Pioneer of Korean communism who fused the Bolshevik revolution with national liberation against Japanese rule
On his deathbed he declared: 'I die without seeing the Korean revolution succeed. Comrades, you must establish a Korean Soviet Republic.'
A pioneer of Korean communism who transformed from a Korean Empire army officer into a socialist revolutionary, becoming the first to fuse Marxism with the Korean national liberation struggle. He founded the Korean Socialist Party in 1918, served as prime minister of the Korean Provisional Government where he championed armed resistance, and after breaking with Syngman Rhee led the Korean Communist Party (Shanghai faction) in pursuit of combining national liberation with class revolution.
Career timeline
- 1895–1902Graduated from Imperial Military Academy; army major and Ganghwa garrison commander
- 1906–1911Co-founded New People's Association; founded Bochang School; jailed in 105-Man Incident
- 1913–1917Exiled to Primorsky Krai and Manchuria; established military academy, trained independence forces
- 1918Founded Korean Socialist Party in Khabarovsk; chairman
- 1919–1921Prime Minister of the Korean Provisional Government in Shanghai
- 1921Founded Korean Communist Party (Shanghai faction)
- 1922–1935Comintern liaison; Far East Korean director of MOPR
The first Korean communist, who gave her life bridging the Russian Revolution and Korean liberation
On September 16, 1918, dragged before Ataman Kalmykov's White Cossacks to be shot, her final cry: 'Freedom and independence for Korea!'
Born to Korean migrants in Siberia, she joined the Bolsheviks in 1916, becoming the first Korean communist. Dispatched to the Far East on Lenin's orders, she served as Commissar of Foreign Affairs for the Khabarovsk Soviet, co-founded the Korean Socialist Party with Yi Tong-hwi, and organized Korean Red Guard units against White and Japanese forces before her execution in 1918 at 33, a symbolic figure bridging the Russian Revolution and the Korean independence struggle.
Career timeline
- 1916Joined the RSDLP(B)
- 1917Secretary, Khabarovsk Bolshevik branch & Commissar of Foreign Affairs, Far Eastern Council of People's Commissars
- 1918.04Co-founded the Korean Socialist Party in Khabarovsk
- 1918.06–08Organized Korean and international Red Guard units against White and Japanese forces
- 1918.09.04Captured by White and Japanese forces
- 1918.09.16Executed by White Cossacks in Khabarovsk
Internationalist socialist who fought across the Korean independence movement and the Chinese Revolution, subject of Song of Arirang
"Even in death, I want to see Korea's independence and the victory of the socialism I have believed in all my life." — to Nym Wales in Yan'an, 1937
Kim San was an internationalist socialist who fought across the Korean independence movement and the Chinese Revolution. He left twenty-two interviews with American journalist Nym Wales in Yan'an that became Song of Arirang (1941), a first-person account of that struggle; in 1938 he was executed on false spy charges and rehabilitated by the CCP in 1983.
Career timeline
- 1919Participated in March First Movement; detained by Japanese police for 3 days
- 1921Studied in Tokyo, then moved to China
- 1922Joined the Chinese Communist Party
- 1923Joined Communist Youth League; published magazine Revolution
- 1925–1927Studied at Whampoa Academy & Sun Yat-sen University; fought in Guangzhou Uprising
- 1936Founded Alliance for Liberation of the Korean People in Shanghai; elected Korean revolutionary representative
- 1937Lecturer at Yan'an Anti-Japanese Military Academy; interviewed by Nym Wales
- 1938Arrested by Kang Sheng's security apparatus; executed on false espionage charges
