How North Korea became the world's longest-lasting totalitarian state

As North Korea continues to flex its military muscles Blaine Harden's book offers a deep dive into the origins of the totalitarian state.

"The Great Leader and the Fighter Pilot" follows the improbable trajectories of two North Koreans, Kim Il-sung and No Kum-Sok. One built the dictatorship; the other escaped it.

Harden charts how Kim went from guerrilla fighter to Supreme Leader, and how, in 1953, No, the youngest fighter pilot in North Korea's air force, undermined Kim and staged a high-profile defection that captured the world's attention.

Harden spoke with MPR News host Tom Weber about the book, and his deep research into Chinese, Russian and U.S. archives to piece the story together.

On how Korea was split in two

"I think one of the things that American have forgotten is that we invented North and South Korea," Harden said. "In the summer of 1945, around the time of the end of World War II, a couple of officers in the White House got together and drew a line across the Korean peninsula — the 38th parallel — and created two new countries out of a kingdom that had never been anything other than one place before."

"It was a very idiotic line to draw, in many ways. It had nothing to do with the politics, the geography, or the ethnicity of the Korean peninsula, and it set in motion a war, because Stalin's Soviet Union took the top and we took the bottom."

On where Kim Il-sung's story begins

Kim Il-sung was born in Korea, Harden said, but moved with his family to Manchuria to escape Japanese control.

"The Japanese controlled Korea for nearly half a century — the first half of the 20th century. Kim Il-sung and his family went to Manchuria where the Japanese were still in charge, but less brutally so."

"[Kim] became an anti-Japanese guerrilla fighter, and then leader, at a very early age, in his late teens and early 20s. He fought against the Japanese, and he lost. In the late 1930s, he fled, two steps ahead of the Japanese police who would have killed him, and he joined the Soviet army."

"He became a captain in the Soviet army, and when the Americans divided Korea in half, the Soviets took the top part and he soon came into North Korea. At that point, he was famous. He was a legend: He had fought against the Japanese, and the Koreans — North and South — hated the Japanese with this incredible passion."

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"When Kim Il-sung came in, he was introduced by the Soviets as a potential leader, and everybody knew his name. What they didn't know was how young he was — he was only about 32 years old, and he didn't look like the famous general they thought he would be. He was smart, incredibly cunning, and he played Stalin well. He got Stalin to send him enough military hardware to attack the South, and he led this incredibly brutal war."

On the international sensation that has been forgotten

On Sept. 1, 1953, a 21-year-old pilot from North Korea named No Kim-Sok landed a Soviet MiG-15 at an air base in South Korea. The U.S. military was shocked and confused at the unexpected appearance of the highly coveted aircraft. No climbed out of the plane and tore up a picture Kim-Il-sung: He wanted to defect.

No's defection to the U.S. was "the biggest story in the world," Harden said. But "it's been completely forgotten. It was a banner headline across the top of the front page of the Washington Post, and virtually every other major newspaper in the world — with the exception of Beijing, Pyongyang and Moscow."

Harden had never heard the story himself until he received a phone call from Kenneth Rowe — the name No Kum-Sok now goes by. He's 84 years old and lives in Daytona Beach, Fla. When Harden admitted that he didn't know who he was, Rowe told him: "Do a little more homework, be a little better educated, and we'll talk again."

In the book, Harden weaves No's life in North Korea in with the rise of the Supreme Leader.

"He pretended to be a Communist — a 'number one Communist' as he described it — because from the earliest age he wanted to get out ... He did this sort of performance art at a very, very high level. He became a naval cadet, and then he became the youngest fighter pilot in the North Korean air force."

"The Russians taught him how to fly a MiG-15, which was the hottest, most lethal fighter jet in the world at the time, and also a very difficult and dangerous plane to fly."

As he trained to fly, he also rose in the Communist party. He would scream denunciations of America in public while secretly longing to go there. All along, he was "looking for a chance to get in that plane and get the hell out of there."

On No's first experience with America

Growing up in North Korea, No had access to Japanese books thanks to his father's connections. It was in those books that he read about the U.S.

"He read lots of picture books, and he remembers one book in particular which showed an American couple, in a convertible, in the California sunshine with a dog in the backseat. That picture showing such happy, beautiful people, with a dog that looked more affluent than anybody he'd ever seen — he just decided that he wanted to go and live in that country."

For the full interview with Blaine Harden on "The Great Leader and the Fighter Pilot," use the audio player above.