Author: Koo Kim
Editor: Jin-soon Doh
Publisher: Dolbegeh
456 pages | 223*152mm
| Important! Please read before you order! |
| >>>This book is written in Korean only. |
About This Book
Kim Koo (August 29, 1876 – June 26, 1949), the sixth and last president of the
Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, was a Korean patriot who has
struggled against Japanese occupation of Korea that lasted from 1910 to 1945.
After Empress Myeongseong of Korea was assassinated by Japanese swordsmen, he
killed a Japanese military officer for a revenge in 1896. He was arrested but
succeeded to escape from prison. Kim Koo exiled to Shanghai after a nationwide
non-violent resistance movement that started on March 1, 1919 was violently
quenched by the Japanese imperialist government. He participated in the exiled
regime with figures like Syngman Rhee and Yo Un-hyung.
In Shanghai, Kim joined the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea,
which vowed to liberate Korea from Japanese occupation. After serving the Police
Minister, Kim Koo became the president of the Provisional Government of the
Republic of Korea in 1927. He was re-elected to the office many times by the
Provisional Assembly.
In 1931 he organized a nationalist group, Korea Patriotic Legion. One of the
members, Yoon Bong-Gil, ambushed and eliminated the Japanese military leadership
in Shanghai on April 29, 1932. The commander of the Japanese Army and Navy died
instantly. It was a great victory for the Korean cause. Another member, Lee
Bong-chang, tried to eliminate the Japanese emperor Hirohito at Tokyo in January
8 the same year. After escaping to Chongqing where Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalist
Government was established, Kim established the Korean Liberation Army,
commanded by General Ji Chung-chun. When the Pacific War broke out on December
8, 1941, Kim Koo declared war on Japan and Germany, and committed the Korean
Liberation Army to allied side, who took part in warfare in China and Southeast
Asia. Kim organised for the Korean Liberation Army to advance to Korea in 1945,
but days before the departure of the leading unit, the war ended.
He returned to Seoul upon the Japanese surrender to the Allied in 1945. When the
United States and the Soviet Union set out to establish two Korean governments,
respective in the southern region and the northern region, he was determined not
to participate in either of the efforts.
As the division of the newly-independent country became obvious, he led a team
of former independence activist to Pyongyang, later to become the capital of
North Korea, to hold unification talks with Kim Il-sung, later becoming the
president of North Korea, but failed drastically after being humiliated by Kim
Il-Sung.
In 1948, the inaugural Parliament of the Republic of Korea nominated Kim as a
candidate for the office of the first president of the Republic. In the election
by the National Assembly, Kim was defeated by Syngman Rhee, the first president
of the provisional government, with result of 180-16. He also lost the election
for vice presidency to Lee Si-young, with the result of 133-59. Kim himself
didn't know about his nominations until after the election, and he certainly did
not approve the nomination, as he considered this a ploy to discredit him.
In 1949 Kim was assassinated by Ahn Doo-hee in his office. Although some suggest
there may have been a right-wing conspiracy to assassinate him in which even
president Rhee could have been involved, no details of the assassination have
been revealed. Moreover, Ahn Doo-hee was murdered by Kim's follower in 1996,
thus further obscuring the prospect of finding the motive of assassination.
He is still revered by many Koreans to have been deserving of being the first
Korean president after the liberation rather than Syngman Rhee, who was favored
to lead South Korea by the US government. He was posthumously awarded the Grand
Cordon of the Order of National Liberation of Korea. His autobiography, Journal
of Baekbeom became a bestseller in Korea when published.
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