Sinheung Military Academy as Seen from the Data Collection of the Japanese Diplomatic Archives: Bright and Darkness of Secret Intelligence Reports

Abstract

The materials related to Shinheung Military Academy, owned by the Diplomatic Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, along with materials left by independence activists, such as Seokju’s posthumous death, Baekha Diary, and Won Byeongsang’s memoirs, must be very important for the study of Shinheung Military School. Among the materials used in the study of Shinheung Military Academy, the most mentioned are the materials left by independence activists. However, in order to more clearly reveal the reality of Shinheung Military Academy, it is urgent to utilize the materials owned by the Diplomatic Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan. Although it contains a lot of incomplete information such as spying, it is of high usefulness as it provides relatively extensive information on the current status of Korean migration in the West Gando region and of organizations directly or indirectly related to Shinheung Military Academy, such as Gyeonghaksa, Bumindan, and Jasakgye. The materials possessed by the Japanese Diplomatic Archives are reports of consuls and vice-consuls of consulates dispatched to the country, and secret agents, and are essential data for research on the history of the Korean independence movement. In particular, the reports of the spies were evidence that revealed the ‘inner life of the independence movement’ of those who had deeply infiltrated the Korean independence movement world. Sinheung Military Academy was the organization that the Japanese paid the most attention to in the West Gando region. It was because it was an organization that encompassed both the aspect of cultivating the independence army and the aspect of being the center of Korean society. Therefore, among the materials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan, Shinheung Education Association, Livelihood Association, and Shingye, etc, which have not been revealed so far, are considered to be data that will reveal more abundantly the reality of the independence movement of Shinheung Military School and outlying organizations and the situation related to bomb production and importation into Korea in the future. In addition, there is an aspect in which research on the Bumindan and the Han Chinese Association has not been relatively progressed compared to the known status so far.