Bodo League massacre
| Bodo League massacre | |
|---|---|
Summary execution of South Korean political prisoners by the South Korean military and police at Daejeon, South Korea | |
| Location | South Korea |
| Date | Summer of 1950 |
| Target | Alleged communists and communist sympathizers |
Attack type | Massacre, politicide, summary execution |
| Deaths | 60,000 to 200,000 |
| Perpetrators | South Korean police, military, and anti-communists on direct orders from President Syngman Rhee |
| Motive | Anti-communism; fear of North Korean fifth column |
The Bodo League massacre (Korean: 보도연맹 학살; Hanja: 保導聯盟虐殺) was the mass killing of alleged communists and communist sympathizers by South Korean forces in the summer of 1950, during the Korean War. Many victims were civilians who had no connection to communism or communists. Estimates of the death toll vary, with historians estimating that between 60,000 and 200,000 people were killed.
South Korean president Syngman Rhee ordered the massacre, but the South Korean government falsely blamed it on the communists led by North Korean leader Kim Il Sung. The South Korean government made efforts to conceal the massacre for four decades. Survivors were forbidden by the government from revealing it, under threat of being treated as communist sympathizers; public revelation carried with it the threat of torture and death. From the 1990s onwards, several corpses were excavated from mass graves, resulting in public awareness of the massacre. Half a century after the massacre, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission investigated the massacre among other incidents that were largely kept hidden from history, unlike the well-publicized North Korean executions of South Korean right-wingers.