The Workers’ Party of Korea [WPK] Central Military Commission [CMC] met in an enlarged session (or held on an expansion basis) at the WPK Central Committee Office Building on 12 March (Sunday). Technically, this was the 5th enlarged meeting of the 8th CMC. The CMC gathered as “the whole country has turned out in the efforts to the implement the resolutions of the 8th Congress of the WPK and plenary meetings of its Central Committee in single-hearted unity.”
Kim Jong Un (Kim Cho’ng-u’n; KJU) attended and chaired the CMC meeting. Among those joining KJU at the table were: DPRK Premier Kim Tok Hun (Kim Tok-hun), WPK Secretary for Organizational Affairs Jo Yong Won (Cho Yo’ng-wo’n), WPK Secretary for Military Affairs and CMC Vice Chairman Ri Yong Gil (Ri Yo’ng-kil), Chief of the Korean People’s Army [KPA] General Staff Gen. Pak Su Gil (Pak Su-kil), KPA General Political Bureau Director Jong Kyong Thaek (Cho’ng Kyo’ng-t’aek), Minister of National Defense Gen. Kang Sun Nam (Kang Sun-nam), WPK Military Affairs Department and WPK Civil Defense Department Director O Il Jong (O Il-cho’ng), WPK Organization Guidance Department Senior Deputy Director Kim Jo Guk (Kim Cho-kuk), Minister of Public Security Gen. Ri Thae Sop (Ri T’ae-sop), KPA Navy Commander ADM Kim Myong Sik (Kim Myo’ng-sik), State Security Department Director Ri Chang Dae (Ri Chang-tae) and Military Security Command Director Gen. Jo Kyong Chol (Cho Kyo’ng-ch’o’l). WPK Secretary for Propaganda and Agitation Ri Il Hwan (Ri Il-hwan) Also in attendance were other CMC Members, command staff of the KPA General Staff and Ministry of National Defense, corps commanders and a variety of cadres from Central Committee Departments. CMC Vice Chairman and WPK Secretary Ri Pyong Chol (Ri Pyo’ng-ch’o’l) did not attend the meeting.
First, the CMC took up the KPA’s contributions to domestic economic policies (soldier-builders, soldier-farmers and whatnot). The CMC “reaffirmed the importance of solving the rural question, set forth by the WPK, as a prerequisite and strategic foremost affair in accomplishing the cause of socialism, and the present rural constructions” and that “since the medium- and long-term development orientation and goal for the socialist rural construction were set clearly, it raised as a key point for discussion the issue of implementing them unconditionally.”
The CMC meeting “confirmed the KPA’s action orientation and detailed duties for accelerating rural development, regional construction and grand socialist construction which the Party has planned on a long-term basis and is leading as a purposeful struggle, discussed the organizational and structural measures for implementing them and ways for using forces, and unanimously approved the relevant resolutions.”
Second, the CMC took up military and defense industry policy. It “discussed and adopted the important practical steps for making more effective, powerful and offensive use of the war deterrent of the country in coping with the present situation in which the war provocations of the US and south Korea are reaching the red line.” KJU reviewed the “subjective and objective situation of our revolution” and he remarked that the “present grand drive for creation for accomplishing the gigantic cause of overall national prosperity, resolutely overcoming all the challenges and difficulties, calls upon the KPA, that always played a vanguard role in the struggle for implementing the grand, practical program of the Party, to lead the whole society with more advancing and vigorous struggle.”
Kim Jong Un said that the “KPA should become a driving force and model in the sacred struggle for the socialist rural construction and economic development to turn the ideal of the people into reality, unconditionally implement the step wise goals and thus bring about the entities of prosperity welcomed by the whole country year after year.” The CMC meeting participants “made a firm pledge to certainly attain the goals of grand changes for national prosperity by fulfilling their important responsibilities and duties in carrying out the militant tasks set forth by the Party Central Military Commission.”
