North Korea Is Learning Exactly the Wrong Strategic Lesson In Ukraine

The North Koreans now fighting in Kursk are employing brutal Russian tactics, trading the bodies of their expendable peasant and factory worker troops for incremental gains in land. But the Russians and North Koreans are fighting a far smaller and less well armed Ukraine which - despite those disadvantages - has fought them to a standstill for three years. 

If the North Koreans think this strategy will work against the modern, technologically sophisticated, extremely well armed and trained South Korean military, they are setting themselves up for an even bloodier slaughter than the one they're engaged in at Kursk. JL

David Axe reports in The Telegraph:

Russia’s war on Ukraine is, for North Korea, a lesson in 21st-century warfare, brutal and bloody. In 34 months, the Russians have traded enormous numbers of humans for incremental territorial gains. For the Kremlin, people are a cheap and expendable resource. Are people as cheap for North Korea? So far, yes. The initial North Korean assaults in Kursk copied Russian tactics. Infantry attacked on foot. As mines, drones and artillery dashed one wave, a second and third rolled in. Half the North Koreans died.  It’s a horrific strategy. The question for the North Koreans is whether that will work on the Korean Peninsula where  the South Koreans with their extensive, modern arms industry and cutting-edge air force are superior to the decrepit North Koreans. 

Two months after deploying to Kursk Oblast in western Russia to reinforce Russian troops battling the then two-month-old Ukrainian invasion of the oblast, a 12,000-person North Korean army corps finally went on the attack last weekend.

For Russia, the North Korean deployment was a critical boost to Russia’s costly effort to eliminate the 250-square-mile Ukrainian salient in Kursk ahead of the January inauguration of the US president-elect Donald Trump – an event that could signal a chaotic new phase of Russia’s wider war on Ukraine. 

For North Korea, it was an opportunity to learn. The army of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea hasn’t fought a major land war in seven decades. And yet North Korean strongman Kim Jong Un expects it to be capable of defeating the exceptionally well-equipped South Korean army in the event the tensions across the Korean Demilitarised Zone ever escalate into open warfare.

 

Russia’s war on Ukraine is, for North Korea, a schoolhouse teaching lessons in 21st-century warfare. The lessons are brutal and bloody ones. In 34 months of grinding warfare, the Russians have learned to trade enormous numbers of human beings for incremental territorial gains. It’s a horrific strategy, but not always an ineffective one.

The big question for the North Koreans is whether that approach to land warfare will work 4,700 miles away on the Korean Peninsula. 

After losing 10,000 armoured vehicles in the first couple of years of the war, and struggling to replace those losses with new production and the restoration of old Cold War vehicles, the Russian ground forces shifted tactics. Large coordinated mechanised assaults involving potentially scores of vehicles became rarer. Small haphazard attacks by infantry, marching on foot, became more common.

“Russian forces are now deploying tiny units, sometimes as few as two soldiers, to probe for weaknesses in Ukrainian lines,” explained Frontelligence Insight, a Ukrainian analysis group.  “When they identify a vulnerability, they signal for larger reinforcements, often platoon- or company-sized units. Until such gaps are found, however, these small groups, sometimes using motorcycles, continue their repetitive efforts, probing for openings and exhausting defenders.”

 

The probes are risky. Many if not most of the infantry assault groups fail in their missions – and die or get hurt in the process. But “Moscow can afford to lose these small units daily, as the steady influx of new soldiers ensures that the pressure never lets up,” Frontelligence Insight noted. 

For the Kremlin, people are still a cheap and expendable resource, even as Russian casualties in Ukraine possibly exceed 700,000 killed or wounded. 

Are people as cheap for North Korea? So far, yes. The initial North Korean assaults in Kursk copied Russian tactics. Infantry attacked Ukrainian positions on foot. If mines, drones and artillery dashed one wave of infantry, a second and even third wave rolled in. In Kursk last weekend, three waves each with 150 or more North Korean infantry succeeded in capturing the village of Plekhove from 100 dug-in Ukrainian troops. 

But as many as half of the North Koreans died, Ukrainian journalist Andriy Tsaplienko reported.

Whether the bloody, infantry-first tactics might work along the Demilitarised Zone between the two Koreas is an untested question. It’s worth noting the differences between the conflict in Ukraine and the possible conflict on the Korean Peninsula.

In Ukraine, the Russians enjoy a massive advantage in people. In some sectors, the attacking Russians outnumber the Ukrainian defenders five to one. And the Ukrainians often struggle with shortages of the most important munitions, especially artillery shells. And perhaps most critically, Russian air power dominates, meaning Russian jets can bomb with impunity, wearing down Ukrainian defences.

Conditions would be different along the DMZ, where the North Korean troops outnumber South Korean troops – but only two to one. The South Koreans with their extensive and modern arms industry are unlikely to suffer munitions shortages. And the cutting-edge South Korean air force is vastly superior to the decrepit North Korean air force. 

In joining the war on Ukraine, the North Korean army is learning important lessons. But are they the right ones? And when the survivors of the DPRK corps in Kursk return home and teach attritional tactics to their peers, will they also doom these peers to die in pointless attacks on numerous, well-armed South Korean forces?

We won’t know unless and until North Korea invades across the DMZ. But anyone expecting that war to look like the war in Ukraine is probably in for a shock.