) and Minister of Defence Choe Kwang (February 1997).
The vast majority of changes were undertaken to secure the power and position of Kim Jong Il. Formerly, what is now the State Affairs Commission - formerly the National Defence Commission - was part of the Central People's Committee (CPC) while the Ministry of Defence, from 1982 onward, was under direct presidential control. At the Eighteenth session of the sixth Central People's Committee, held on 23 May 1990, the SAC became established as its own independent commission, rising to the same status as the CPC (now the Cabinet of North Korea) and not subordinated to it, as was the case before. Concurrent with this, Kim Jong Il was appointed first vice-chairman of the National Defence Commission. The following year, on 24 December 1991, Kim Jong Il was appointed Supreme Commander of the Korean People's Army. Four months later, on 20 April 1992, Kim Jong Il was awarded the rank of Marshal and his father, in virtue of being the KPA's founding commander in chief, became Grand Marshal as a result and one year later he became the chairman of the National Defence Commission, by now under Supreme People's Assembly control under the then 1992 constitution as amended.
Within the KPA, between December 1991 and December 1995, nearly 800 high officers (out of approximately 1,200) received promotions and preferential assignments. Three days after Kim Jong Il became Marshal, eight generals were appointed to the rank of Vice-Marshal. In April 1997, on the 85th anniversary of Kim Il Sung's birthday, Kim Jong Il promoted 127 general and admiral grade officers. The following April he ordered the promotions of another 22 generals and flag officers. Along with these changes, many KPA officers were appointed to influential positions within the WPK. These promotions continue today, simultaneous with the celebration of Kim Il Sung's birthday and the KPA anniversary celebrations every April and since recently in July to honour the end of the Korean War. Under Kim Jong Il's leadership, political officers dispatched from the party monitored every move of a general's daily life, according to analysts similar to the work of Soviet political commissars during the early and middle years of the military establishment.