Pyongyang, July 27 (KCNA) — At least 550,000 foreigners visited the Victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum over the past more than 50 years since it was opened to visitors in Juche 42 (1953).
Exhibited at the museum are materials and evidence proving that the army and people of the DPRK heroically defeated the armed invasion of the U.S.-led imperialist allied forces under the leadership of President Kim Il Sung in the Fatherland Liberation War.
Foreigners who visited the museum highly praised Kim Il Sung as a gifted strategist and a symbol of victory in anti-imperialist struggle, being struck with admiration at the outstanding military war method and commanding art of the President who led the war to victory. – KCNA article
“If all records told the same tale — then the lie passed into history and became truth.” – George Orwell, 1984
As an American, one of the most fascinating parts of visiting North Korea was the constant reference to the Korean War. In North Korea, the war is a defining, integral part of everyday life. One might have imagined that just yesterday North Korean and American troops were battling each other in the streets of Seoul. In the United States, however, the Korean War is the “forgotten war.” In my own education, at least up until high school, we were given a mere overview of the Korean War, with perhaps twenty minutes or so allotted to covering a conflict that claimed the lives of 36,000 American servicemen. It wasn’t until I took history courses in college that I studied the Korean War in-depth and had a better understanding of its impact on past and contemporary geopolitics.
Much like our trip to the USS Pueblo, our visit to the Victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum was an opportunity to hear the North Korean version of history. As such, a trip to this particular museum required a “willing suspension of disbelief” as it was replete with historical inaccuracy colored by Marxist dogma.
The museum itself is a cavernous, dimly lit building filled with relics from the war. Our first visit, of course, was to the main hall which housed a giant mural of Kim Il-Sung leading his victorious citizens.
We were then led to another room where we shown a film explaining the origins of the Korean War. Apparently the United States capitalist pigs, having exhausted their customer base in Europe, needed new markets to sell weapons, and thus instigated war on the Korean peninsula in June 1950. Embarrassingly, the film was interrupted by a short blackout in which the museum lost its electricity supply. This, of course, was the fault of the U.S. Imperialists.
After the film, we were taken to another room to watch a diorama scene of a military convoy. Apparently, the U.S. destroyed a bridge and the North Korean convoy was unable to deliver supplies and troops to the front until local villagers used their backs and arms to support the remains of the bridge, thus allowing the convoy to pass overhead.
We then proceeded to view the rooms and rooms of war relics, the majority of which being captured American weaponry.
“The film cites relics on display at the Victorious Fatherland Liberation War Museum to prove that the U.S. imperialists ignited the Korean war by instigating the south Korean puppet clique for the purpose of destroying the young DPRK in its cradle and committed all sorts of atrocities and show the miserable end of the aggressors.” – KCNA
At one point in the tour, our guide pointed to a torpedo boat and proudly boasted that this was the boat which sank the USS Baltimore. Another tourist and I exchanged puzzled glances. Certainly none of us were experts in naval history, but surely we would have heard about this incident. So when I returned to the United States I googled the USS Baltimore and discovered that the USS Baltimore was not, in fact, sunk by North Korea forces. The ship was never deployed during the Korean War and was eventually scrapped in the 1970s.
I really hope they defused all of these
Kim Il-Sung discussing military strategy.
Our last stop at the war museum was the impressive 3-D cyclorama depicting the battle of Taejon. (It really was done nicely. You could sit down on the bench and view the entire cyclorama as the platform under you revolved.) When we entered the room, a guide was lecturing a group of schoolchildren on how the 24th Infantry Division of the U.S. Army was defeated by the victorious Korean People’s Army, or something like that. Despite admonishments by their teachers, the kids would steal occasional glances at the group of U.S. Imperialists staring at a depiction of North Korean soldiers trampling on an American flag.
More photos here.
