ABSTRACT
A survey of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's (DPRK) three revolutionary fronts in the struggle for Korean reunification in 1970 would have given Kim II Sung considerable cause for encouragement. Serious shortcomings in the economic planning system had emerged during the First Seven-Year Plan period, but the overall pattern was one of continuing growth in heavy industry and military-industrial production. The country was well on its way to becoming, as he frequently and ritually described it, an 'impregnable fortress of socialism'. Developments within the Republic of Korea (ROK) would also have encouraged Kim. The Korean Workers' Party's (KWP) efforts to conduct effective espionage activities and to build a Marxist-Leninist Party within the ROK had failed, as had the direct military pressure of the 1967–1968 period, but Kim convinced himself that this was not the result of any strategic miscalculation.
