Kim Il Sung: The Accidental Tyrant Who Changed Korea Forever

Korea Deconstructed

Jun 20, 2025•1 hr 57 min•Ep. 106

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Episode description

My guest is Fyodor Tertitskiy, a prolific scholar, polyglot, and one of the few who reads the footnotes of history in multiple languages. His new book, Accidental Tyrant, a biography of Kim Il Sung, challenges the official state mythology and unearths the improbable rise of a guerrilla fighter turned dynastic dictator.

This is how Kim Il Sung outwitted imperialists, communists, comrades, and colonels alike, turning chance into legacy, failure into foundation. But the question remains: what does this all mean for those of us living in a world still shaped by the ghosts of his decisions?

Buy Fyodor's latest book here: https://www.amazon.com/Accidental-Tyrant-Life-Kim-sung/dp/0197800882

David A. Tizzard has a PhD in Korean Studies and lectures at Seoul Women's University and Hanyang University. He writes a weekly column in the Korea Times, is a social-cultural commentator, and a musician who has lived in Korea for nearly two decades. He can be reached at datizzard@swu.ac.kr.

Watch this video next: https://youtu.be/vIbpLfWJoZM

Subscribe to the channel: @DavidTizzard/videos

Thanks to Patreon members: Hee Ji Jacobs, Bhavya, Roxanne Murrell Join Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/user?u=62047873

Discussion Outline

0:00 Who was Kim Il Sung?

9:00 Japanese colonization of Korea

13:40 Kim Il Sung's early life

22:30 What is communism?

27:30 Kim Il Sung the anti-Japanese guerrilla fighter

35:15 How the Soviet Union created North Korea

44:10 Why was Kim Il Sung chosen to lead?

52:40 Planning the Korean War