After all this I am not really bothered by juche gang posts, whether ironic or not, like damn. South Korea was just indefinitely worse than North Korea, it was like a fucking totalitarian state. It wasn’t until the 80s that the economic situation reversed. I mean I don’t think anyone should support the current regime but when you learn that more bombs were dropped on North Korea per capita than anywhere else in the world, ever, it becomes understandable why they’re seen as a backwards country with no development. The country was literally flattened by US bombing campaigns. And then you learn that Kim il sung gave rights to women while Rhee was murdering suspected communists by the thousands. The US was committing atrocities like No Gun Ri and yet in the common image America and South Korea are the good guys. I mean, fuck, I don’t think I can support the direction that Kim Jong un has taken North Korea in, but after learning this it solidifies my anti American views, there is officially no war after WW2 that America was justified in. I can’t believe that anti Korean War sentiment isn’t as high as anti Vietnam war, more people need to know about this
I tend to like Revionist historian’s views on any topic pertaining to the Cold War. The term “revionist” has been soured because of holocaust deniers who are masquerading under the guise of revisionists, but in essence it’s just historians challenging popular conceptions of historical events. For most events of the Cold War the orthodox view has been that fundamentally America enforces freedom. Revisionists challenge that idea and bring up a lot of really excellent points, suggesting things like America was more responsible for the Cold War due to such articles as the Truman doctrine and Kennan’s long telegram. So I’d look into revisionist history on whatever period you want to learn about. One excellent historian is William A Williams, his books on American diplomacy do not shy away from criticizing American foreign policy and his students founded socialist clubs at his university.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Appleman_Williams