The Workers Party of South Korea and their appeal find sympathy among the local population due to the prevailing sentiment that the local government and police forces had collaborated with the Japanese occupation of Jeju and unrest caused by heavy taxation of agricultural commodities.

Seeking a speedy resolution to the insurrection, the South Korean government sends 3,000 soldiers of the South Korean 11th Constabulary Regiment to reinforce local police, but on April 29 several hundred soldiers mutiny, handing over large small-arms caches to the rebels.

The Seoul government also sends several hundred Northwest Youth Association members, a group of anticommunist North Korean refugees, as part of a paramilitary force.

The Northwest Youth Association become notorious for killing male Jeju residents and then forcing the victim's female family members into marriage arrangements with Northwest Youth members so that they would inherit their land.