North Korea’s Soldier Supply Chain

Dr. Vijay Sakhuja

It did not take very long for Russia and North Korea to ratify the Treaty on Comprehensive Strategic Partnership signed in June 2024 during President Vladimir Putin visit to Pyongyang. In Moscow, the Russian lower house endorsed it followed by the upper house ratifying the treaty on 9 November 2024. Likewise, the KCNA news, an official North Korean agency announced that Treaty on Comprehensive Strategic Partnership between North Korea and Russia “was ratified as a decree” on 12 November 2024 and will “take effect from the day when both sides exchanged the ratification instruments.”

Notwithstanding the time of the ratification of the Treaty by North Korea in November 2024, the country had already dispatched over 10,000 troops to Russia for training and onward deployment in the Kursk border region to fight alongside the Russian Army against Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has confirmed that “Eleven thousand North Korean soldiers or soldiers of the North Korean army are currently present on the territory of the Russian Federation in the border with Ukraine on the north of our country in the Kursk region.”

Zelensky also announced that North Korean soldiers had taken part in combat against the Ukrainian soldiers and that there had been losses among these soldiers. South Korean broadcaster KBS, Rustem Umerov too has claimed the presence of North Korean soldiers in Russia and that these soldiers were attired in Russian military outfits and receiving practical training.

According to media sources, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, in his telephonic conversation on 15 November 2024 with Russian President Vladimir Putin had expressed concern over the presence of North Korean troops at the frontlines against Ukraine and conveyed that it was a “grave escalation” of the ongoing war.

South Korea summoned Russian ambassador in Seoul to express alarm over the presence of North Korean troops at the Russia-Ukraine borders and sought their “immediate withdrawal”. Although South Korea has a policy of not supplying weapons to any country that is at war, President Yoon Suk-Yeol warned that his country could rethink and provide weapons to Ukraine based on the level of North Korean troop involvement in the war.

The Russian Army is losing men rapidly and its fighting strength is weakening every day. It is very difficult to determine the exact number of losses or casualties on both sides because Russian and Ukrainian authorities do not make public such figures. The estimates vary and these could be in the order of over thousand troops lost on a daily basis. The overall losses are estimated to be 712,610 men between 24 February 2022 and 15 November 2024.

For instance, the month of October 2024 was perhaps the most fatal. John Healey, the British defense minister told the Telegraph that the Russian military lost “an average of 1,354 Russian fighters killed or wounded per day” during the month. This totals up to 41,980 in one month. Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, the Chief of the Defence Staff of United Kingdom has observed that the Russian losses (killed or wounded) in the ongoing war could touch as high as 700,000.

Russia is facing major challenges to recruit its own people to fight the war. Under the circumstances, the North Korean soldiers are a morale booster for the Russians. The North Korean soldiers belong to the special operations forces of the 11th Corps. Their involvement in the war is an opportunity to hone skills for modern warfare. There is a belief that the first lot of 10,000 North Korean soldiers could be followed by another batch.

Ukraine is visibly alarmed by the possibility of more North Korean soldiers on its borders and Zelensky called on his countrymen to come forward and fight the Russian and North Korean forces. Ukraine too is facing shortage of troops and the government has decided to reduce the conscription age instead of passing a mobilisation law.

Experts strongly believe that there is a quid pro quo between Russia and North Korea and the deployment of North Korean soldiers could result in cash payments or supply of military hardware such as long range missiles, antitank weapons, RPGs, and personal weapons such as machine guns.

It is useful to point out that there are soldiers from many nationalities particularly from the Global South who have offered military services in their private capacities to Russia through recruiting agents. There are reports of these soldiers fleeing, abandoning positions, surrendering, wounded and even being killed in action.

Finally, the future supply of additional North Korean soldiers to Russia will depend on the combat performance of the existing soldiers in the battlefield, their ability to operate with Russian military, and successful command and control.

Dr. Vijay Sakhuja is Professor and Head, Center of Excellence for Geopolitics and International Studies (CEGIS), REVA University, Bengaluru.