The world could soon see how North Korea’s soldiers perform in a modern conflict after NATO and the Pentagon confirmed this week that about 10,000 of Pyongyang’s troops have landed in Russia, with U.S. officials warning Thursday that the majority are in the Kursk region bordering Ukraine and will soon likely enter the conflict.
“We’ve not yet seen these troops deploy into combat against Ukrainian forces, but we would expect that to happen in the coming days,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at a news conference.
In the more than two and a half years since Russia invaded Ukraine, it has sustained heavy battlefield losses (NATO puts the number of dead or wounded Russian soldiers at more than 600,000) and faces challenges in finding new fighters.
Soldiers provided by its ally North Korea would provide Russia with a fresh source of manpower without requiring them to call up Russian citizens to fight, but the question of how effective these soldiers can be in modern warfare remains.
North Korea hasn’t participated in a war of such a scope in decades, but the reclusive state led by Kim Jong-un maintains an army of more than a million people, conducts provocative missile tests and has aggressively pursued the development of nuclear weapons despite Western efforts to stop it.
All of this makes the North Korean contingents being sent to Russia and deployed in Ukraine what one think-tank calls “a wild card.” Here’s what we know and don’t know about these troops.
A Ukrainian government agency says North Korea has sent troops to Russia to support its military operation in Ukraine. Unverified video purportedly shows North Koreans picking up Russian uniforms and military gear.
What battle experience do North Korean troops have?
The last time North Korea’s military entered into a large-scale conflict was in 1950, when it invaded South Korea to begin the Korean War, which lasted three years before an armistice was signed. But tensions between the two have endured.
In the decades since, North Korea has occasionally sent troops abroad, but on a smaller scale that what’s happening in Russia today.
“This deployment is historic for North Korea, which has previously sent advisory or specialist groups abroad but never a large ground force,” the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a U.S. think-tank, said in a recent post on its website.
North Korea was known to have sent pilots to fight in the Vietnam war in the 1960s and ’70s, though accounts vary on the number.
North Korea also sent some 1,500 military advisers and several dozen air force personnel to Egypt during the Yom Kippur War of 1973, according to Niu Song, a professor at Shanghai International Studies University.
More recently, according to media reports in 2013 that Pyongyang denied, North Korea provided military aid to Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria, including helicopter pilots and advisers.
What kind of training do these troops have?
Ukraine’s military intelligence has stated that the North Korean deployment includes 500 officers and a handful of generals. On Thursday, Blinken said the troops sent to Russia had been receiving training in artillery, drones as well as “basic infantry operations,” which he said included training on the clearing of trenches.
South Korea’s National Intelligence Service had previously reported that some of the troops that Pyongyang sent to Russia are part of North Korea’s special forces — and they had been undergoing training at military bases in Russia’s Far East.
The Brookings Institution, a Washington-based think-tank, says North Korea’s special forces are considered “elite troops” that are better trained than fresh recruits from Russia.
More generally, analysts see potential challenges Russia will face in integrating these troops into their war effort, including being able to communicate — though media reports suggest it’s aiming to provide one translator for every 30 North Korean soldiers.
Can they make a difference?
Opinions vary on the impact Pyongyang’s soldiers could have on the Ukraine war, though their presence in Russia is viewed as an unwelcome development for both the war itself and broader regional security.
“The deepening military co-operation between Russia and North Korea is a threat to both Indo-Pacific and Euro-Atlantic security,” NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte told reporters Monday.
Analysts and observers say the initial number of North Korean troops isn’t large enough to significantly change the picture on the battlefield.
Mick Ryan, a retired Australian army major general, assesses that the troops from North Korea currently being deployed from Russia “are unlikely to have a decisive impact on the war in Ukraine.” In a recent analysis he noted that their current totals amount to roughly a week’s worth of Russian casualties.
The CSIS think-tank called the presence of the troops “a wild card.” It predicted they would likely serve in support roles for Russia.
Kim Yong-hyun of South Korea’s Dongguk University also sees the Pyongyang-sent soldiers providing “meaningful support,” but says it won’t be a game-changing boost for Moscow.
He told Reuters they could provide a role defending against potential Ukrainian advances within Russian territory.
Mark Montgomery, a retired U.S. Navy rear admiral and senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think-tank, believes the most significant threat North Korea poses to Ukraine isn’t these troops, but rather the millions of rounds of ammunition it has already sent to Russia.
“This is how the Russians are just conducting a comprehensive artillery campaign against the Ukrainians,” he said.
Montgomery also said that though North Korean troops could gain practical battlefield experience by fighting in Ukraine, they could also be thrown into the costly “meat-grinder” assaults that Russia has relied on to make incremental gains.
And if, as a result, they face high casualty rates, the Brookings Institution has noted that Kim Jong-un’s willingness to send elite soldiers to Russia would likely be tempered.
U.S. Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin on Thursday reiterated Washington’s position that if North Korea’s troops join the fight against Ukraine, “they would make themselves legitimate military targets.”
South Korean intelligence suggests North Korea is sending troops to aid Russia in its war with Ukraine. Andrew Chang explains the implications of the alliance between Russia and North Korea on the war, and why South Korea could become involved.
Why is North Korea doing this and what’s next?
In recent months, North Korea has signed a mutual-aid pact with Russia and is now doing even more by sending thousand of troops to serve its ally.
Jun Lee, a political scientist at the RAND Corporation think-tank, says North Korea has seemingly leaned toward Russia in a bid to change the status quo, as it struggles with ongoing sanctions and spillover effects from the pandemic.
“It saw the Ukraine war as this sort of geopolitical opportunity to make a big bet, get closer to Russia and kind of mitigate some of its biggest issues,” he said in an interview.
And with North Korea’s armed forces numbering some 1.3 million members, the troops it has sent to Russia represent just a fraction of its available soldiers, and several observers see the potential for these deployments to grow.
On Tuesday, North Korea said its foreign minister had travelled to Russia. Though it didn’t state why, South Korea’s spy agency suspects the diplomat may be there to discuss the possibility of sending even more troops to Russia’s aid.