Mobilization within 24 Hours Following the Outbreak of War

It was revealed Wednesday that North Korea distributed a directive and a wartime bylaw by National Defense Committee Chairman Kim Jong Il nationwide on April 7, 2004.

Kim signed the two-page directive, classified as top secret, as the chairman of the Central Military Commission of the Korea Worker`s Party, which officially confirms that the Dear Leader has concurrently served a chairman of both bodies. The position of the Central Military Commission chairman was known to be vacant since the death of Marshall Kim Il Sung in 1994.

South Korea said that the chairman ordered every sector and unit to carry out the wartime bylaw when war breaks out, to map out specific bylaws related to their assigned roles, and to be ready thoroughly to go to war.

The 31-page wartime bylaw ordered all parties, troops, and people to be fully alert for mobilization within 24 hours following the outbreak of war and to organize military recruiting groups in each province, city, and county in order to secure as many available troops as possible.

The bylaw, in regard to war strategies, divided major forces in the second line and the third line and ordered each line to establish an independent torpedo net. According to the bylaw, wartime will progress in three phases of defense, attack, and attrition. It ordered to carry out aggressive psychological and operational warfare against “freed” local people in the phases of attack and attrition.

It was said that the North Korea’s police and intelligence authorities would establish command centers in underground tunnels, and commanding officials must secure the personnel, weapons, and military equipments in hiding places in the tunnels, and must make eating places, drinking water, sanitary and purification facilities ready for a protracted war. Also, each unit is required to take portraits and statues of the Dear Leader, his mother, Kim Jung-suk, and their revolutionary family to safe locations. The bylaw states this as the first thing for North Koreans to do when war breaks out.

taewon_ha@donga.com