6.25전쟁 초기 조선 종군실화로 본 토지개혁 = North Korean Land Reform in South Korean Occupied Region Described in Newspapers

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

I raised a hypothesis that there are Nominal aspect and actual one to the aims of Land Reform and Raw Crop Tax System carried out in the occupied South Korean Region by North Korea in the early stage of the Korean War.
Nominal aspect is the result from the North Korean recognition that the Korean war was for liberating South Korean People from Imperialist America and fascist Lee Sungman regime. It was important for North Korea to liberate South Korean People in the occupied region from the feudalistic oppression and so many unfair taxes.
In 1949 the North Korean cabinet made the draft for the Land Reform to be carried in the South Korean occupied region. On July 4,1950 Top People’s Assembly made public an political order ‘Decree on the Land Reform of the South Korean occupied region’. Soon the Assembly make public ‘Concrete Rules for the Land Reform’, and On August 18,1950 it made public ‘Decree on the Raw Crop Tax System on the South Korean Occupied Region’.
According to these decrees, Land Reform and Raw Crop Tax System were widely and promptly executed over South Korean occupied region except South and North Kyoungsang province and Jeju province.
Actual aspect of those polices was that Kim Ilsung wanted to mobilize labors and by encouraging them as the core power of social revolution in order to win the war by making them help North Korean People’s Army(KPA). That kind of aim was revealed in the address of Kim Ilsung, ‘we have to use peasants as producers of wartime crop and raw material’ spoken in ‘Congratulation Rally of Pyongyang’s People Committee for the 5th anniversary of Liberation’. In the early stage of the war, peasants fulfilled their duty as the core power of social revolution on the war front to help KPA.
The conclusion of this article is that those two policies were not ‘revolutionary’ successful but ‘actually’ successful by mobilizing peasants to help KPA.
There are several reasons that those two policies were not revolutionary successful.
There is a critical viewpoint that the land reform executed by North Korea was almost the same thing from the land reform executed already by South Korean Government. On April 26, 1946 South Korean Assembly passed ‘Land Reform Law’ to be executed by the method ‘paid appropriation, paid distribution’ under the tough urge of peasants. The width of the land distributed to the peasants was 5846km2, among the amount of 5974km2 appropriated land. North Korea distributed 5733km2 to peasants among the amount of 5962km2.
But peasants less felt the effect of the land reform because peasants were allowed to harvest the crop if it had been scattered by them. And it was impossible ‘to eliminate classes’ because rich farmers were allowed to possess up to 200,000m2 in order to embrace them. Moreover it was impossible ‘to eliminate shameful history because the land owned by pro-Japan imperialism was not appropriated.
Harvest Sampling Method introduced to execute Raw Crop Tax System reasonably and scientifically made Southern Peasants feel disgusting. Though the rate of raw crop tax was just 10-27%, the burden of peasants was not lessened because of various semi-official taxes like ‘Patriotic Rice’, ‘Fund for Airplanes’.
Despite these negative aspects, the fact that those two policies were actually successful in mobilizing peasants constituting over 80% of Southern people into war is shown in the reports by professional writers who visited fronts.
Peasants to whom land was distributed made their effort in order to secure crop for soldiers in the front of by raising manure, reconstructing irrigation system, helping themselves. About 400.000 peasants volunteered to serve army by August 15, 1950. Many peasants helped soldiers proceed their way by reconstructing roads, bridges and railways and made communication easy by connecting telephone cables. Women whose social status was raised during the war carried bullets and food, sent solacing items to the front and helped wounded soldiers.
But we have to pay attention to the fact that these kind of peasants’ activity was driven not solely by these two policies but also by massacres of citizens by American Troops and South Korean Army.
We are able to notice that there are several historical meanings in those two wartime policies.
First, these kind of reforms executed rashly during the war were ‘liberation of human beings’ from the feudalistic oppression system thousands years long.
Second, peasants got special experience of ‘class liberation’ and ‘people’s economy’ in the condition that there were no landlords, pro-Japan imperialism, traitors to the motherland.
Third, it was possible to execute these two policies in the occupied region without strong antagonistic activity by landlords and right-wings.
Fourth, these two policies urged Lee Sungman government to continue that kind of land reform when they restored Southern region.

목차 (Table of Contents)

• Ⅰ. 말머리
• Ⅱ. 점령지 남반부에서 실시한 토지개혁과 농업 현물세제
• Ⅲ. 토지개혁이 전시 주민 생활에 끼친 영향
• Ⅳ. 마무리