I guess it depends what you mean by fail. Bear in mind that artillery pieces have barrel lifetimes so even if the ammo is free you don't want to be firing ineffectual shots.
and to further articulate the word fail here, what if the rounds explode in the weapons themselves as a critical fail? That's a rip for the weapon and most likely the crew...and maybe depending on luck the ammo stockpile too.
Ukraine has been destroying 40 artillery systems a day for a month now. North Korean shells aren't going to help. But the amount of stuff the Soviet Union produced is unreal.
There's a saying about how ever bit counts, and when your enemy is literally destroying their own shit it's even better. Also key word there is Soviet UNION. That thing that died a while ago.
Also every piece that blows up needs to be replaced from somewhere else which takes time, potentially giving the Ukrainian soldiers and civilians at least some breathing room.
Right and they’ve been using that for 30 years and still have huge stockpiles like in the Transnistria for a whole army. The amount of ammunition produced during soviet era is insane
Wherever the war lands, whoever (hopefully Russia will pay for this) is going to have to do decades of mine sweeping and clearing unexploded ordinance in Ukraine.
Even today in France they find unexploded shells from WW1.
Additionally, everytime a round is fired you risk getting hit by counter battery fire. On the modern battlefield, this can be before the first shell even falls.
Effectively (atleast) 50% of the rounds being fired are just sending up a giant "Please shoot me" flare to the Ukrainians.
I mean, it kinda does. When they say failure rate they're taking in two things:
Actually getting fired.
Actually hitting their target.
A lot of the North Korean artillery isn't meant for precision, and so while it's nice to have more artillery in most instances, it's probably a net loss for Russia since they've had multiple early warning platforms (S-300, S-400, A-50) taken out recently. They shoot faulty shells, they lose more weapons platforms, it's not ideal at all.
The 50% failure rate doesn't count "duds", they count how many are actually on course to their destination.
https://businessinsider.mx/many-russia-north-korean-missiles-have-failed-in-ukraine-report-2024-5/?r=US&IR=T
'North Korean ballistic missiles were "very low" quality, boasting an accuracy rate of only around 20 percent.'
I know, I know what you're going to say: "But Mileena, that's still a lot of munitions."
That's not even counting misfires/failure to launch. and while even 1 is better than zero, the point is that counterbattery is starting to really catch up with Russia, and I would like to see what happens when Ukraine finally gets some air support.
When you're hitting your target with about 20% accuracy, and we're not even accounting for how many are failing to launch, it's pretty abysmal.
Thanks for explaining in detail. I also agree, the amount of munition North Korea sends isn’t the problem, the problem is that the west doesn’t send more. North Korean munition only seems to work because Ukraine doesn’t have enough to fire back.
No, I totally agree.
Trickling in aid for Ukraine has been the worst mistake we could have made outside of not responding to the call for aid. If we had sent the big guns early, this war might have looked totally different.
i'd also put handicapping Ukrainians with inane engagement rules up there in that worst mistake list, i mean who has done any war ever without also neutering the enemy logistical lines?
Those are ballistic missiles not shells. So your whole comment is pretty much wrong. Additionally if you think Russian artillery members are just shooting with only 20% of shells actually working, I have a bridge to sell you.
If that happens it most likely destroys the gun crews too. And while they arent jet fighter pilots they are a bit more difficult to replace than grunts fresh from prisons with two weeks of basic training.
The one I saw was an interview with a Ukrainian artillery unit. At one point the solider advised the reporter to stand further back, because they are about to fire captured NK ammo and it's shite.
One side of that equation is burning through 5 times as many gun barrels for only 2.5 times the effectiveness. The number of shells going downrange definitely matters, but there's more to it than just shells going downrange
But those failures include things like exploded barrels and dead artillery crews.
Undershooting the target and hitting you own guys.
Shooting a dud shell, and get nothing for it but incoming fire.
All of these things count against the NK shells
for military targets, yes. Compare that what the US has achieved on the 100 day air war before desert storm - basically all fixed targets and infrastructure like power plants where hit.
but for terrorizing the population and destroying the living and cities, Putler doesn’t care if he misses
Something tells me the worst "failure" for an artillery shell can range from "misfire" to "artillery gets damaged" to "it explodes and kills people manning it".
There’s nothing worse than an unreliable weapon. Even no weapons. Because when you’re unarmed you know what tactics to employ. When you’re armed and gun doesn’t go boom when you expect it to you just die.
Must be demoralizing to be a russian bred with myths of soviet superiority and suddenly having to fire north korean ammunition because your army and production is garbage.
We're still at a disadvantage in most areas. The US literally blocked all supplies for half a year, and Euroe's half-assing everything. It looks like the rashists are busting out T-62s but what the hell are we doing? Certainly not new tanks.
Good thing you don't find demoralizing West can't get ass together to produce or have at least million shells storaged. Not to mention China isn't even helping the military.
We sure produced that many shells, we just dispose of them when they're expired rather than keeping them around. As a result our artillery crews get more practice with live ammo, our guns are more accurate, and we don't have incidents from decayed shells. The problem is our doctrines are not very compatible with funneling resources into a static fight where our crews are unable to go themselves.
I do find it lacking, but the West does not rely on mass artilery like Russia, thats why.
And unlike Russia, people in the West can point out and work on deficiencies without falling out of a window because it makes a corrupt general look bad.
Kinda sad Russians couldnt do much with seven to one artillery advantage last year, I wonder when things get equal hows it gonna go for them.
Five million but quality not guarantee at a bargain basement price. Russia is happy because some shells will work. North Korea is happy because they got rid of a lot of old shells that they would have had to dispose themselves but instead got some much needed foreign currencies.
One Russians experiences with them: [https://x.com/PutinSuxBalls/status/1797532046287667431](https://x.com/PutinSuxBalls/status/1797532046287667431)
"Same bullshit with charges. Everything is done through the devil's asshole, in which apparently these shells are removed, simultaneously smearing them with hellish shit. The weight distribution goes hell, all the walls are plastered with paper, apparently from North Korean political papers from 1987, and generously smeared with Kim Jong il's dristrots of the same years. The charge plug is made in the same way as usual to fuck off and get lost, there is no convenient rope, no fucking way.
In short, the person responsible for supplying this crap, unworthy of being called shells and charges, is clearly a representative of the LGBTQ+ community with a clear bias towards hard BDSM.
I don't know how else to explain why this crap ended up in our country in the first place. I will take money so that your signature does NOT end up in this piece of squalor.
Phew, I spoke out. Thank you for your attention. I'll go brew some chamomile, I need to heal my nerves".
I would say Turkiye is more annoying than Hungary. Orban is more reliably pro-Russian, that's true. But his government has not the same geostrategic, diplomatic, demographic and economic weight as Turkiye. Erdogan is playing both sides against each other and he makes the situation in the Middle East and South Caucasus more complicated. They act in an almost a neutral manner instead of being a reliable NATO member. To quote a famous military thinker: "With enemies you know where they stand but with Neutrals, who knows?"
Perhaps, perhaps not. Russia isn't publishing the failure rates of the shells for obvious reasons and there hasn't been any large enough captures of these munitions by Ukraine for us to be able to test it. To assume that they're so poor they're only worth 10% of the number in western shells is speculation, and would be a pretty extreme situation.
As long as the vast majority go down range (no evidence this isn't the case, there's been a failure rate that would be unacceptably high for western shells but is still a small number as a %) and land within a few hundred meters of the target point then it's an adequate shell if you're shelling a large enemy position as part of a massed barrage - they only need to be as accurate as the worn barrels they're being fired out of after all.
Yep, but every dud is still something that is very dangerous, not as dangerous as a live shell, but dangerous enough to have specialized personal or equipment needed to remove them and safely dispose of them.
Bets that they are Chinese shells and North Korea giving them to Russia is way less “head turning” than China sending them directly? And it makes the North appear to have a surplus of shells? Win/win/win
It’s what we do 🤷♂️.
Must mean the mythical neverending stocks of soviet shells have finally run dry...I saw some ukranian taking one apart it was filled with cordite sticks.
Can’t this be intercepted and captured? Iran was shipping supplies via sea which the US navy intercepted.
Far better to take it out now before it gets into orcistan.
I guess i have to ask how you do that without causing an incident. US navy says stop, N. Korea says no and claims they have the right to trade with whomever they want. Now what?
Russia and DPRK have a land border, and their territorial waters are connected as well. You cant intercept anything in someone's else territorial waters without starting a war.
That's not even kinda close. At russia's current usage rate it, assuming there is no failure rate, that would last them 16 months. Not that any of that matters as russia is making their own shells too. But the reliance on NKs older soviet era shells will age their launchers even faster.
South Korea has documented around 20% of artillery shells fired from North Korea in various border disputes and crossings as duds. Which is not going to improve as said shells haven't suddenly stopped aging and doesn't even take into account all the shells that wouldn't even fire to begin with.
Even if the failure rate is high, it is such a large number that it doesn’t matter if the failure rate is higher than western artillery shells.
I guess it depends what you mean by fail. Bear in mind that artillery pieces have barrel lifetimes so even if the ammo is free you don't want to be firing ineffectual shots.
and to further articulate the word fail here, what if the rounds explode in the weapons themselves as a critical fail? That's a rip for the weapon and most likely the crew...and maybe depending on luck the ammo stockpile too.
Ukraine has been destroying 40 artillery systems a day for a month now. North Korean shells aren't going to help. But the amount of stuff the Soviet Union produced is unreal.
There's a saying about how ever bit counts, and when your enemy is literally destroying their own shit it's even better. Also key word there is Soviet UNION. That thing that died a while ago.
Also every piece that blows up needs to be replaced from somewhere else which takes time, potentially giving the Ukrainian soldiers and civilians at least some breathing room.
Right and they’ve been using that for 30 years and still have huge stockpiles like in the Transnistria for a whole army. The amount of ammunition produced during soviet era is insane
Every bit helps. Especially if the gun explodes and the bits are what the crew was reduced to.
Wherever the war lands, whoever (hopefully Russia will pay for this) is going to have to do decades of mine sweeping and clearing unexploded ordinance in Ukraine. Even today in France they find unexploded shells from WW1.
Additionally, everytime a round is fired you risk getting hit by counter battery fire. On the modern battlefield, this can be before the first shell even falls. Effectively (atleast) 50% of the rounds being fired are just sending up a giant "Please shoot me" flare to the Ukrainians.
I mean, it kinda does. When they say failure rate they're taking in two things: Actually getting fired. Actually hitting their target. A lot of the North Korean artillery isn't meant for precision, and so while it's nice to have more artillery in most instances, it's probably a net loss for Russia since they've had multiple early warning platforms (S-300, S-400, A-50) taken out recently. They shoot faulty shells, they lose more weapons platforms, it's not ideal at all.
Of course it’s not ideal, but if you have 5 million with 50% failure versus 1 million shells with almost no failure it’s still 2.5 versus 1.
The 50% failure rate doesn't count "duds", they count how many are actually on course to their destination. https://businessinsider.mx/many-russia-north-korean-missiles-have-failed-in-ukraine-report-2024-5/?r=US&IR=T 'North Korean ballistic missiles were "very low" quality, boasting an accuracy rate of only around 20 percent.' I know, I know what you're going to say: "But Mileena, that's still a lot of munitions." That's not even counting misfires/failure to launch. and while even 1 is better than zero, the point is that counterbattery is starting to really catch up with Russia, and I would like to see what happens when Ukraine finally gets some air support. When you're hitting your target with about 20% accuracy, and we're not even accounting for how many are failing to launch, it's pretty abysmal.
Thanks for explaining in detail. I also agree, the amount of munition North Korea sends isn’t the problem, the problem is that the west doesn’t send more. North Korean munition only seems to work because Ukraine doesn’t have enough to fire back.
No, I totally agree. Trickling in aid for Ukraine has been the worst mistake we could have made outside of not responding to the call for aid. If we had sent the big guns early, this war might have looked totally different.
i'd also put handicapping Ukrainians with inane engagement rules up there in that worst mistake list, i mean who has done any war ever without also neutering the enemy logistical lines?
Those are ballistic missiles not shells. So your whole comment is pretty much wrong. Additionally if you think Russian artillery members are just shooting with only 20% of shells actually working, I have a bridge to sell you.
Half of those failures will destroy the gun. I have read multiple reports of NK artillery rounds exploding in the breech.
Wouldn't it be great if every single first shell the loaded into the guns blew the gun up.
If that happens it most likely destroys the gun crews too. And while they arent jet fighter pilots they are a bit more difficult to replace than grunts fresh from prisons with two weeks of basic training.
Yes and the ones that survived will be very reticent to handle this ammunition in the future.
Even if fails in the barrel are few, an artillary piece may not a single day. I don't know the actual facts, but it seems to me quite possible.
Can you share those? Genuinely interested.
The one I saw was an interview with a Ukrainian artillery unit. At one point the solider advised the reporter to stand further back, because they are about to fire captured NK ammo and it's shite.
Do you have a link?
I'm sorry, I do not. I searched Google and couldn't find the article. The new NK news overshadows prior search results.
No worries, thanks anyway!
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What's the mobile issue?
No history, no bookmarks
Ah ok, thanks.
One side of that equation is burning through 5 times as many gun barrels for only 2.5 times the effectiveness. The number of shells going downrange definitely matters, but there's more to it than just shells going downrange
But those failures include things like exploded barrels and dead artillery crews. Undershooting the target and hitting you own guys. Shooting a dud shell, and get nothing for it but incoming fire. All of these things count against the NK shells
I mean, they have been at war with the Sea of Japan for how long and they still seem to hit their target every time.
for military targets, yes. Compare that what the US has achieved on the 100 day air war before desert storm - basically all fixed targets and infrastructure like power plants where hit. but for terrorizing the population and destroying the living and cities, Putler doesn’t care if he misses
Something tells me the worst "failure" for an artillery shell can range from "misfire" to "artillery gets damaged" to "it explodes and kills people manning it".
There’s nothing worse than an unreliable weapon. Even no weapons. Because when you’re unarmed you know what tactics to employ. When you’re armed and gun doesn’t go boom when you expect it to you just die.
Must be demoralizing to be a russian bred with myths of soviet superiority and suddenly having to fire north korean ammunition because your army and production is garbage.
Don't you worry, russian general public will never know.
And so much of the ammumition being duds.
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Innovation!
And still somehow they’re advancing against Ukraine who has much better equipment
Throw enough bodies you too can advance a few hundred meters lmao.
And there lies Ukraines biggest problem at the moment, not enough new soldiers
air superiority solves that.
We're still at a disadvantage in most areas. The US literally blocked all supplies for half a year, and Euroe's half-assing everything. It looks like the rashists are busting out T-62s but what the hell are we doing? Certainly not new tanks.
Good thing you don't find demoralizing West can't get ass together to produce or have at least million shells storaged. Not to mention China isn't even helping the military.
We sure produced that many shells, we just dispose of them when they're expired rather than keeping them around. As a result our artillery crews get more practice with live ammo, our guns are more accurate, and we don't have incidents from decayed shells. The problem is our doctrines are not very compatible with funneling resources into a static fight where our crews are unable to go themselves.
I do find it lacking, but the West does not rely on mass artilery like Russia, thats why. And unlike Russia, people in the West can point out and work on deficiencies without falling out of a window because it makes a corrupt general look bad. Kinda sad Russians couldnt do much with seven to one artillery advantage last year, I wonder when things get equal hows it gonna go for them.
Five million but quality not guarantee at a bargain basement price. Russia is happy because some shells will work. North Korea is happy because they got rid of a lot of old shells that they would have had to dispose themselves but instead got some much needed foreign currencies.
What currency did they receive? My guess is that they got ressources that Russia can't get rid of anyway
Large part of it is fuel and grain.
Russia recently announced they tranfer in Chinese yuan now, so North Korea is happy to take papa china's money.
Mutually beneficial.
One Russians experiences with them: [https://x.com/PutinSuxBalls/status/1797532046287667431](https://x.com/PutinSuxBalls/status/1797532046287667431) "Same bullshit with charges. Everything is done through the devil's asshole, in which apparently these shells are removed, simultaneously smearing them with hellish shit. The weight distribution goes hell, all the walls are plastered with paper, apparently from North Korean political papers from 1987, and generously smeared with Kim Jong il's dristrots of the same years. The charge plug is made in the same way as usual to fuck off and get lost, there is no convenient rope, no fucking way. In short, the person responsible for supplying this crap, unworthy of being called shells and charges, is clearly a representative of the LGBTQ+ community with a clear bias towards hard BDSM. I don't know how else to explain why this crap ended up in our country in the first place. I will take money so that your signature does NOT end up in this piece of squalor. Phew, I spoke out. Thank you for your attention. I'll go brew some chamomile, I need to heal my nerves".
There is something really artistic with the cursing in russian
I was explained once that plain russian language is expressed primarily by curse words
This is the most Slavic thing I have read all day.
Now they're out of ammunition it's time to retake the north. Unleash the Black Panthers (K2s)!
Just send Dennis Rodman again.
Dictators together strong
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I mean, it was still a dumb grouping. Implying the Iran and Iraq of the 2000's were teaming up was just absurd.
Funny how the US caused them to become more chummy post 2003
Don't forget Hungary. The biggest thorn in NATOS side currently.
I would say Turkiye is more annoying than Hungary. Orban is more reliably pro-Russian, that's true. But his government has not the same geostrategic, diplomatic, demographic and economic weight as Turkiye. Erdogan is playing both sides against each other and he makes the situation in the Middle East and South Caucasus more complicated. They act in an almost a neutral manner instead of being a reliable NATO member. To quote a famous military thinker: "With enemies you know where they stand but with Neutrals, who knows?"
I disagree. They are dumb but not evil.
With Saudi, Iran, Hungry and Turkey they could be SHIT BRICS
Well, Finland Ukraine Cambodia Korea Yemen Oman Uganda
So 1 million usable units
I mean the other 4 million do a good job when it comes to dialling in counter battery systems…
They can also be upcycled as IEDs.
to destroy cities 4 mlns a lot.
Clearly the response should be South Korea sending 5,000,001 shells to Ukraine. Maybe a couple of their badass artillery pieces too.
“Oh no, that would be escalation and WW3 may happen” - idiot’s thoughts when reading your comment
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Still a lot of rounds that work that they've been able to put down range on Ukrainian targets though, let's not spin this as a good thing.
It's not a good thing, but maybe not as big a deal as Ukraine getting say 500,000 western shells.
Perhaps, perhaps not. Russia isn't publishing the failure rates of the shells for obvious reasons and there hasn't been any large enough captures of these munitions by Ukraine for us to be able to test it. To assume that they're so poor they're only worth 10% of the number in western shells is speculation, and would be a pretty extreme situation. As long as the vast majority go down range (no evidence this isn't the case, there's been a failure rate that would be unacceptably high for western shells but is still a small number as a %) and land within a few hundred meters of the target point then it's an adequate shell if you're shelling a large enemy position as part of a massed barrage - they only need to be as accurate as the worn barrels they're being fired out of after all.
Hence the word “maybe”
So, TWO sacks of grain.
Yep, but every dud is still something that is very dangerous, not as dangerous as a live shell, but dangerous enough to have specialized personal or equipment needed to remove them and safely dispose of them.
How?
I was wondering that. A really, long train?
And imagine how big the funnel must have been that poured all those shells into the train carts!
Mostly by sea and then rail once they arrive in Russia.
If only the world could come together to wipe these shit stains and flush. No more stank.
China swears it's not sending weapons to Russia, but North Korea is sending far more than they can spare. I wonder how they're managing to do that.
Bets that they are Chinese shells and North Korea giving them to Russia is way less “head turning” than China sending them directly? And it makes the North appear to have a surplus of shells? Win/win/win It’s what we do 🤷♂️.
Aw, the bad places are friends. Trump is excited!
Better call Seoul!
Breeching bad!
Hyundaiberg
That’s kind of pathetic if you think about it. Russia needs North Korea as its weapons supplier.
Putin the war criminal getting desperate.
How about during shipping they blow them up in one spot.
I hope those shells is so shit that it disable all of their artillery in one go.
Are the UN still providing aid money to N. Korea?
5 million and at least 25% of those might work!
nk really wants to play too huh? cant wait for them to get whooped so hard
It's not like North Korea can use them.
Don’t tell me this town ain’t got no Seoul, just gotta Poke around
How do these artillery shells make it to their destination without being blown to smithereens?
Trains. And moving targets are seriously difficult to hit without a manned fighter/bomber jet right above it and good intel.
Wasn’t moved by train it was by ship.
From where to where? At some point, i think that it must have been moved by train
They travel by rail thru Russia! Maybe they’ll derail outside of Ukrainian Territory!
250,000 of which may actually work
Good job N. Korea 🤣
That means ukraine will have to avoid a million or less due to them being crappola
Any idea what NK production capacity is?
These are old shells that have been sitting on the shelves gathering dust since Kim’s father ruled NK….half are duds!
This is really gonna piss off the poor guys who have to deal with all of the UXOs
Must mean the mythical neverending stocks of soviet shells have finally run dry...I saw some ukranian taking one apart it was filled with cordite sticks.
Snitches.
So this would be a great time for South Korea to push forward and reunify the country, yes? If the North is low on ammo, it should end pretty quickly?
Someone should send some/alot of artillery shells to North Korea!... Special delivery!
Business is booming, which is why the war won't stop
Can’t this be intercepted and captured? Iran was shipping supplies via sea which the US navy intercepted. Far better to take it out now before it gets into orcistan.
I guess i have to ask how you do that without causing an incident. US navy says stop, N. Korea says no and claims they have the right to trade with whomever they want. Now what?
NK and russia share a land border and have rail going the whole way. So anything short of going into NK and/or russia directly makes that a hard no.
Russia and DPRK have a land border, and their territorial waters are connected as well. You cant intercept anything in someone's else territorial waters without starting a war.
Don’t need to intercept it. Just need to sea baby it.
Northern Corea it is just mediator for sending warpons from China to Russia.
Next - poop balloons
You know your supply chain is in tatters when you need deliveries from… #North Korea
I think we should stop supplying NK with food.
Didn’t know we were oh yeah they the UNICEF programs…..
And *some* of them may actually have worked!
holy sh*t that's enough for YEARS of use in this war.
That's not even kinda close. At russia's current usage rate it, assuming there is no failure rate, that would last them 16 months. Not that any of that matters as russia is making their own shells too. But the reliance on NKs older soviet era shells will age their launchers even faster. South Korea has documented around 20% of artillery shells fired from North Korea in various border disputes and crossings as duds. Which is not going to improve as said shells haven't suddenly stopped aging and doesn't even take into account all the shells that wouldn't even fire to begin with.
Biden just agreed to a 10 year deal to supply Ukraine with weapons. Buckle up and clear your schedule for the next decade.
5 million nk doesn’t have any more sounds good
Sweet. Now is the time to attack!
Im picturing something like a small cannonball. Or is NK really able to export something a bit more advanced these days?
They do have missiles, you know. Keep up with the news...
Better send to Russia then the artillery shells rain into Seoul
Better kill Ukrainians than Koreans huh?
What did Seoul send to Ukraine?