Stephen Cho | Coordinator of the Korean International Forum
Can we win? Will our people triumph in this war, in the Third World War, and experience a new high tide of progress like in Second World War?
The Third World War is already underway. Compared to the beginnings of the First and Second World Wars, the Third World War is much broader and fiercer. War is ongoing in Ukraine, and the Kyiv authorities, under NATO’s manipulation and support, have invaded Russian territory, Kursk. In West Asia (the Middle East), it has already turned into a“regional war.” No one doubts the Fifth West Asia War. Even conservative media have started reporting that the war in Ukraine will expand into a war in Eastern Europe. In fact, the former Secretary General of NATO stated in the media that he supports lifting restrictions on the missiles NATO has provided to Ukraine, saying that it is up to the providing countries to decide. Shortly after, the European Parliament passed a resolution to lift the missile restrictions.
In this Third World War, these two theaters are already engaged in war, and military tensions are rising in the East Asia, Western Pacific theater. Judging by the overall trend, the war in East Asia, the Western Pacific are only a matter of time. The cause of all wars lies in imperialism.
The ones who plan, provoke, and drive wars are imperialism, and its agents and proxies, the fascists. In order to create a “new Cold War” framework, imperialism has labeled not only Russia and Iran, who are already at war, but also China and DPRK, who are not, as the “New Axis of Aggressors” and is attempting to use the Third World War to fuel its agenda. While fierce struggles against the imperialist camp are taking place in Africa and Latin America, the current theaters of this world war, including all-out wars, are in Eastern Europe and West Asia, with East Asia or the expanded Western Pacific expected to follow. In essence, the Third World War is a great anti-imperialist war, and its main theaters are three: Eastern Europe, West Asia, and East Asia or the Western Pacific.
To win a war, one must be superior in justification, capacity, and strategy. Justification, capacity and strategy are relatively the goals, means, and methods of strategy and tactics. The two factors for winning a war are subjective factor—the men, namely soldiers and the people—and objective factor—the material, namely weapon and wealth. The decisive factor here is the subjective factor. The truth is clear when considering at the factors behind the Soviet victory in the Second World War, DPRK’s in the Korean War, and Vietnam’s in the Vietnam War. These subjective and objective aspects are analyzed on another level as justification, capacity, and strategy.
In the Third World War, the justification lies with the anti-imperialist camp. The war of the anti-imperialist camp is just war, while that of the imperialist camp is war of injustice. The anti-imperialist camp has the great causes of anti-fascism, liberation, and reunification. The anti-imperialist camp fights with these goals in mind. The source of the unmatched bravery and ingenuity of the armies and people in the anti-imperialist camp is their political and ideological superiority. When we see the character of war in this context, the war in Ukraine is an anti-imperialist, anti-fascist war, a war of liberation, and a preventive war; the war in West Asia is an anti-imperialist, anti-Zionist war and a war of liberation; the war in Taiwan is an anti-imperialist war, a national liberation war, and a war for national reunification; and the war in the “ROK” is an anti-fascist, anti-imperialist war, a war of subjugation, and a civil war. The common character among these individual wars in the three main theaters is that they are all anti-imperialist wars of liberation. The fact that anti-fascism, liberation, and reunification are just causes is so evident that even conscientious intellectuals in imperialist countries cannot deny it. The main imperialist countries, including the US and Britain, have a history of joining the anti-fascist camp and fighting against fascism, and France has a history of being liberated from the occupation of fascist Germany. Although the side of justice doesn’t always win in wars, over the great course of history, it is undoubtedly one of the main factors that decisively inspires the enthusiasm of armies and the people, and influences the win and lose of wars.
For the just and righteous side to win, there must be strength in terms of capabilities. The anti-imperialist camp has strength. The capabilities of the anti-imperialist camp are divided into leading and auxiliary forces, according to a scientific revolutionary strategy. The leading forces can be described as national powers, much like in the Second World War, and they consist of three countries: DPRK, China, and Russia.
The commonality among the first three main countries is that they are all nuclear missile powers armed with hydrogen bombs and hypersonic missiles. DPRK officially announced in 2017 that it had successful test of hydrogen bomb for ICBM, so the development of the hydrogen bomb itself must have been completed much earlier. DPRK has developed various types of strategic and tactical hypersonic missiles and has deployed them in practice. Even the head of the US Strategic Command is complaining that DPRK’s missile development speed is too fast. There is no need to explain China’s rapid nuclear missile development pace. Russia, as the world’s acknowledged nuclear missile superpower, is in a similar position. What sets DPRK apart is its status as the most thorough socialist state. This plays a crucial role in determining the direction the world will take after the final victory of the anti-imperialist camp. China, as a socialist state with Chinese characteristics, stands out in terms of economic and diplomatic power. Russia, as a country with a socialist legacy, has made particular contributions to strengthening the anti-imperialist military power of many nations within the anti-imperialist camp. Specifically, Russia has played an important role not only in providing military support to Iran, a focal point of the current situation, but also in helping several countries in the Sahel region expel the French imperialist and US imperialist forces. If the Third World War were to escalate, it would inevitably lead to nuclear conflict, making the nuclear war deterrence of the anti-imperialist camp crucial in countering imperialist nuclear strikes. In this context, the three major powers hold a special role in a Third World War, where the use of tactical nuclear weapons is highly likely. Iran is a strong missile power. The “Axis of Resistance,” which shares the same cause with Iran, is fiercely waging an anti-imperialist and anti-Zionist armed struggle on the West Asian theater. Although Iran and the “Axis of Resistance” are neither socialist states nor countries with a socialist legacy, they are one of the leading anti-imperialist forces engaged in a life-and-death armed struggle against imperialist and Zionist powers.
They are waging fierce anti-imperialist armed and people’s struggles in various regions, including the Sahel region of Africa. Latin America may not be engaged in a full-scale war like West Asia or a regional conflict like Africa, but it is, in essence, waging an anti-imperialist struggle, albeit without the sound of gunfire.
While anti-imperialist armed struggles are being waged on a national or regional scale, not in full-scale wars, they are not recognized as one of the three major theatres of the Third World War. As a result, they cannot play a leading role, but it is important to note that armed struggle, the main form of the anti-imperialist struggle, is being conducted.
In short, the auxiliary anti-imperialist forces are those engaged in the world anti-imperialist popular struggle. This includes all forces except the major national powers that, in the three main theatres, are waging life-and-death armed struggles against imperialism with missiles and other means. These forces represent an overwhelming majority, encompassing the vast majority of the world’s population and natural resources.
These anti-imperialist leading and auxiliary forces are the most powerful forces in the history of the anti-imperialist movement, and their unity has reached its highest level. For example, the June 19 DPRK-Russia treaty that President Vladimir Putin directly signed with Chairman Kim Jong-un during his visit to DPRK this year is not only the strongest in the history of DPRK-Russia treaties but also far stronger than the US-“ROK” Mutual Defense Treaty, the US.-Japan Mutual Defense Treaty, or even the NATO Treaty. The more imperialist military aggression, economic sanctions, and distorted propaganda intensify, the stronger the unity of anti-imperialist forces grows, in the three major theaters as well as worldwide. In the leading anti-imperialist forces, socialist countries form two of the three major countries. It is important to note that DPRK stands out for its strict adherence to socialist ideology and the principles of independence, self-reliance, and self-defense; that China and Russia remain firmly united within the anti-imperialist camp; that the anti-imperialist armed struggle led by the “Axis of Resistance,” including Iran, is drawing the 2-billion-strong Islamic population into the anti-imperialist front; and that anti-imperialist movements in Africa and Latin America continue to grow stronger.
In war, not only strength but also strategy is equally important. Even with superior military power, a poorly military strategy can still lead to defeat. In the Second World War, the Soviet Union’s victory was not only due to its justification and capacity but also because it had superior strategy. The reason why Georgy Zhukov is highly regarded as agreat commander and hero is not only because he led victories in numerous battles but also because he developed a strategy that spanned the entirety of the Second World War.
The foundation of the anti-imperialist camp’s strategy is the combination of armed struggle and people’s struggle. The former involves military force, while the latter is the basic methods of resistance by the people. Given the scale of a world war, armed struggle inevitably becomes the main method of anti-imperialist resistance. Even historically, in struggles for national or class liberation against imperialism, armed struggle has been the main method. Modern warfare is not only a high-tech war involving advanced weapons, but also a total war, where all national forces are mobilized with the fate of the nation at stake. This means it takes on the character of an all-people’s war, where all available military force and the entire population participate in the war. In this context, it is important to highlight the “all-people’s war” declared by Supreme Leader of DPRK Kim Jong-un during hispolicy speech to the Supreme People’s Assembly of DPRK on January 15, 2024. The all-people’s war is a basic method of the struggle of the anti-imperialist camp. The imperialist camp can never adopt such a strategy. This is why the anti-imperialist camp holds an absolute advantage in its basic method of the struggle of the anti-imperialist camp.
Based on this method of all-people’s war, the anti-imperialist camp has historically employed various tactics and operations to achieve victory. Around the time of Second World War, revolutionary forces and anti-imperialist forces gained valuable practical experience that remains relevant today, such as the Soviet Union’s war of attrition, China’s protracted war, DPRK’s guerrilla war, and other positional warfare strategies. These lessons should be considered alongside the characteristics of modern warfare, with its high-tech weapons, and the tactics being employed by the imperialist camp in the three main theaters of war.
Currently, the imperialist camp primarily bases its operations on proxy war, expeditionary war, regional war, and non-nuclear hybrid warfare. Led by US and European imperialism, the imperialist camp is employing proxy war tactics in Ukraine, with the Kyiv regime, and in West Asia, with Netanyahu’s Israeli government, acting as its proxies. The same tactics apply to the wars in the “ROK” and Taiwan, and will continue if these wars expand into East Asia and the Western Pacific. In other words, the leading forces of imperialism—the US and Western Europe—do not directly engage but provide support from afar. The imperialist camp is trying to limit Third World War to “regional wars” confined to the three main theaters, pushing for these to remain local wars. Moreover, they are provoking Russia, China, and DPRK touse tactical nuclear weapons in an attempt to label them as part of the “New Axis of Aggressors.” The imperialist camp’s greatest fear is that if they also resort to tactical nuclear weapons, it could escalate into mutual strategic nuclear attacks on each other’s homelands, leading to mutual assured destruction (MAD). Nuclear weapons in the anti-imperialist camps serve not only their essential mission of deterring imperialist nuclear attacks but also as a powerful tool for instilling nuclear fear within the imperialist camp.
In summary, the imperialist camp does not expect to win this war outright. Instead, their goals are to exhaust the national power of Russia, Iran, China, and form a “new Cold War” frame work on a global scale by labeling them as the “New Axis of Aggressors” and isolating them. They hope to stretch this into a long-term struggle, ultimately securing final victory, much like in the “Cold War”. The imperialist camp’s objective sare already limited.
This means that if the major power countries of the anti-imperialist camp take matters into their own hands, fully leverage the advantages of a battlefield close to their homelands, and engage in a war of attrition, a protracted war, or sometimes a lightning war—an all-out war with all their capacity, a full-scale war—the anti-imperialist camp is bound to win. In fact, in the war in Ukraine, Russia is winning despite the astronomical support of NATO, including the US; in West Asia, Iran has proven that its ballistic missiles can penetrate Israel’s air defenses and strike wherever it wants. And in East Asia and the Western Pacific, the US, as the only nuclear-armed country, is faced with three nuclear-armed countries: DPRK, China, and Russia. Here, DPRK and China are determined to give everything they have to win. Meanwhile, the other non-nuclear states that follow the US hold little significance in this war where tactical nuclear weapons would be used. The anti-imperialist camp also holds overwhelming superiority in the war in East Asia and the Western Pacific, the main battlefield of Third World War.
The imperialist camp aims to win the war even while losing battles, but defeat in this particular battle is so decisive that it effectively means defeat in the war. The victory of Russia in Eastern Europe, the victory of Iran and the “Axis of Resistance” in Western Asia, and the victory of the DPRK and China in East Asia and the Western Pacific will defeat the imperialist powers on their respective battlefields, serving as aturning point to fulfill long-cherished aspirations and achieve significant leaps forward in military, political, and economic aspects. Meanwhile, the imperialist camp will face fatal consequences, including collective withdrawals from NATO and the European Union, the collapse of US dollar hegemony, and the collective membership of countries in BRICS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. This will usher in a new period of upsurge of history, marked by the rise of national liberation revolutions worldwide and the resurgence of transitions toward socialist revolutions.
In this war, which the imperialist camp is waging to promote “the militarization of the economy” and exploit monopoly profits based on its boundless greed in order to escape its political and economic crisis, its limitations and errors are evident in all aspects—goals, means, and methods. The victory of the anti-imperialist camp, superior in all aspects of justification, capability, and strategy, is certain. The imperialist camp will perish in the flames of Third World War, just as the fascist powers did in Second World War. Imperialism will be miserably defeated by the struggling peoples on the battlefields of Eastern Europe, Western Asia, East Asia and the Western Pacific, and in Africa, Latin America, and every corner of the world. The victory of the anti-imperialist forces in the Third World War will be a decisive turning point in promoting independence, peace, people’s democracy, and socialism in Africa and across the globe. We, the people, will inevitably win.