ⓒ YONHAP News

This song titled “A Girl on a Steed” was sung by Hyon Song-wol, who led a North Korean art troupe that visited South Korea on the occasion of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics. 

In North Korea, the phrase “a girl on a steed” means a hard-working woman. It is used as a slogan to mobilize female labor. 

A North Korean state-run TV praises women workers at a factory as “girls on steeds” who exceed their production targets, with each laborer working on multiple machines. 

In this way, North Korean media push for the so-called “speed battle.” Today, we’ll learn about North Korea’s “speed battle” from Dr. Jeong Eun Mee at the Korea Institute for National Unification. 

A “speed battle” refers to a mass mobilization campaign unique to North Korea. Its purpose is to produce the best result, both in quality and quantity, in the shortest period of time.  

A speed battle is an economic campaign aimed at fully mobilizing labor, technology and resources to quickly produce results in important projects. 

It seems North Korea has been pushing for speed battles in recent years. Dr. Jeong explains why. 

North Korea’s repeated speed campaigns have much to do with its political background. The country held the eighth congress of the Workers’ Party in January last year. Prior to the important event, the North staged a 200-day speed battle in 2020. The purpose was to show some fruitful outcome at the party congress. North Korea has held large-scale, important political events quite often under Kim Jong-un’s rule. Whenever the events took place, the North had to demonstrate, both internally and outwardly, that Kim’s leadership remains undiminished. That’s why the country has resorted to speed battles again and again before the events. 

North Korea claims that the country was able to resolve a severe shortage of houses through speed battles in the 1950s. After the end of the Korean War, which left Pyongyang in ruins, a new propaganda slogan “Pyongyang speed” appeared to rebuild the capital quickly. 

In the late 1950s, North Korea launched the Chollima Movement, which is even familiar to South Koreans. Chollima refers to a mythical horse that runs extremely fast. 

It is believed that speed movements like this actually contributed to boosting industrial growth and food production in North Korea. 

Most of North Korea’s infrastructure and factories were destroyed during the war. In the process of recovering from the aftermath of the war, speed campaigns like the Chollima Movement proved highly effective. The North Korean top leader and the people experienced the war together, and the citizens, as members of a political and economic community, were eager to reconstruct their country and bring about a major change in their lives. Therefore, they didn’t complain of the demanding speed battles. Rather, I think they have positive memories about the labor campaigns. 

Another notable slogan of the speed battle is “Heechon speed,” which was created in the course of constructing the Heechon Power Plant. 

North Korea broke ground for the new power plant in 2001, but the construction had been, in effect, suspended due to economic reasons. Construction resumed in March 2009, when then-leader Kim Jong-il visited the construction site. The leader instructed officials to complete the construction by 2012, the target year of achieving the goal of becoming a strong and prosperous nation. 

In general, it takes ten years to build dam and power plant facilities. But under the absolute ruler’s order to complete the project just in three years, North Korea concentrated all its resources on the power plant’s construction. In the process, North Korea coined new terms “Heechon speed” and “Heechon time.” Even a new song was created to facilitate the construction. 

State media agencies reported the progress of the construction project almost every day. North Korea managed to complete the power plant in 2012, just as the leader had instructed. 

North Korea often said, “Rice is socialism” and “Electricity is socialism.” It reflects that electricity, along with rice, comprises the country’s key industry. In reality, North Korea finds it difficult to develop the economy due to its chronic power shortage. The North needed more power stations. That’s why it built the Heechon Power Plant capable of generating a large amount of electricity, even conducting a speed campaign that mobilized young people and soldiers. The term “Heechon speed” indicates that the country can achieve an economic goal in a short period of time despite the difficult environment. 

Current leader Kim Jong-un has also promoted speed campaigns. In his New Year’s speech in 2013, he stressed the spirit of “at one go.” The phrase “at one go” has since been used as the slogan of speed battles, while a newly arranged song with the same title performed by the Moranbong Band has resonated throughout the country. 

From 2015, when North Korea celebrated the 70th anniversary of the foundation of the Workers’ Party, the country staged speed campaigns in full swing. It expanded the movements across the nation in the run-up to the seventh party congress in 2016. The speed battles involved large-scale construction projects including the Future Scientists Street in Pyongyang and the Mt. Baekdu Hero Youth Power Stations. A documentary film released at the time shows just how keen the authorities were on the nationwide construction projects driven by speed battles. 

In the documentary, soldiers in military uniforms carry heavy stones and build a wall without any safety gear. It shows an extremely dangerous scene of someone hammering a large nail held by another person. What matters the most in the process was “speed,” of course. 

At the seventh party congress in 2016, the phrase “Mallima speed” emerged. As a new adaptation of Chollima, Mallima refers to a much faster horse—ten times as fast as the original Chollima. The Mallima Movement, therefore, pushes for economic results ten times faster than the Chollima Movement. Kim Jong-un proclaimed that an era of Mallima had opened, with this word taking root as the representative slogan of speed battles in the Kim Jong-un era. 

North Korea created a new poem and a song dedicated to the Mallima slogan. 

Symbols of the Mallima Movement include the Ryomyong Street in Pyongyang. The old slogan “Pyongyang speed,” which had been introduced 70 years ago, reappeared at the construction sites of ten-thousand apartment units in Pyongyang last year. 

North Korea sends an organization called “Assault Troops” to speed battles in industrial facilities and construction sites. Former leader Kim Jong-il organized such a unit known as “Speed Battle Youth Assault Troops” in 1975. Those who do not attend college or people who do not serve in the military are assigned to the group. It is said that some members who show outstanding performance are given the opportunity to enter the party. 

The Speed Battle Youth Assault Troops are known to have been dispatched to a number of construction sites including the Mansudae Street and the Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Area. 

It would be ideal if the assault troops consist of skilled workers. But the reality is quite the opposite. The group lacks workers with technical skills. Rather, those from poor family backgrounds and those with a low position in society are mobilized or volunteer to join the group. For that reason, speed battles using the workforce cannot produce maximum effect. 

While North Korea praises assault troops as socialist heroes, it cannot avoid outside criticism for labor exploitation. 

Speed battles do not end in a few days. Participants of the speed battles have to work for a long time, until the projects are done. During the campaign period, they have to stop their economic activities. Breadwinners, in particular, cannot support their family. Clearly, the state is exploiting their labor. The country cannot mobilize labor forever in this way. These days, it seems North Korea encourages people to join the campaigns by providing them with practical compensation, such as rations and wages.

North Korean authorities have pressed ahead with speed campaigns whenever the nation faced a crisis, showing off the outcome of the movements. However, the chronic economic difficulty and endless speed battles leave the people extremely exhausted. It is hard to expect for North Korean-style speed campaigns, based on the people’s labor and sacrifice, to continue to produce result.