White Shirts Society
1945–c.1950 Korean fascist terrorist group / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The White Shirts Society (Korean: 백의사; RR: Baeguisa) was a secret fascist terrorist organization that operated between World War II and the Korean War.[1][2] It was mostly composed of young North Korean defectors to South Korea. It was militantly anti-communist and also opposed the trusteeship of Korea [ko], especially by the Soviet Civil Administration in the North.
This article may rely excessively on sources too closely associated with the subject, potentially preventing the article from being verifiable and neutral. (May 2024) |
White Shirts Society | |
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Also known as |
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Founding leader | Yeom Dong-jin |
Foundation | November 1945 |
Dissolved | Around 1950 |
Ideology | |
Notable attacks | |
Allies | |
Opponents |
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Korean name | |
Hangul | 백의사 |
Hanja | 白衣社 |
Revised Romanization | Baeguisa |
McCune–Reischauer | Paegŭisa |
Preceded by Daedongdan (1943) |
Because the group operated in secret, much of the information on it is derived from interviews and limited documents, and is still subject to uncertainty and debate. According to most scholars, the group was founded by Yeom Dong-jin in November 1945. It was the successor to Daedongdan, which was also founded by Yeom in 1944. A number of prominent assassinations and assassination attempts have been attributed to the group, including an assassination attempt on Kim Il Sung in 1946, the killing of Lyuh Woon-hyung in 1947, and the killing of Kim Ku in 1949. But there is disagreement on whether the group was responsible for many of its attributed attacks.
In 2001, it was confirmed that the group began cooperating with the U.S. Counterintelligence Corps some time after the assassination attempt on Kim Il Sung, due to declassified documents published by the US National Archives and Records Administration.[citation needed] According to multiple interviews from former members of the group, the group trained and sent spies to the North to both gather military information for the US and South Korea as well as stir local discontent.
Its activities slowed after the establishment of the First Republic of Korea in August 1948. Many of its members went on to join either the South Korean Army Headquarters [ko] or the Korea Liaison Office, the South Korean military's intelligence unit. Yeom disappeared and was likely killed in the early days of the Korean War.