Progressive Youth League (the ‘Republic of Korea’)
World War 3 is underway. The war in Ukraine, which signaled the beginning of World War 3, started under the masterminding of NATO and imperialist forces with the 2014 “Maidan Coup,” which resembled a civil war. It escalated into a full-scale phase in February 2022 with Russia’s special military operation aimed at prohibiting NATO’s eastward expansion, liquidating Neo-Nazism, and protecting residents. World War 3 deepened through the West Asian (Middle Eastern) war centered on the Palestinian war in October 2023. NATO politically and militarily finalized the “Pacificization of NATO” through the Washington Summit in July 2024 and multinational joint military exercises from June to August. Furthermore, in the second half of 2024, they provoked local and civil wars to escalate World War 3 into a full-scale phase through the East Asian war centered on the war in the ‘Republic of Korea (ROK).’ However, this was deterred and crushed by the war deterrence and “strategic patience” of the DPRK, as well as the December Uprising of the people of the ‘ROK.’ After igniting the West Asian war centered on the Iranian war in February of this year, the imperialist forces are desperately maneuvering to expand it into the East Asian war centered on the Taiwan war.
The war machine NATO is the military command of World War 3. After integrating the IP4 (the four Indo-Pacific partner countries: Japan, the ‘ROK,’ Australia, and New Zealand) at the Madrid Summit in June 2022, following the outbreak of the war in Ukraine in February 2022, NATO has sought to expand the battlefield into the Indo-Pacific through the Vilnius and Washington Summits. At the Hague Summit in June 2025, it decided to raise the military expenditures of NATO member states to 5% of their GDP, and then applied this exact same standard to pro-NATO East Asian countries such as the ‘ROK’ and Japan. At the upcoming Ankara Summit in July 2026, they are concretely discussing weapon support for Ukraine and military spending increases, rallying pro-NATO Arab states, and preparing a conspiracy ground for global military-industrial capitals. The increase in European military spending signifies “militarization” and is bound to inevitably lead to the expansion and prolongation of war. Right now, in the Third World, youth and the people are losing their lives due to wars of aggression, civil wars, conflicts, and terrorism, while within imperialist countries, the reduction of welfare and the gap between the rich and the poor are accelerating. As the NATO Summit is held every year, the global war crisis intensifies, the political and economic crises of each country deepen, and the lives of the people, including the youth, plunge.
In addition to the soaring military expenditures, the economic crisis and the ruin of public livelihoods are severely threatening the situation of the youth. The national defense budget of the ‘ROK’ was finalized at 65.8642 trillion won (approximately US$45 billion) for 2026, an increase of 7.2%, surpassing 60 trillion won for the first time in history. Reflected here are the costs of arms buildup and the construction of advanced weapon systems to strengthen the US blockade against China and maintain US hegemony in Northeast Asia. The cost for securing capabilities linked to the “Kill Chain”—which entails a US preemptive nuclear strike against the DPRK—and the “Joint All-Domain Command and Control (JADC2)” which is integrated into US command and control, was budgeted at 19.9653 trillion won (approximately US$14 billion), a whopping 11.9% increase compared to the previous year. The pro-US traitorous Lee Jae-myung government is enforcing murderous restructuring while cutting budgets for youth and worker support, as well as employment, by hundreds of billions of won every year. It is massively reducing vocational training budgets for vulnerable groups, public rental housing-related budgets for low-income families, and care service budgets. The disastrous situation of the people today is sufficiently confirmed by a few figures. The economically inactive population among the youth has surpassed 1.6 million, and while the ratio of non-regular workers among all wage workers is in the 40% range, the ratio of non-regular workers among the youth is in the 50% range. When the average wage of all ages is set at 100, the average wage of the youth is a mere 60%. This is not a matter of years of continuous service or skill level, but a gap that occurs as the opportunities themselves are blocked. If comprador capital outsources risk and cost to subcontractors, agencies, and subsidiaries, the resulting risk burden is directly concentrated on the youth, who are newcomers to society. The suffering of the youth is confirmed by the fact that the 20s and 30s account for around 40% of all depression patients, and the suicide rate of those in their 30s exploded by 14.9% compared to the previous year. Attention must be paid to the fact that the ‘ROK’ is classified as a so-called “advanced economic nation.”
Imperialist and far-right forces are operating in the shadows to paralyze the consciousness of economically vulnerable and socially isolated youth, thereby eliminating the engine of social revolution. Since the 2010s, when the community was destroyed and the economic crisis and the ruin of public livelihoods deepened as the ‘ROK’ was integrated into the neoliberal system, contents disparaging the history of popular uprisings and instigating regional conflicts have spread rapidly, centered around far-right online communities. The psychological warfare unit and cyber team of the National Intelligence Service (NIS)—the fascist repressive apparatus of the ‘ROK’—are notorious for manipulating public opinion. As befitting a subordinate body of the CIA, the NIS takes the enforcement of its directives as its primary mission. Meanwhile, the US NED is injecting funds into “defector of the DPRK” organizations in the ‘ROK.’ Far-right communities carry and disseminate the “fake news” produced by these defector organizations, brainwashing the youth of the ‘ROK’—particularly young men—with anti-DPRK and anti-communist ideologies. Through this, the fundamental problems of the society of the ‘ROK’ are distorted and misled into conflicts of gender, region, and ideology.
If war finally breaks out on the Korean Peninsula, the young men of the ‘ROK’ will be the very first to degenerate into “cannon fodder.” Since the US military occupied the southern half of the peninsula in September 1945, conscription has been entrenched in the ‘ROK.’ The Commander of the US Forces in Korea (USFK) holds the wartime operational control of the military of the ‘ROK,’ and the military of the ‘ROK’ is a puppet army commanded by the US military. Currently, the ‘ROK’ is strengthening its military conscription system by mobilizing AI and advanced science and technology. The USFK treat the ‘ROK’ as a “floating aircraft carrier” between China and Japan, and the youth of the ‘ROK’ as “war materiel.” The pro-US proxy regime of the ‘ROK’ is violating freedom by extremely controlling the mobility and autonomy of the youth to suit the palate of the US military. Meanwhile, imperialist countries are generalizing the “‘ROK’ model” into their own nations, deepening surveillance and control for youth conscription. Conscription is being revived in the three Baltic states, and Germany, the UK, and France are also full-scaling compulsory service and mandatory military training policies targeting the youth.
The essence of the youth movement of the ‘ROK’ is the anti-US struggle for national salvation. With the establishment of the US military government in September 1945, the People’s Committees—democratic self-governing bodies—were outlawed, and the national territory was divided. This history confirms that anti-US independence is the foremost strategic task. From the early 20th century to the present 21st century, the Korean youth have stood at the vanguard of the anti-imperialist liberation struggle, waging armed struggles against Japanese imperialism and popular uprisings against US imperialism. The youth of the ‘ROK,’ who confirmed the ugly reality of the imperialist US on the occasion of the May 1980 Gwangju Popular Uprising, engaged in a fervent anti-US, anti-imperialist struggle, transforming the anti-US independence line into the mainstream of the social revolution movement in the ‘ROK.’ With pro-US fascist forces and pro-US comprador forces—the puppets of US imperialism—taking turns in power, the fundamental character of the ‘ROK’ society, which is thoroughly dependent and deformed in all military, political, and economic fields, is colonial; more precisely, colonial semi-capitalist.
At the present time, the anti-US struggle for national salvation is precisely an anti-US, anti-imperialist struggle, and an anti-NATO struggle. The imperialist aggressive forces, the culprits of war, have expanded the regional scope of NATO from the North Atlantic to the entire world, transforming it into the headquarters of World War 3. NATO member states are frantically staging all-domain joint military exercises in the ‘ROK’ and its surrounding areas, targeting the DPRK and China, which are the main pillars of the anti-imperialist camp. Recently, Xavier Brunson, the Commander of the USFK, made a reckless remark, referring to the ‘ROK’ as a “dagger” aimed at China. This is the most bellicose, reckless remark made in the midst of publicly declaring that they will develop the “Kill Chain” into a “Kill Web” in military operations and employ a “wedge” tactic targeting China. The NATO and imperialist forces, who are spreading the flames of World War 3 across the globe, are indeed the public enemy of all humanity that loves peace. The solution to economic, livelihood, and social problems also begins with the overthrow of imperialism and the dissolution of NATO. In this sharp, grand confrontation, the revisionist and opportunist forces that disrupt and obstruct the anti-imperialist, anti-NATO struggle are the very pro-imperialist elements that have infiltrated the anti-imperialist camp; and as history shows, a militant and sharp ideological warfare against these factions is an essential part of the anti-imperialist struggle.
Together with workers and peasants, as one of the three main forces of the revolutionary movement, the youth of the ‘ROK’ have historically fought bravely for the independence and democracy of our society, reunification of motherland, and human peace. In the 20th century, the young fighters of the world organized the International Brigades of the Spanish Civil War and stood at the vanguard of the anti-fascist front during World War 2, risking their lives to pave the way forward. Today’s reality, on the brink of a full-scale World War 3, urgently demands that our youth stand at the forefront of the anti-imperialist, anti-fascist struggle and the anti-NATO struggle and fight with all their might. The youth of the ‘ROK’ and the world in the 21st century will strengthen the anti-imperialist joint front and rise up in the anti-imperialist struggle to hasten global independence and lasting peace. As history proves, final victory is always on the side of righteous youth and people.
