North Korea Sending Troops to Ukraine
Escalation? Russian desperation?
Via NBC News: Kim Jong Un to send Putin 12,000 soldiers, South Korea says; U.S. warns they’ll be ‘fair game’.
Pyongyang is expected to augment Russia’s military with its own sizable contingent of special forces, military engineers and artillery troops, South Korean Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun reported to lawmakers Thursday, his office told NBC News. The total number is expected to reach 12,000, he said, with 3,000 having been deployed already.
That matches Washington’s assessment.
“They’re fair game,” National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters Wednesday, saying the U.S. believes at least 3,000 North Korean soldiers have already arrived in eastern Russia by sea. The soldiers moved this month and are being trained at multiple Russian military bases, Kirby said.
“They’re fair targets, and the Ukrainian military will defend themselves against North Korean soldiers the same way they’re defending themselves against Russian soldiers,” he said. “There could be dead and wounded North Korean soldiers fighting against Ukraine.”
Additionally,
The U.S. and other countries say North Korea has already provided critical munitions, including millions of artillery shells, to Russia in possible exchange for key military technology that Pyongyang could use to advance its nuclear ambitions. Both countries deny the arms transfer.
And,
For more than two years, South Korea has provided only nonlethal assistance to Ukraine, but Yoon said Wednesday that Seoul will now consider providing Kyiv with both defensive and offensive weapons.
I don’t have a lot to add to this, save to note that it does feel like both an act of desperation on Russia’s part and that it is also escalatory to introduce troops from another country into the mix (which seem to, in turn have the potential to affect South Korean behavior). One thing is for certain, it is yet another example of Putin’s initial miscalculation as it pertains to the original invasion.
Meanwhile, Ukrainians clearly have a stake in the American election, given that Trump has clearly been signaling he will come on the side of Russia, at least in terms of a settlement over already stolen Ukrainian territory. And then we get things like this:
I am going to agree (kind of) that there is a terribly simplistic tendency in the US of reducing wars to cartoonish good v. bad guy narratives. But let’s not forget that the Russians invaded and are solely responsible for this war. And yes Vance gently notes that the Russians shouldn’t have invaded (in way that sounds like Timmy shouldn’t have been playing ball in the house), but what he is doing is saying sure, the thief shouldn’t have broken into your house and then squated in the living room, but can’t we just get along now and be roomies?
It is really important to note that Russia has violated a major norm of the post-WWII era, which is that wars of territorial acquisition are not acceptable. Indeed, they have been at for a while, but this was an especially brazen action. There are good reasons to want that behavior punished.
Totally tangential but I wonder of the Russians are going to keep the North Korean troops completely segregated. Or are they going to give the North Koreans a full doses of Russian racism.
Actually I was surprised Belarus did not supply troops at the start of Mad Vlad’s War, seeing as how they allowed Russian troops to stage the initial invasion from their territory.
@Kathy: My impression (but I would defer to those better informed) is that a) the Belarus population would be very unhappy with having their children sent to die for Putin’s misadventures, and b) any troops sent outside Belarus aren’t available to suppress the populace.
@MarkedMan:
There’s that. Also maybe the butcher in Minsk knew or suspected Mad Vlad’s invasion would bog down into a quagmire, and who wants to contribute troops for that.
If you believe our political polls, it seems likely that Russia will win, with or without Norks. Trump will sell Ukraine out to Putin, and then he will offer Putin the rest of Europe. And China might as well make its play against Taiwan, ditto South Korea – Trump will never fight. War won’t be about his ego, his power or his bank account and nothing else matters.
If Trump wins, and you have friends in the Baltics, advise them to GTFO. And if you have investments in Taiwan or South Korea, ditto. The only use Trump has for the military is for arresting his political opponents.
This will be the greatest self-own in American history. We will snatch global defeat from the jaws of victory.
I’m ignorant about the organization of North Korean troops. Do they, like the Russians, not make use of Non-Coms as on the scene decision makers? Also, what is the chance of defection among the troops once they are in Ukraine?
@Mr. Prosser:
Hmm. The Ukrainians say, “Defect and we will let you disappear in such a way that you’ll be reported as dead on the battlefield, so no reprisals against your family. I would guess close to 100% defections rate
@MarkedMan:
And that is why I find it odd that NK would send troops to fight in Russia, too much of a chance they will defect. However, I also think back to the opening of Oliver Stone’s Scarface where you get that screen scrawl message talking about how many of the Cubans who were part of the Mariel Boatlift were the dregs of their society, prisoners, crooks, etc.. (probably including LGBTQ+ folks at that time, as I am sure Cuba was not a fan of these individuals).
Cuba seemed happy to let those folks go and not care what happens to them, maybe NK did the same, send over a bunch of prisoners who spoke out against the NK regime, and other individuals in prison who were likely to die in prison due to never being released, hard labor, and torture, figuring that the Russians will not give a damn about them, as they are just cannon fodder, and if some of these folks end up in a position to defect to Ukraine, NK could care less as the folks they sent over are a tiny amount of the numbers that make up NK’s population, and again are most likely folks who were told go and fight for Putin or die in prison.
@inhumans99:
Considering using prisoners has been Russia’s strategy for supplying reenforcement for its own troops/cannon fodder, this seems like a believable theory.
@MarkedMan: I’m not as sure. The rumor was that the military was an elite employment opportunity granting advantages to immediate and extended family. Need to keep your family safe from reprisals? Sure. Kill off your family’s access to whatever advantage can be leveraged in NK society (not to mention never see them again)? Meh… color me skeptical.
I would hope the wounded get taken off the front lines so they can heal. The dead though…. If Putin really deploys North Korean zombies, this will be a major escalation.
I wonder if the mental gymnastics required to claim that the North Koreans are the good guys will prove at all difficult for Republicans.
Ok, I don’t wonder. I guess we fought on the wrong side in the Korean War.
@Gustopher: I do believe that high publicity to North Korea- Putin axis could be of some utility for putting Vance and Trump on back foot as indeed it requires major gymnastics to adopt the pretence that someone siding with North Koreans is a good guy
@MarkedMan:
I know it’s snark, but it reminds me of how Spartan women allegedly sent off their husbands to war. They’d say “come back with your shield or on it.” The assumption was that someone running away from a fight would discard their heavy wooden shield, the better to run away fast. While the dead were supposed to be carried home on their shields.
I can see Kim promising to kill or imprison the families of those who don’t come back either alive or dead, even if they are listed as missing and presumed killed.
In WWII, Russian POWs were assumed to be deserters or collaborators. There’s no reason I can see to believe repressive, totalitarian communist regimes have become more rational since then.
@Gustopher: Their candidate liked and admired Kim. They’ll spike the landing just fine. 🙁
@Lounsbury: You really don’t get how credulous MAGAts are, do you? We’re not dealing in FP wizardry here, the people who know and care the least are deciding this. (And Kamala’s identity as female may still turn out to be the spoiler in the contest. We can’t predict about that.)
@Mr. Prosser:
Unlikely they’ve adopted the British model of the backbone being SNCOs that we adopted, but I wouldn’t judge that as particularly meaningful, most of the world’s armies don’t use it either.
The South Koreans pay close attention, so here’s an article about which of his forces Lil’ Kim has allowed out of the country. Elite infantry, no artillery, no armor. I imagine he fears a significant portion of his regular grunts might defect if given the chance.
@Gustopher:
I’m not convinced it is a major escalation, The agreement between Russia and Kim seems to stipulate the agreement only applies to defending each other’s territory, which would mean North Korean troops will be limited to the Kursk salient…and IMO the Ukrainians should probably get the hell out of there anyway. Months in, and the objective of that op remains unclear? Not a good sign.
Will this spur any nation to defend Ukraine with their troops? Certainly Zelenskyy can so hope, but I’m not optimistic. Nobody stepping up so far.
I wonder what Vance thinks of countries that picked sides in the war between Al Qaida and America, and who simplistically took America to be the good guys.
@dazedandconfused:
The SNCO backbone model was used by by the most effective combat armies of both World Wars: British Imperial, French (WW1 variant), American, and (it must be said) German.
All Western post-WW2w armies have adopted this model.
But it depends a lot on having a “homogeneous loyalty” army and therefore, often (not always) a similar society.
It poses problems for elite-dominated autocracies unless they have armies that bypassed national political problems in that regard (see Wehrmacht; see for contrary, Italian army WW2)
@dazedandconfused:
The objective of the Kursk operation is quite obvious: to set up a position which Russia feels obliged for reasons of politics/prestige to counter-attack.
Therefore imposing an adverse attrition on the counter-attack against prepared defensive lines.
@dazedandconfused:
Make no mistake: from the pov of a lot of Europeans, this IS a major escalation.
And one plainly signed off in Beijing.
The arguments for strategic autonomy and a central command authority become increasingly obvious.
China may be missing the obverse of Napoleon’s aphorism:
“There lies a sleeping giant. Let him sleep, for when he wakes he will move the world.”.
@JohnSF:
Didn’t have to open a new front to accomplish that.
@dazedandconfused:
Of course they did.
Russia was assaulting limited sectors of the front in Donetsk that it chose to select.
By opening a new front in Kursk, Ukraine has obliged Russia to conduct assault operations on a another wider front.
Therefore increasing their adverse attrition.
@JohnSF:
What you are missing is that invading Russia allows Putin to use his conscripts, of which he has something like a couple hundred thousand, which he could not deploy outside of Russia in Ukraine. Now he can also use Norks on that too.. As a plan to attrit Russian troops it would have to judged idiotic.
I suspect it was based on a notion that if they could just have a “victory” it would help convince his allies to support them fully, instead of half-assed, which they are.
@dazedandconfused:
Oh come on.
As if Putin is in any regard WHATSOEVER constrained by any Russian laws regarding use of conscripts.
In addition, by “Russian law” all the “four oblasts” are Russian territory.
Russia was, and is, in Ukraine, able to select any frontage it desired for offensive operations, and thus to manage its assault operation attrition.
The entire point of the UAF Kursk incursion is to force Russia to commit to another offensive front, and thus bleed them.
@JohnSF: You should pay more attention to this war. It’s Russian law and Putin has not broken it. This has been widely reported. The conscripts are not in Ukraine. He is afraid of full mobilization and had not done that either.
And btw, a salient is not a good defensive configuration, precisely the opposite in fact.
Another plausible theory about the Kursk op is that it was hoped that might cause Putin to re-deploy his forces in the east and south up there, stopping the advances the Russians were and are making. If so it’s clear it failed to accomplish that goal.
I pay considerable attention.
For a variety of reasons.
I repeat: under RUSSIAN LAW the “four oblasts”, which includes a rather large portion of Ukraine not under Russian control, are, legally Russian territory, and therefore any and all Russian forces may be deployed there.
A salient can actually be quite a good defensive position, depending on the circumstances.
And the “mighty Russian army” offensive in Donetsk appears to be going nowhere fast, and at horrendous cost.
Personally, I’m little inclined to second-guess the operational judgements of the UAF .
YMMV.
@JohnSF:
Seriously, John, if you think the Russians have gone nowhere in Donbass over the summer you haven’t been paying attention. You can google up the issue of the Russian conscripts to see what I’m talking about too.
The issue is not a legalism one for Putin, it’s the condition of the Russian city-folk having their kids drafted into coffins being a politic liability of the first order for him. He has made due by promising life-changing chucks of change to Russian peasants for becoming contract soldiers. Heck of a lot of Russian peasants willing to put heavy chips on life-change. If I were one so would I.
@dazedandconfused:
I have, in fact, been paying attention, on and off.
The Russian advances in Donbas are really rather minimal, and, what is of far more importance, coming at the cost of massive adverse attrition.
They have STILL not even taken Pokrovsk, after almost a year of hammering away at it, at enormous attritional cost.
And that “strategic logistic centre” almost certainly ceased to be such months ago.
An army guy I chat with from time to time is of the opinion that the indicated Russian loss rate, in both men and equipment, is huge, and obviously unsustainable.
There are quite clear signs Russia is having recruitment issues.
Contractnik pay and bonuses have gone through the roof.
But even the dimmest (often non-Russian) peasants are now inclined to think a lot of money is of small use to the dead.
The UAF operation in Kursk sets up a new front where Russia feels obliged to attack; and therefore can be bled.
The Nork option is unlikely to get Russia out of that particular hole.
Well, indeed it is not. But did you not argue rather the opposite a little while ago?