Day of the Shining Star
Kim Jong-il was born in February 1941 to Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-suk in Siberia in the Russian Federal Republic, Soviet Union where his father had been in exile because of his guerilla activities. North Korean propaganda, however, dates Kim Jong-il's birth to 16 February 1942 and locates it at the Mount Paektu area in Korea, the mythical place of origin of the Korean people, where Kim Il-sung supposedly ran a guerilla camp. In reality, the guerillas were based in Manchuria at the time and Kim himself had been to the Soviet Far East before and after Kim Jong-il's birth.
Kim Hyong-uk
Kim Hyong-uk (Hangul: 김형욱, Hanja:金炯旭, January 16, 1925 – c. October 8 1979) was a South Korean brigadier general who served as director of the Korean Central Intelligence Agency. Born in Hwanghae province, he left for the South after high school and was a classmate of future President Park Chung-hee at military academy, graduating in 1949. He was an infantry troop commander in the Korean War. He attended the United States Army Infantry School at Fort Benning, Georgia, in 1955. As colonel, he took part in the May 16 coup in 1961, when he led a group of soldiers to take Prime Minister John M. Chang into custody. He served for two years as Minister for Home Affairs in the junta and then was director of the KCIA from March 1963 to October 1969, where he was notorious for his brutality and corruption. After refusing to support Park's bid for a third term, he was replaced as head of the KCIA by Lee Hu-rak. Reportedly, at a meeting with Park, the President asked him, "why don't you take a rest after your long service?" - and on returning to his office, he discovered it had already been cleared out. In 1971, he became a member of the powerless parliament. Kim went into exile in the United States in 1973.