 While North Korea had already begun to move from a foreign policy based upon proletarian internationalism at the Conference of Party Representatives in 1966 , the WPK leadership had never explicitly broken with proletarian internationalism as it did at the 6th Congress . In theory , a communist party supports policy contributing to the world revolution . Communist regimes rarely lived up to this ideal ; by the 1950s , ideological schisms within the world communist movement made it all but impossible . From 1966 onwards , North Korea strengthened relations with neutral countries in the global Cold War . Proletarian internationalism was replaced with a national , independent foreign policy ; if a socialist and non @-@ socialist country were at war , North Korea could ( in theory ) support the non @-@ socialist country if it benefited North Korea . At the 6th Congress , Kim Il @-@ sung attached more importance to relations with Third World countries than to unity in the socialist camp . While North Korea argues that independence and proletarian internationalism are not exclusive , in orthodox communist theory they are . 
