During the colonial era, communists were the most targeted and repressed group in the peninsula, but everything changed after Japan’s defeat in the Second World War. The soon-after freed communists would hold positions in at least half of the people's committees that were prepared to govern a post-colonial Korea. While the Comintern advised communists to build support among the masses, right-wing nationalists continued to lose relevance in exile and the local elite discredited themselves through colonial collaboration.

Unfortunately, the US military occupation and the Korean War would eradicate the Korean Left (the first casualty of the Cold War). Nevertheless, Communism represented the radical hope for an equally nationalist and cosmopolitan Korea, a dream kept alive by the Soviet Union's strong commitment to the colonized world. The Comintern’s guidance may have been heavy handed but they provided the resources and connections Korean communists needed to survive persecution and showed us what we can achieve when the left combines international solidarity with local organizing. 

In a future where the world seems more hopeless than today, unemployment, fascism, and forever wars have metastasized beyond what states can manage. In a desperate bid to stay in power, the United States invades Iran, triggering a global famine. However, in M.E. O’Brien’s novel, “Everything for Everyone,” desperate and hungry New Yorkers launch an insurrection at Hunts Point Market, the world’s largest food distribution center. The rebels turn Hunts Point into the New York Commune, which sparks a worldwide revolution that finally takes down capitalism.

On January 19, 150 people protested in front of the Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) office in the city of Daejeon, demanding the South Korean government stop arming Israel. While Palestine may seem like a distant conflict to South Koreans, the South Korean military-industrial complex is a key pillar in the Israeli war machine. According to Peace Momo, Hanwha, South Korea’s leading defense company, signed a major technology cooperation and export deal with Israeli weapons company, Elbit Systems, at the Seoul International Aerospace & Defense Exhibition (ADEX) in 2021.

July 27th marked the 70th year anniversary of the 1953 ceasefire to the Korean War. In the three years leading up to the anniversary, South Korean peace movements organized the international campaign Korean Peace Appeal to end the Korean War with a peace treaty. Yet, the anniversary has come and gone and peace is nowhere on the horizon. In fact, rather than working towards defusing tensions in the Korean Peninsula, the Biden Administration is using North Korea as a cover for building a NATO-level trilateral alliance with South Korea and Japan against China.

Upon taking office, when South Korean President Yoon Seok-yeol sidestepped claims for historical accountability of Japanese colonialism, he cleared the way for the US’s regional “cornerstone” (Japan) and “linchpin” (South Korea) to connect with each other. In the process, they overcame the US’s roughshod San Francisco system, which had sacrificed justice against Japanese colonialism at the altar of anti-communism. On Aug. 18, to immunize the trilateral alliance from changes in administration, at Camp David, Biden, Yoon, and Kishida announced the “Spirit of Camp David” which would institutionalize annual trilateral summits, meetings, and consultations. 

On Aug. 28th, to explore the state of South Korea’s peace movement and the tasks ahead for it, I met with Francis Dae-hoon Lee, a long-time peace activist and veteran of Korea’s democratization movement and a Professor of Peace Studies at Sungkonghoe University and Director of Peacemomo, a research institute for peace and education. The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.