Koreans Becoming a Soviet People 111themselves. As we have seen, the Geitsman and the Rabkrin reports pro-
vided inaccurate or even deliberate “disinformation” in order to portray the
Koreans in a very “alien” or po liti cally suspect manner. These reports were
accompanied by the partial deportations of Koreans from the Primore.
During the first half of indigenization, we encountered the deploy-
ment and the revival of populist, nationalist, and primordialist tropes that
still resonated with Soviet cadres and society.^130 Soviet social policies and
community mobilization during phase one (1923–1930) focused primarily on
developing peoples (nationalities) such as Korean, Polish, or German while
spending much less effort and fewer resources to build the idea of a “Homo
Sovieticus.” In the second half of korenizatsiia, we shall see the Soviet Kore-
ans actively defending their borders and internalizing the idea of becoming
“Soviet.” All the while, the greatest proof of the Soviet Korean character
(and fidelity to the state) remained in the Poset district, which bordered
Korea and was over 90 percent Korean. The stability of life and lack of any
espionage or insurrections among the Koreans in Poset provided a beacon of
hope that their Soviet construction would pro gress throughout korenizat-
siia. However, the question loomed ominously: “Would others in the Soviet
Union accept Poset as a synecdoche for Koreans and their loyalties?”