By Dianne Mathiowetz
July 31, 2025

The following is a talk given at a Workers World Party meeting in New York City, on July 24, 2025, prior to the start of the People’s Summit for Korea at Riverside Church July 25-27.

I appreciate the opportunity to say a little about the importance of the Korean War in advance of the Summit taking place this weekend at Riverside Church. This “little known war” marks the early projection of U.S. global military, political and economic dominance of the world for the last 75 years.

Korea wasn’t an armed conflict between two capitalist forces fighting for the same territory. It  was a class war between exploiters and the exploited. Korea, it must be remembered, was an independent and ancient nation before it was occupied and ruled by Japan beginning in the early 1900’s.

The Japanese occupation was brutal in the extreme. A guerrilla liberation movement developed, led by Kim Il Sung and other communist forces that had support throughout the country but was strongest in the north. When the U.S. used atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, killing and sickening vast populations, it effectively ended World War II as well as Japanese control of Korea.  The future of Korea was put in question with the U.S. ruling class looking to keep the workers, resources and profits firmly in their hands.

Following Japan’s surrender, there was a negotiation between the U.S. and the Soviet Union that established a temporary division at the 38th parallel with the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea in the north and the Republic of Korea in the south with thousands of U.S. troops stationed there. For five years, the U.S. army cooperated in attacks on the labor movement, jailing and killing thousands of Korean activists and supporters of a socialist Korea.

With conditions in the south becoming more oppressive under the rule of Syngman Rhee, the autocratic businessman who repressed workers’ rights and had opened South Korea to international plunder, on June 25, 1950 troops from the North crossed over the imposed line. And so began what came to be known as the Korean War.

While encountering little resistance from ROK forces, the liberation of the South was soon countered by the intervention of the imperialist nations on the United Nations Security Council to provide military support to the Rhee regime, under U.S. leadership.  For three very bloody years, soldiers and civilians died as areas were won and lost, ending in an armistice that gave South Korea a little more land above the 38th parallel and established a two-mile wide demilitarized zone between the DPRK and the ROK.

An estimated 5 million soldiers and civilians were killed – at least half of whom were noncombatants. Some 40,000 U.S. forces were killed and more than 100,000 wounded.

Today’s destruction of Gaza is reminiscent of the U.S. military’s leveling of Pyongyang, the capital city of the DPRK, along with other population centers and any modes of production.

Korea today

The U.S. remains a dominant political force in South Korea, regardless of what regime is in power.  However, the progressive and socialist movement continues to grow as global conditions of exploitation and class division intensifies in all capitalist countries.

Meanwhile North Korea, while under intense economic, political, diplomatic and military pressure, has not only survived but made impressive gains in providing not just the basic necessities for its population, but material and cultural advances,

The Peoples Summit for Korea this weekend is the result of a significant effort by a multitude of Korean organizations to advance the struggle of the Korean people’s long independence and liberatory history.

Workers World Party has a remarkable history in defense and support of the DPRK and the progressive forces in South Korea. Early on, the U.S. Out of Korea Committee was formed and over the decades, comrades, including the late WWP chairperson Sam Marcy, and many others have traveled in solidarity with the DPRK and to the South in support of the movement forces there.

What needs to be understood is that it is illegal in South Korea, as in many other right-wing governed countries, for a Communist Party member to be allowed to speak on the airwaves. The South Korean movement deserves enormous recognition for joining this political gathering to address a liberation struggle that has refused to be defeated despite generations of occupation, war, sanctions and political repression.

I feel personally very glad to be able to attend this Summit. My two visits to North Korea several years ago representing Workers World Party and the U.S. Out of Korea Committee remain critical experiences that bolstered my own personal dedication to the fight for communism and the overthrow of capitalism everywhere.

U.S., Hands Off Korea!  Down with US Imperialism! Victory to the Korean People!