Someone once made a statistical analysis: since the world entered the 20th century, counting all civil and foreign wars, the days where the entire globe was at peace could practically be counted on one hand. After the end of World War I, regardless of whether there were flames of war elsewhere in the world, on the land of Korea, slaughter was staged every single day.

March 1, 1924, Dandong.

Uiju, the capital of North Pyongan Province in Korea, not far opposite Dandong, had seen no trace of the Japanese since June 4, 1922. The Battle of Uiju, comprehensively commanded by the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army and with the Revolutionary Army bearing the main brunt of the fighting, had wiped out a Japanese brigade in one stroke. Since then, Uiju was not only the capital of North Pyongan Province but also the temporary capital of the newly established People's Republic of Korea.

The Yalu River Bridge, built by the Japanese, was now operated by a joint management group from China and Korea. The railway bridge had long been repaired by the Japanese. This transportation hub connecting Korea and China was currently a sea of people.

The Chinese government had long ago issued orders to gather Koreans in China and send them back to Korea. At this time, absolutely no one could have imagined that one of Chen Ke's goals was to send all Koreans in China away. A practice that might be viewed as a racial issue in peacetime was now considered a necessary method by both the People's Party and Korean patriots. Even those Koreans in China who were reluctant to return felt that Chen Ke was doing the right thing.

After the Japanese ravages, more than a million people in Korea had been killed or "consumed" in death mines within a dozen years. Coupled with the large-scale Japanese immigration to Korea, all insightful people in Korea realized that things were heading in a very dangerous direction. Intelligence warfare and public opinion warfare are important modes of war between nations. As a "self-funded Wumao" (volunteer pro-China commenter) who had fought against the "50 Cents" (paid pro-West commenters) for many years on the internet in another timeline, Chen Ke could be said to be the one with the deepest understanding in this spacetime.

The key to public opinion warfare lies in using facts as much as possible to expound on the enemy's atrocities. Japan's atrocities in Korea were numerous and needed no further incitement. However, many Koreans actually did not know about the Great Kanto Earthquake in Japan. The People's Party dug deep into this matter. From Japanese disaster victims massacring Koreans in the disaster areas to Japan frantically plundering Korean supplies to send to Japan. Finally, the People's Party strove to publicize a "conclusion": The Japanese want to kill all Korean men and use Korean land to settle Japanese disaster victims.

If the propaganda simply said the Japanese wanted to kill all Koreans, it would certainly not reflect the power of public opinion warfare. If "Koreans" were replaced with "Korean men," this would combine the fact that "the Japanese have been killing Korean men" with the imaginative space that the masses love to hear and see, such as "If Korean men are all killed, how will the Japanese treat Korean women?"

So the news that the Japanese wanted to kill all Korean men spread like wildfire throughout Korea. Even the southern Koreans, who dared not make the slightest move for fear of Japanese suppression, did not doubt the authenticity of this news. In North Pyongan Province, which had now become a liberated area, this was even more of a consensus. The current Korea-Japan War had turned from a war of liberation into a war of survival. Korean patriots firmly believed that if they could not drive the Japanese out of Korea, it would mean the complete extinction of the Korean nation.

If one must speak of so-called "national character," Korea's national character, to put it nicely, could be called "seizing the day." Near the Yalu River Bridge, some wooden poles were erected, with quite a few human heads stuck on top. Beside them were notices with annotations like "Japanese Spy" and "Korean Traitor." There was also a large white cloth banner with two lines written in red ink.

Never let go of a single Japanese spy!!

Never let go of a single Korean traitor!!

The handwriting was aggressive and radiated a murderous aura.

In these days, Japanese squads had also tried to blow up the Yalu River Bridge. After failing, their heads were chopped off and stuck here for public display. In addition, the Korean patriots had created a roster themselves. Anyone who advocated being pro-Japanese during the Joseon Dynasty or served as an official for the Japanese after Japan annexed Korea was classified as a Korean traitor. Many Koreans fled to Uiju. After screening, the heads of the traitors were also chopped off; some were hung here for display, and some were displayed in various places in North Pyongan Province.

Comrades from the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army also advised the Korean patriots, suggesting they should at least pay attention to the united front issue. Killing all the way like this, those "Korean traitors" who originally wanted to leave the Japanese forces and defect to the Korean side would have absolutely no way to live. It would have been better not to advise; this advice instead provoked the dissatisfaction of the Korean patriots. "It was because these traitors were not completely eliminated back then that Korea fell. Just killing them is letting them off lightly! They should actually be dismembered and executed by lingering death."

Since the Korean patriots said this, the comrades of the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army could not say anything more. After all, the organization had long made it extremely clear that China absolutely had no intention of taking the opportunity to annex Korea, and the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army must respect the right of Korean comrades to speak on Korean affairs.

Of course, everything has two sides. Such a clear-cut concept of enemy and friend, while lacking political flexibility, could also simplify contradictions. For example, the Korean comrades were quite simple in battle. When fighting a winning battle, they had the momentum of swallowing thousands of miles like a tiger; when fighting a losing battle, they retreated quite briskly too. Of course, if they were absolutely required to hold their ground, the supervising teams showed no mercy when killing people. All in all, the comrades of the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army felt that there was really no need to stay in this place of Korea for long.

Most of the middle and high-ranking cadres in the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army had civil administration experience. In their view, establishing some bases for operations against Japan in Korea in the future would be purely a base issue. They absolutely could not engage in more things together with Korea. Otherwise, everyone would just argue endlessly.

March was the reorganization period in the plan. Since China had entered the war, there was no need to completely hide it. The Korean combat troops were reorganized into the Korean Volunteer Army. Theoretically, these people were all ethnic Korean volunteers. With 40,000 volunteers from the Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army as the backbone, four armies and twelve divisions were formed according to the organization model of the Revolutionary Army, designated as the 1st to 4th Volunteer Armies. In the 1st to 3rd Armies, Chinese troops accounted for five-ninths, Koreans sent from China accounted for two-ninths, and local Korean troops accounted for two-ninths. In the 4th Army, Chinese troops accounted for one-third, and Korean troops accounted for two-thirds.

The purpose of this organization was for veterans to lead new recruits. The Workers' and Peasants' Revolutionary Army not only followed the "three-three system" in large formations but also used three-man combat groups within squads. This combat mode had high technical content. If the proportion of local Korean troops was too large, the battle simply could not be fought. According to the plan, Korean soldiers who qualified in battle would be handed over to the Korean side to learn to form the Korean Defense Force themselves. Their designations would be independent, and they would begin to undertake more and more combat tasks until the combat was completely undertaken by the Korean side independently.

Besides organization, the same applied to weapons. The Volunteer Army's weapons and equipment were unified Chinese standard weapons. The Korean side's current equipment was Japanese-style equipment. This was not discriminatory treatment; the Korean side consisted of locals after all, and they were also responsible for the work of guerrilla teams infiltrating the south. The opponent was the Japanese army, so the Korean side could naturally make better use of captured weapons and ammunition.

April was the "green and yellow don't meet" month (the lean season); last year's grain had been eaten, and the new grain was just green seedlings. For the Korean side, war logistics relied entirely on China, so having no grain did not affect the overall situation at all. For the Japanese, it was completely different. They suffered repeated blows, and the larger the scale of the war, the more troops they had to mobilize. The troops needed to eat and drink, and that was eating and drinking while separated from the homeland. The logistical pressure was immense.

On April 15th, large numbers of reorganized Korean guerrilla teams began to move south. The target was Pyongyang.

It wasn't that Japan didn't know the situation; they had long known that the "Korean bandits" were preparing to take this opportunity to make a big scene. Knowing was one thing; having the power to solve it was another.

"The Japanese want to kill all Korean men and use Korean land to settle Japanese disaster victims." This rumor was known to everyone on the street in Korea, placing the Japanese side in a wonderfully awkward position. The Japanese Army Ministry had not thought of doing this, but the Japanese Army Ministry felt that this plan was too difficult to implement in the short term, so they rejected it themselves. As colonizers, expending tremendous effort to kill all the indigenous people and then engaging in mass immigration—tax revenue alone could not support such a huge operation. At the same time, slaughtering Koreans also had a cost; Japanese people would die. These costs were too high. For Japan, the best method was to slowly encroach upon Korea and squeeze the labor of Koreans to death during the encroachment process. Finally, consume the Koreans completely.

However, after the Great Kanto Earthquake, many extremist ideological organizations with no brains spontaneously appeared in Japan. Amidst the panic brought by the great earthquake, firstly they felt Japan was unsafe, and secondly, they heard Koreans were rebelling. So they instinctively shouted the slogan "Kill all Koreans! Immigrate to all of Korea!" This slogan actually had quite a market in Japan. From the perspective of Western-style democracy, this idea had deep popular support. In Western-style democracy, the government theoretically has to follow public opinion; this belongs to the content of "procedural justice."

The Navy Ministry, which advocated party politics, complained endlessly. They had been striving to beg the UK, requesting the UK to suppress China according to the terms of the "Anglo-Japanese Alliance" so that China would not interfere in "Japan's internal affairs." But the British were not stupid either. After World War I, Europe advocated peace. Although Britain itself was the biggest executioner in slaughtering indigenous people, Britain was attacked by the People's Party's public opinion war. Some left-wing newspapers in Europe reported on the domestic Japanese advocacy of "Kill all Koreans! Immigrate to all of Korea!"

After the Americans got this news, they reported it at great length in major newspapers. The American public didn't like the British to begin with, and liked the Japanese even less. Now, the little sympathy American society had for the Great Kanto Earthquake instantly flew to the nine heavens. A wave of voices appeared in American society believing that the Japanese were fundamentally not civilized people.

After industrialization, especially after World War I, the civilization level of human "civilized society" had improved quite a lot. Britain could not openly support Japan's policy no matter what. Because "public opinion" was really opposing this kind of national policy of massacre. Most importantly, Britain had the ability to threaten China with force, but Britain did not have the ability to attack China with force.

Before the Sino-Soviet alliance, China was surrounded by enemies on all sides. Now with China and the Soviet Union clearly putting on the face of an alliance, China was not afraid of external forces traveling thousands of miles to attack the Chinese mainland. At the same time, Britain now had a great regret of having been deceived. After China legally and reasonably swallowed Northern Vietnam and Laos, and almost substantially controlled Cambodia, the strategic situation of geopolitics had undergone subtle changes.

China was building railways on a large scale, and the railway leading directly to Cambodia had also started construction. Once this railway was completed, China would have a good transportation line to attack Burma. Behind Burma was India. India was Britain's most important colony and the source of the crown on the British King's head.

The close military exchanges between China and Germany also allowed Britain to obtain a lot of intelligence on the military level of the Chinese army. Sometimes knowing the truth is not necessarily a good thing. The more sober people in the British military departments had to admit one thing: Britain commanding Indian troops to fight against China did not hold an advantage. The terrifying scale of China's 5.5 million army was a big deal. If China and Britain completely tore their faces and had a long, full-scale war, the British really couldn't take it.

On Britain's strategic map, the Western Pacific was not Britain's core interest at all; it was the strategic boundary. In the concepts the British had held, the British took Indian servants, drove African slaves, and conquered the world. The yellow race in Asia was just the lowest level of existence. At least strategically, Africa was more important than the Western Pacific. That China could attack Malaya by land was something Britain found very headache-inducing. The country of China had declined for decades; when China suddenly rose, Britain was not yet used to viewing China from the perspective of a major power. So this difficult ideological transformation was very painful for the British.