In the past two weeks, we learned about the history of Korea. A language class is not only about how to speak, listen, write and read. It is also really important for us to learn the history background of this country.
The Japanese occupation of Korea began in 1910 and ended at the end of World War II in 1945. The empire of Korea was stripped of its diplomatic sovereignty and declared a protectorate of Japan with the signing of the Japan-Korea Treaty of 1905. This came after the Russo-Japanese War in which Russia was forced to concede that Japan had “paramount political, military, and economic interest” in Korea. On August 22, 1910, Japan officially annexed Korea. Through this time, Japanese settlers had been migrating to Korea to combat overcrowding in Japan. By 1910 there were over 170,000 Japanese people living in Korea. In Korea, the landowners were mostly Japanese, while the tenants were all Koreans. The Japanese created a feudal state where they owned the land and the Koreans worked the fields. The Korean tenants were forced to pay over half their crop as rent which caused many farmers to send their wives and daughters to work in factories or to become prostitutes（위안부.）By 1910 an estimated 7 to 8% of all arable land in Korea had come under Japanese control.This ratio increased steadily; as of the years 1916, 1920, and 1932, the ratio of Japanese land ownership increased from 36.8 to 39.8 yo 52.7%.
The March 1 Movement was a large anti-Japanese rally in 1919. A declaration of independence was read in Seoul. Over 2 million people attended these rallies which were violently suppressed by the Japanese. The protests continued for about a year. It is estimated that 50,000 Koreans were arrested 7500 were killed. In 1939 Japan was plagues with labor shortages as a result of conscription for WWII military efforts. Koreans were recruited, first voluntarily and later by force, to move to Japan and work in the factories. In 1942, the National Mobilization Law extended to the conscription of Korean workers for factories and mines in Korea. Out of the 670,000 Koreans who went to work in Japan, 60,000 died from the horrendous work conditions. The total death toll from forced labor in Korea is estimated between 270,000 and 810,000 people. On 10 December 1941, the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, under the presidency of Kim Gu, declared war on Japan and Germany. Kim Gu organized many of the exiled Korean resistance groups, forming the “Korean Liberation Army”. On the other hand, Kim II-sung led tens of thousands of Koreans who volunteered for the National Revolutionary Army and the People’s Liberation Army. The communist-backed Korean Volunteer Army was established in China, outside of the Provisional Government’s control, from a core of 1000 deserters from the Imperial Japanese Army. After the Manchurian Strategic Offensive Operation, the KVA entered Manchuria where it recruited from the ethnic Korean population and eventually became the Korean People’s Army of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
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