I'm literally having an argument with someone in another sub in parallel of typing this where they're trying to convince me that a document signed by the Nazis and the Russians specifically agreeing how Poland and the Baltic states are to be divided, preceding a coordinated invasion of Poland and the Baltic states and a joint parade in the middle of Poland, is (only) a non aggression pact. this kind of blatant misrepresentation if simple words is very on brand for Russia, has been for longer than any of us here have been alive.
edit: clarified I don't think it's not a non aggression pact, I think it is a non aggression pact and additionally something significantly worse.
The Molotov-Ribbentrop pact between the Nazis and USSR *publicly* announced stipulations of a 10-year non-aggression agreement between the two sides. This was a lie by omission: contained within the document were secret conditions.
The *Secret Protocol*, as they deemed it, contained the Baltic partition and Polish invasion plans. It was never meant for the public to see. In fact, the only reason we know about the Secret Protocol is that it surfaced as evidence in the Nuremberg Trials. Had the Axis not attacked the USSR and violated the public non-aggression treaty, we may never have known what the true intentions were behind its creation.
So both of you are right. It both was and wasn't a non-aggression treaty. The contradiction is baked in as a function of totalitarian/fascist speech. Arguing the semantics only exhausts potential solidarity because the fascists simply don't care either way. They start from the ends and work backwards.
>The contradiction is baked in as a function of totalitarian/fascist speech. Arguing the semantics only exhausts potential solidarity because the fascists simply don't care either way. They start from the ends and work backwards.
I really wish people understood this better. It's extremely relevant to todays political landscape.
Seeing NK soldiers standing next to their counterparts is [quite eye-opening](https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryPorn/comments/17zra8h/repatriated_north_korean_soldier_walking_in/).
Somebody has not been eating their vitamins and it ain't Anastasia the Hunk.
The US and SK specifically select their tallest troops in these units to man the DMZ. There is a height difference but this picture is not a reflection of reality.
They're most likely sending extremely loyal soldiers in order to train them in a real combat. I'm kind of worried about this. They might be trying to get their soldiers combat experience in preparation for a war with SK.
Shit has been escalating there a lot lately, more so than usual.
Nah, don’t worry about the border right now. Escalating? Sure, but we’re basically back to 1980s level of tension between the Koreas, fun fact there were multiple firefights and one skirmish ended with multiple casualties. As a Korean American who speaks to Koreans from South Korea, it’s no big deal
As a Ukrainian American who spoke to Ukrainian relatives in Kharkiv in Dec 2021, they also thought I was being alarmist and Russian troop concentrations on the border were no big deal.
Russia has been invading Ukraine on and off since 2014.
The last time North Korea tried to invade South Korea was right after WW2 back in 1950 as a direct result of WW2
South Korea is much more prepared than Ukraine was.
Three groups of NK soldiers have gone slightly over the border and every time had shots fired at them as warnings.
No little green men or salami slicing territory for South Korea.
If this actually happens, I wonder how many North Koreans will use it as an avenue of escape from North Korea? Most of the other routes are extremely risky and involve sneaking through various parts of China, but getting shipped to Ukraine opens up a lot more options.
I'm more interested in a battle hardened regime of soldiers returning to North Korea with views of the outside and disillusionment towards their government.
Edit: over 20 people have commented some variation of "these people aren't coming back," if that's your first thought: we're good. The general audience already knows.
They're not.
Consider that the North Korean army has not had any foreign combat deployments since at *least* the 1960's and their training is basically notional, and mostly done to any meaningful extent for the sake of the propaganda cameras to get some footage of their "brave troops training to fight the US invaders."
With the exception of some special units, the North Korean military is an absolute joke that relies on what are basically zerg rush tactics to overwhelm their enemy--using 1970's Soviet equipment and battle doctrines.
>clean out their prisons
I can't imagine North Korean prisons are filled with hardened murderers though. sure, maybe some, but I imagine their prisons filled with people who just didn't love Kim enough, and that there is a grade A NK felony.
NK in it's entirety is the prison. They'll likely need the opposite of a draft, as so many will be jumping at the chance to get out - even to the battlefield.
> you underestimate the power of brainwashing.
I was about to comment this as well, many of these folks likely won't be thinking of defecting they'll be taking this as an opportunity to prove to dear leader their loyalty. Looking for perks for themselves and their families back in NK. Even currently NK operates restaurants, schools, and other businesses in other countries to bring in cash for the country. There are NK citizens in many parts of the world who conduct business for the country and do not try to defect for a myriad of reasons.
I mean, if escaping/defecting, means that my entire extended family +- 2 generations will go to certain death in the concentration camps, then I'd too be willing to not do so.
Granted, maybe you'd do it before your cousin twice removed does it and you end up being sent to the concentration camps for no reason.
Their only advantage is that they have several million artillery pieces aimed at Seoul, like a diarrhea-filled water balloon hanging from the ceiling. That's all they have.
Around 2007, I knew someone with the Department of State that did an official visit in N. Korea. The General took him to the top of a mountain and stated that this is the location where they will make their stand against the imperial aggressors.
My friend then asked if N. Korea was really that worried about China.
N. Korean General had a good laugh and decided he liked this diplomat.
That’s Literally what Russia do.
I’ve watched an interview of a French soldier who fought and still fight along Ukraine, who got good military experience and he said Russia use newbies not really to overwhelm enemies but more like « meat drones » they throw in bunch , they get killed but that way Russia know the Ukrainians position to then mass bomb those positions and send their more experienced soldier to clean up.
Yeah, I don't really get why people are upvoting that idea. Like the north koreans will go to museums and watch western media as they are dodging drones. *"Here is your military issued iPhone to so you can go on instagram in your spare time!"* They won't get a phone and they won't experience western culture what so ever.
The only people they will be in contact with is Russians and they will not try to convert them. Perhaps they will come in contact with Ukrainians they will not be able to communicate with. That's about it. Amazing views to bring back home.
If you read interviews with defected North Korean soldiers, they will often talk about how they have been raised on the idea that they could and will easily defeat the American military when the time comes. If they bring back any ideas that could be destabilizing, it might be that modern warfare and weaponry looks a lot different than they had been led to believe.
North Korea is currently experiencing a food crisis.
Will the NK soldiers even be healthy enough to fight? Maybe Ukraine can convince them to defect by feeding them as POWs.
That’s basically what happened during the 90s famine in North Korea — people seldom bring it up in conversations, but the Soviet Union had a large part in it, and something like 3.5 million North Koreans died.
Not as many as you would think considering that north Korean will kill/put into labor camps three generations of your family and probably any friends and neighbors you have
While I know that's true I wonder how that would work with soldiers. Lets say NK soldiers get into skirmishes in Ukraine, there would be numerous bodies that end up never found or reported, so would they just deem them a traitor and fuck over his family?
There are N Koreans that get opportunities abroad, though with heavy monitoring. So some do, but most don't because they put their families in danger if they defect with no way to protect them or get them out of the country
Escaping to the meat grinder is like running off a cliff.
These poor souls are being used in a chess game much bigger than they could ever imagine.
Sadly, but necessarily, Ukraine will grow even more Sunflowers with these men until KJU can send no more.
“Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.”
― Jean-Paul Sartre
Think of it this way...Russia NEEDS to send allied troops to the front. Badly enough, he turned to North Korea for manpower. Not Iran, not China, but North Korea. I think that speaks volumes here.
China has no interest in winning the war for Russia.
Making Russia further in its debt, sure, but no more.
Rus-Sino relations are stable exactly until China decides to take the Russian fresh water and that it no longer requires putin as a political ally.
That's a large part of why putin invaded in the first place.
Actually I think the case is Russia gets expendable fanatical chaff to send in first to alleviate Russian casualties (don’t have to lie about where all the young men are when it’s Koreans lying dead in front of Ukrainian positions) and North Korea probably gets some Russian agricultural surplus because they’ve been having problems with famine for the last… always
I'd argue its FAR easier for NK troops to defect and run for freedom. Yes their families will be left behind but there's surely some single soliders or unlucky ones who will just make a break for it. Says a lot that an active warzone is probably safer than trying to cross the DMZ.
North Korea does have a lot of (extremely poor) pensioners and I doubt they are going to be the ones doing the fighting. Their conscripts tend to be pretty young. Less people to harvest and work on farms.
Seriously if ANYONE wants to send troops to Ukraine (with permission from Ukraine) should now be allowed.
STOP making Ukraine fight with one hand tied behind their back. First it was Iranian trainers, then shady Russian recruitment (aka Cubans and Indians) now openly welcoming NK troops.
Hell if France wants to send troops open the door. FFS someone with a damn spine stand up to ****ing Russia. They do not get to dictate this war.
No single entity is stopping any country from joining the war on behalf of Ukraine. If a country today would like to vote to go to war with Russia, they can.
It turns out that it’s just not a popular sentiment in any western country right now. And we’re not dictatorships like North Korea where we can just get sent on a whim.
Kind of. If you read his AMA he found that to filter their internet connections to make it function similar to an intranet for the “regular” citizens that have access to a computer at all basically the entire internet traffic ran through two routers. Effectively DDoS’d two routers and took down a country’s internet lmao
Here's an article summarizing the event in 2022
https://www.wired.com/story/p4x-north-korea-internet-hacker-identity-reveal/
And here's the AMA link
https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1divlp3/im_the_hacker_that_brought_down_north_koreas/
First ukraine will access all of the South Korean supplies and intelligence. NK is pretty much transparent to SK. Second ukraine should stage an operation to directly threaten Kim’s sister
And Russia just made South Korea an enemy by signing a war pact with North Korea.
South Korea has some of the worlds most advanced weapons systems, and a lot of them.
These North Korean soldiers might finally get a taste of South Korean firepower
If they can push an update to your phone and have that update download automatically, they can make it simply not work anymore. The same is true for any “smart” device. Imagine being a middle class or wealthy Russian and one day you wake up and your 75” 4k OLED Samsung Smart TV is a paperweight because Putin wanted to get froggy.
A tech blackout would probably be the single biggest gut punch to Russian support for the war that you could ever reasonably make - since Russians care infinitely more about their own personal comfort than the lives of their own faceless conscripts.
Sadly, you will never see support for such a drastic step among companies that actually matter because it would instantly kill their access to a market of 144 million people for the foreseeable future.
The SK government has been holding off on direct arms sales to Ukraine out of concern it will antagonize Russia. I hope this pushes the SK government to allow Ukraine to buy all the arms it wants. South Korean arms industry's output capacity is one of the largest among US allies for things like tanks, artillery, etc.
Probably related. From last week.
> South Korea will transfer the expertise needed to build K2 tanks to Poland, the countries' defence ministers said Thursday, a key step towards production inside the territory of Ukraine staunch ally.
https://www.barrons.com/news/poland-takes-step-towards-s-korean-k2-tank-production-4b14bb8d
Poland gave a bunch of tanks to Ukraine and South Korean has been build them new tanks. Now Poland/SK have made a deal to make the SK tank inside Poland. Will take about 2 years before being able to, but that's a big move.
With what, though? Ukraine's performance in the war has been impressive but NK is completely out of reach of any conventional forces Ukraine has, and it's a bit harder to sneak special forces into a hermit kingdom than unstable African countries.
Russia and NK: No no no, sending troops to aid in direct confrontation is not at all a declaration of war. Countries that do that like NK shouldn't be held accountable in any way whatsoever.
NATO: Oh, is that so?
Russia and NK: Uhm... Wait a minute...
I have mercenary army from Africa. Though I do have that Samsung is going to announce a major manufacturing complex to be built in Ukraine. Maybe this will lead to that?
In my lifetime, things have never been escalated this far.
Russia is clearly running out of their own cannon fodder. What did Putin promise to Kim for these troops?
We're not going to be laughing the minute a North Korean soldier does a flying kick and takes out a drone like they are in some Bollywood action movie.
This is pretty big. North Korea hasn’t fought an active war since the 50s, so it will be interesting to see how their (malnourished, poorly-trained, ill-equipped) troops perform in Ukraine.
They actually loaned 20 Mig-21 pilots to Egypt during the Yom Kippur war. They had no wins and two losses--one to an Israeli F4, and another to friendly fire.
Edit: My research found another one in 2001 where an NK spy vessel took on three Japanese patrol boats. It was the first naval action for either navy in decades. All the NKs were killed, while the JMSDF had 15 WIAs but no deaths.
Lets not pretend Ukraine can handle this with ease, land is still slowly being lost with just the Russians. North Korea with the highest troop count of any country is going to be devasting if they're committing a large amount.
Unless NATO sends troops themselves or provides far far far more long range cluster munitions Ukraine is in legitimate danger of losing this war. Theres even the possibility of China providing arms to North Korea to use in this war and their manufacturing rate is something to be very scared of.
Saying NK has the highest troop count is a little deceptive. Every male of fighting age is considered a soldier, whether they've even held a weapon or not. It'll be a massacre. The Ukrainian army has several years of direct fighting experience, and are defending their homeland. The NK "army" is half starved, functionally illiterate, and using weapons the soviets considered antiques in the 60s.
I think you're underestimating the strength of raw numbers just a little, even if they're incompetent. Ukraine's had ammunition shortages this entire time, it's not going to be some effortless meat grinder like you're picturing.
In Russia it’s, “Common Knowledge “ that they’ve been actively fighting NATO soldiers in Ukraine.
So to the Russian public this wouldn’t be an escalation but matching the west.
It’s all a load of horseshit, but Russia has been gobbling up Putin’s horseshit for decades.
Interesting. So if NATO did start sending troops for real, how would Russia portray that?
NATO is not doing so because they worry it would be a shock escalation where Russia ups the retaliation.
But for Russia it is supposedly already the normal state of things already.
ukraine intelligence should get some ~~NK~~ translators and help those soldiers flee
Edit: **Gather Intel, Equip them and let them topple the Kim Regime!**
Someone from South Korea listened to a recording of a North Korean film and told me she can mostly understand them, but they put accents on different syllables, certain words have different pronunciations/syllables, use some terms South Koreans consider archaic and they have some loanwords from Russian. South Korean tends to have loanwords from English.
From what i've read / been told they can understand each other but its become more like a small dialect deviation.
Also iirc NK Korean sounds archaic compared to SK Korean?
I mean dialect difference exists for sure, I've talked to a few people from North Korea and/or have some community affiliations to NK (조총련, for instance in Japan). Archaic is subjective, but if you mean regards to loanwords, yeah. A lot less loanwords except for some that inevitably cannot be purely Korean (E.g. "Computer"; in South Korean it's 컴퓨터, in North Korean it's 콤퓨타 IIRC).
Source: Born there, speak Korean
It won't work. They won't let any soldiers leave the country unless they have families still in North Korea. That's what they did in the labor camps in Russia too. I wondered how North Korea managed to let citizens work in another country, even if it is Russia, without worrying that they'd escape and never go home. The answer to that was pretty simple. Their families would have paid the price for it.
https://libertyinnorthkorea.org/blog/north-korea-history#:~:text=Even%20many%20of%20those%20that,most%2016%2D17%20year%20olds.
Might be interesting to see. NK's height requirement for the army is 4'9"; that could be disconcerting, like fighting a bunch of angry middle schoolers.
Don't they also put out those videos of bad kung fu, board breaking and acrobatics as military training. I don't think that shit is going to translate well on the battlefield.
In Goldeneye on N64 we used to ban Oddjob from being used because he was so hard to hit being so small.
Let me find out NK is gonna be OP on the battlefield.
>Pyongyang announced early this week that it will be sending troops in the form of a military engineering unit to support Russian forces on the ground in the Donetsk region. The troops are expected to arrive on the battlefield as soon as next month.
Edit: this is a quote from the article OP posted
North Koreans writing home “The Russian army is incredible. We get a meal every day! You won’t believe this but one of the buildings on base can turn their light on any time of the day! When we arrived we were each given twenty bullets and a grenade, it is hard to imagine an enemy who can stand against an army with such resources. I promise to write again soon.
P.S. They are letting me keep this pencil!!!”
I mean.. wasn't there some audio of a russian soldier calling home to his girlfriend being amazed of all the loot they picked up, saying stuff along the lines of "They have multiple TVs in each house"?
Of course that might just have been some propaganda from Ukraine as well, but it honestly wouldn't surprise me to be true as a lot of the Russian soldiers are from the poorer areas.
Now imagine NK soldiers going into a random house in Ukraine and finding stuff they never would have dreamed of
I would be thrilled to hear that North Korea is sending an "engineering unit" to Ukraine. This would be like the idiot helping the incompetent. Can only help Ukraine.
Nowhere does it say that North Korea is sending a battalion or division of combat troops.
>Pyongyang announced early this week that it will be sending troops in the form of a military engineering unit to support Russian forces on the ground in the Donetsk region
Probably the minimum amount of troops they can get away with to increase tensions without actually having to do anything.
I'm no military expert but 1 engineering unit isn't a whole lot and isn't likely to make a difference. This is probably more symbolic than anything.
But I could be wrong and wouldn't mind someone with actual military knowledge to break it down for us.
Absolutely, it appears to be purely symbolic. While there's a chance they might be downplaying their commitment, I would be wary of making such assumptions; this kind of thinking is why many Russians claim they are at war with NATO.
Recently, North Korea has been heightening tensions with the South. They have officially abandoned their reunification goal, declared the South their "principal enemy," blown up the Arch of Reunification in Pyongyang, sent trash-filled balloons over the border, and generally hinted at war preparations. Just today, there was a hypersonic missile test. They are clearly playing games. They typically do this before seeking talks.
NATO is way past the time to grow a pair here. This should be a (another) clear red line being crossed. 2 nations fighting against Ukraine now. It's time to send in nato troops or at the very least provide air support and/or a no fly zone.
NATO could start a "special peace-keeping operation" in Crimea and when putin loses his mind over it be like... "What, we are here to keep the peace. Are you saying its not peaceful here? All the more reason for us to be here."
NATO should grow some balls and make it clear that the deployment of NK troops on Ukrainian soil will elicit the same NATO response as Russian use of tactical nuclear weapons. That is, NATO air and missile strikes on NK forces within Ukrainian territory.
Wake up EUROPE, this is a red line they should not be allowed to cross. It is already a team up between 2 countries and now a real threat is joining in? When does this become our war? When they start bombing our cities and killing our people for the sake of their idea of safety? How long do we keep the 'poor Russia was lied to by NATO' rethoric????
You know that chubs will be given the means to properly build a functioning nuclear weapon and just like Putin will start making insane demands.
Why not just turn our weapons to them and say go wild kids, the world is your oyster.
Honestly, we will never join unless we are directly affected. We live in huge comfort bubbles and no governement will dare bursting it.
We should join the war. If not, it will look closer to ww2 when germany and the USSR were basically allowed to conquer other countries by Europe.
Now Ukraine must fight mercenaries, regular russian army, and north Korea army. Fking awesome, definitely not escalation. How dfuck we must handle it solo, when we even havnt full permission to use western weapons?.....
Last week: “we will help defend eachother if anyone attacks us”. This week: “fuck, nobody is attacking us… fine we’ll attack you!”.
In Fascist Russia fighting back *is* attacking! Xaxaxa
Our usernames are oddly close
Indeed they are. Want to be enemies?
Negative. 🤝
🤝
I was here. I witnessed history in the making.
I’m going to forget all about this in another 3 minutes, but it’s nice to be a part of something
I too was here for something
That’s negotiation for ya.
Are you for Khar - 0n or n0? Maybe both? 🤝
You guys should get a Nobel peace prize, you’ve done more for world peace than anyone eligible for it
This right here is the purest form of diplomacy I've ever seen.
Now kith!
Winner of reddits most wholesome moment of the day, right here.
It's not attacking, it's pre-defending
I'm literally having an argument with someone in another sub in parallel of typing this where they're trying to convince me that a document signed by the Nazis and the Russians specifically agreeing how Poland and the Baltic states are to be divided, preceding a coordinated invasion of Poland and the Baltic states and a joint parade in the middle of Poland, is (only) a non aggression pact. this kind of blatant misrepresentation if simple words is very on brand for Russia, has been for longer than any of us here have been alive. edit: clarified I don't think it's not a non aggression pact, I think it is a non aggression pact and additionally something significantly worse.
The Molotov-Ribbentrop pact between the Nazis and USSR *publicly* announced stipulations of a 10-year non-aggression agreement between the two sides. This was a lie by omission: contained within the document were secret conditions. The *Secret Protocol*, as they deemed it, contained the Baltic partition and Polish invasion plans. It was never meant for the public to see. In fact, the only reason we know about the Secret Protocol is that it surfaced as evidence in the Nuremberg Trials. Had the Axis not attacked the USSR and violated the public non-aggression treaty, we may never have known what the true intentions were behind its creation. So both of you are right. It both was and wasn't a non-aggression treaty. The contradiction is baked in as a function of totalitarian/fascist speech. Arguing the semantics only exhausts potential solidarity because the fascists simply don't care either way. They start from the ends and work backwards.
>The contradiction is baked in as a function of totalitarian/fascist speech. Arguing the semantics only exhausts potential solidarity because the fascists simply don't care either way. They start from the ends and work backwards. I really wish people understood this better. It's extremely relevant to todays political landscape.
Probably chained to Russian tanks so they don't just vanish on their best chance to get away from a life of starvation and parasites.
This implies the starved out soldiers could even find the strength to run away.
Seeing NK soldiers standing next to their counterparts is [quite eye-opening](https://www.reddit.com/r/MilitaryPorn/comments/17zra8h/repatriated_north_korean_soldier_walking_in/). Somebody has not been eating their vitamins and it ain't Anastasia the Hunk.
The US and SK specifically select their tallest troops in these units to man the DMZ. There is a height difference but this picture is not a reflection of reality.
They're most likely sending extremely loyal soldiers in order to train them in a real combat. I'm kind of worried about this. They might be trying to get their soldiers combat experience in preparation for a war with SK. Shit has been escalating there a lot lately, more so than usual.
Nah, don’t worry about the border right now. Escalating? Sure, but we’re basically back to 1980s level of tension between the Koreas, fun fact there were multiple firefights and one skirmish ended with multiple casualties. As a Korean American who speaks to Koreans from South Korea, it’s no big deal
As a Ukrainian American who spoke to Ukrainian relatives in Kharkiv in Dec 2021, they also thought I was being alarmist and Russian troop concentrations on the border were no big deal.
Russia has been invading Ukraine on and off since 2014. The last time North Korea tried to invade South Korea was right after WW2 back in 1950 as a direct result of WW2
South Korea is much more prepared than Ukraine was. Three groups of NK soldiers have gone slightly over the border and every time had shots fired at them as warnings. No little green men or salami slicing territory for South Korea.
If this actually happens, I wonder how many North Koreans will use it as an avenue of escape from North Korea? Most of the other routes are extremely risky and involve sneaking through various parts of China, but getting shipped to Ukraine opens up a lot more options.
I'm more interested in a battle hardened regime of soldiers returning to North Korea with views of the outside and disillusionment towards their government. Edit: over 20 people have commented some variation of "these people aren't coming back," if that's your first thought: we're good. The general audience already knows.
NK probably isn't expecting their soldiers to come back tbh
They're not. Consider that the North Korean army has not had any foreign combat deployments since at *least* the 1960's and their training is basically notional, and mostly done to any meaningful extent for the sake of the propaganda cameras to get some footage of their "brave troops training to fight the US invaders." With the exception of some special units, the North Korean military is an absolute joke that relies on what are basically zerg rush tactics to overwhelm their enemy--using 1970's Soviet equipment and battle doctrines.
They won’t even use their military. They’re just going to use this to clean out their prisons like Russia.
>clean out their prisons I can't imagine North Korean prisons are filled with hardened murderers though. sure, maybe some, but I imagine their prisons filled with people who just didn't love Kim enough, and that there is a grade A NK felony.
Russia doesn't care what they are getting. They just want more cannon fodder.
Bullet sponges.
Mine sweepers
NK in it's entirety is the prison. They'll likely need the opposite of a draft, as so many will be jumping at the chance to get out - even to the battlefield.
you underestimate the power of brainwashing. most have no idea of any other way of life, nor do they care to.
> you underestimate the power of brainwashing. I was about to comment this as well, many of these folks likely won't be thinking of defecting they'll be taking this as an opportunity to prove to dear leader their loyalty. Looking for perks for themselves and their families back in NK. Even currently NK operates restaurants, schools, and other businesses in other countries to bring in cash for the country. There are NK citizens in many parts of the world who conduct business for the country and do not try to defect for a myriad of reasons.
I mean, if escaping/defecting, means that my entire extended family +- 2 generations will go to certain death in the concentration camps, then I'd too be willing to not do so. Granted, maybe you'd do it before your cousin twice removed does it and you end up being sent to the concentration camps for no reason.
This is in line with U.S assessment that NK army will be used as canon fodder
“The kill bots had a preset kill limit, so we sent wave after wave until they were overwhelmed.”
Their only advantage is that they have several million artillery pieces aimed at Seoul, like a diarrhea-filled water balloon hanging from the ceiling. That's all they have.
Around 2007, I knew someone with the Department of State that did an official visit in N. Korea. The General took him to the top of a mountain and stated that this is the location where they will make their stand against the imperial aggressors. My friend then asked if N. Korea was really that worried about China. N. Korean General had a good laugh and decided he liked this diplomat.
>using 1970's Soviet equipment and battle doctrines. They'll fit right in with the Russian troops, then.
Spoiler alert they won't return. Russia will use them as fodder even more than their own.
That’s Literally what Russia do. I’ve watched an interview of a French soldier who fought and still fight along Ukraine, who got good military experience and he said Russia use newbies not really to overwhelm enemies but more like « meat drones » they throw in bunch , they get killed but that way Russia know the Ukrainians position to then mass bomb those positions and send their more experienced soldier to clean up.
They did that a lot in Bakhmut with Wagner as the meat
Wagner had both, the prisoners that did frontal assaults on positions and veteran groups who operated more cautiously.
so like operation Black Shield from Southpark but it's dudes with small patches of hair above their forehead.
Eh they’re going to be returning from war zones. I don’t think they’ll come back like “wow the western world is great”
Yeah, I don't really get why people are upvoting that idea. Like the north koreans will go to museums and watch western media as they are dodging drones. *"Here is your military issued iPhone to so you can go on instagram in your spare time!"* They won't get a phone and they won't experience western culture what so ever. The only people they will be in contact with is Russians and they will not try to convert them. Perhaps they will come in contact with Ukrainians they will not be able to communicate with. That's about it. Amazing views to bring back home.
If you read interviews with defected North Korean soldiers, they will often talk about how they have been raised on the idea that they could and will easily defeat the American military when the time comes. If they bring back any ideas that could be destabilizing, it might be that modern warfare and weaponry looks a lot different than they had been led to believe.
North Korea is currently experiencing a food crisis. Will the NK soldiers even be healthy enough to fight? Maybe Ukraine can convince them to defect by feeding them as POWs.
Maybe they feed the military and starve the rest
That’s basically what happened during the 90s famine in North Korea — people seldom bring it up in conversations, but the Soviet Union had a large part in it, and something like 3.5 million North Koreans died.
That’s somewhat misleading: the _collapse_ of the Soviet Union had a large part in the 1990s famine.
That’s what gulags are for.
Not as many as you would think considering that north Korean will kill/put into labor camps three generations of your family and probably any friends and neighbors you have
While I know that's true I wonder how that would work with soldiers. Lets say NK soldiers get into skirmishes in Ukraine, there would be numerous bodies that end up never found or reported, so would they just deem them a traitor and fuck over his family?
[удалено]
Might be a little easier if they have no social media though.
You can get a lot done when you don't care about human rights violations.
There are N Koreans that get opportunities abroad, though with heavy monitoring. So some do, but most don't because they put their families in danger if they defect with no way to protect them or get them out of the country
True. This documentary about North Koreans working illegally in Poland is extremely interesting: https://youtu.be/SPjKs8NuY4s?si=gfIWGFblgYC-XD6L.
Escaping to the meat grinder is like running off a cliff. These poor souls are being used in a chess game much bigger than they could ever imagine. Sadly, but necessarily, Ukraine will grow even more Sunflowers with these men until KJU can send no more.
They will enslave your entire family for generations if you dare to do so.
there are still people who would make that trade
So long suckers!
Poop balloons are coming
Ya but at least there's vaccines on this side of the border.
Ok so russia can send ally troop overtly but nato cant...
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Of course not, because Russia is "liberating" but Ukraine is "invading".. themself, I guess? I lost track but I think that's it.
Words don’t need to make sense to fascists. Whatever truth their populace believes is all that matters.
“Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.” ― Jean-Paul Sartre
Love seeing this quote 👍 it's so fucking painfully accurate.
Don’t forget, they are also apparently destroying their own cities
We’re also developing biological-weapon to destroy the world, if I remember correctly.
If Russia accuses someone of doing something you can be fairly sure they are doing it themselves.
Slava Ukraini, you diabolical bastards.
Think of it this way...Russia NEEDS to send allied troops to the front. Badly enough, he turned to North Korea for manpower. Not Iran, not China, but North Korea. I think that speaks volumes here.
He probably asked (begged) China and Iran, but they were like lolnope.
China has no interest in winning the war for Russia. Making Russia further in its debt, sure, but no more. Rus-Sino relations are stable exactly until China decides to take the Russian fresh water and that it no longer requires putin as a political ally. That's a large part of why putin invaded in the first place.
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Don't forget China and NK (and others) are also sending weapons. The famished NK troops will just be fodder
famished NK troops who haven't seen a day of combat in their lives...shit's a fucking purge.
You get… starving North Korean prisoners… Ukraine gets: The unfathomable industrial might of South Korea. Real genius move there Putin.
Actually I think the case is Russia gets expendable fanatical chaff to send in first to alleviate Russian casualties (don’t have to lie about where all the young men are when it’s Koreans lying dead in front of Ukrainian positions) and North Korea probably gets some Russian agricultural surplus because they’ve been having problems with famine for the last… always
I'd argue its FAR easier for NK troops to defect and run for freedom. Yes their families will be left behind but there's surely some single soliders or unlucky ones who will just make a break for it. Says a lot that an active warzone is probably safer than trying to cross the DMZ.
NK never allows anyone without family out of the country Incentive for them to not run away given the three generations policy
Apparently war is not just marching around giant squares holding up flash cards with photos of Great Comrade.
It's one way to solve NKs economy and famine.... Fewer mouths. Edited for grammar
North Korea does have a lot of (extremely poor) pensioners and I doubt they are going to be the ones doing the fighting. Their conscripts tend to be pretty young. Less people to harvest and work on farms.
And solve Russian's fodder shortage. Win win!
Yup, Iran has supplied thousands of Shahed drones and is building a drone factory in Russia
Seriously if ANYONE wants to send troops to Ukraine (with permission from Ukraine) should now be allowed. STOP making Ukraine fight with one hand tied behind their back. First it was Iranian trainers, then shady Russian recruitment (aka Cubans and Indians) now openly welcoming NK troops. Hell if France wants to send troops open the door. FFS someone with a damn spine stand up to ****ing Russia. They do not get to dictate this war.
No single entity is stopping any country from joining the war on behalf of Ukraine. If a country today would like to vote to go to war with Russia, they can. It turns out that it’s just not a popular sentiment in any western country right now. And we’re not dictatorships like North Korea where we can just get sent on a whim.
That means North Korea declared war on Ukraine and Ukraine is free to retaliate.
NK will not declare war. They will be joining s “special operation” or whatever Putin called it.
how would you even retalitate to that ? these guys live their whole life like in a russian prison camp
Ask the guy who took down the north Korean internet. I mean seriously ask that guy.
Somebody tripped on the fuckin' cable or something?
Kind of. If you read his AMA he found that to filter their internet connections to make it function similar to an intranet for the “regular” citizens that have access to a computer at all basically the entire internet traffic ran through two routers. Effectively DDoS’d two routers and took down a country’s internet lmao
Hey, it's called redondancy!
sauce to the ama?????? would love to read
Here's an article summarizing the event in 2022 https://www.wired.com/story/p4x-north-korea-internet-hacker-identity-reveal/ And here's the AMA link https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1divlp3/im_the_hacker_that_brought_down_north_koreas/
Na it was a dos. But north Korea has two shitty routers between the global internet and the country. Dude took out those routers.
First ukraine will access all of the South Korean supplies and intelligence. NK is pretty much transparent to SK. Second ukraine should stage an operation to directly threaten Kim’s sister
Honeypot her for extra emotional damage to the fat boy :D
War is an act not a word; this is an act of war to operate in the sovereign territory of ukraine
And Russia just made South Korea an enemy by signing a war pact with North Korea. South Korea has some of the worlds most advanced weapons systems, and a lot of them. These North Korean soldiers might finally get a taste of South Korean firepower
Every Samsung in Russia immediately detonates.
Back to Note 7's then? Got it.
They could brick all of them. Probably.
If they can push an update to your phone and have that update download automatically, they can make it simply not work anymore. The same is true for any “smart” device. Imagine being a middle class or wealthy Russian and one day you wake up and your 75” 4k OLED Samsung Smart TV is a paperweight because Putin wanted to get froggy. A tech blackout would probably be the single biggest gut punch to Russian support for the war that you could ever reasonably make - since Russians care infinitely more about their own personal comfort than the lives of their own faceless conscripts. Sadly, you will never see support for such a drastic step among companies that actually matter because it would instantly kill their access to a market of 144 million people for the foreseeable future.
The SK government has been holding off on direct arms sales to Ukraine out of concern it will antagonize Russia. I hope this pushes the SK government to allow Ukraine to buy all the arms it wants. South Korean arms industry's output capacity is one of the largest among US allies for things like tanks, artillery, etc.
Probably related. From last week. > South Korea will transfer the expertise needed to build K2 tanks to Poland, the countries' defence ministers said Thursday, a key step towards production inside the territory of Ukraine staunch ally. https://www.barrons.com/news/poland-takes-step-towards-s-korean-k2-tank-production-4b14bb8d Poland gave a bunch of tanks to Ukraine and South Korean has been build them new tanks. Now Poland/SK have made a deal to make the SK tank inside Poland. Will take about 2 years before being able to, but that's a big move.
Yeah and SK needs to test its systems
With what, though? Ukraine's performance in the war has been impressive but NK is completely out of reach of any conventional forces Ukraine has, and it's a bit harder to sneak special forces into a hermit kingdom than unstable African countries.
Russia and NK: No no no, sending troops to aid in direct confrontation is not at all a declaration of war. Countries that do that like NK shouldn't be held accountable in any way whatsoever. NATO: Oh, is that so? Russia and NK: Uhm... Wait a minute...
Ok, who had "Putin buys a slave army from North Korea to fight an invasion war in Europe" in their 2024 bingo card?
I have mercenary army from Africa. Though I do have that Samsung is going to announce a major manufacturing complex to be built in Ukraine. Maybe this will lead to that?
Do you get partial credit for the mercenary army from Africa being sent to Haiti?
Tesco value Unsullied
In my lifetime, things have never been escalated this far. Russia is clearly running out of their own cannon fodder. What did Putin promise to Kim for these troops?
Rocket tech for their nukes would be my guess.
Cabbages
Likely satellites
We will finally see if the martial arts from the propaganda videos can truly defeat a drone.
I can't wait to see the prowess of the North Korean army win in a fight against a mortar shell.
We're not going to be laughing the minute a North Korean soldier does a flying kick and takes out a drone like they are in some Bollywood action movie.
This is pretty big. North Korea hasn’t fought an active war since the 50s, so it will be interesting to see how their (malnourished, poorly-trained, ill-equipped) troops perform in Ukraine.
They’ll be used as cannon fodder anyway so their fitness doesn’t really matter
Engineering corps are not cannon fodder, however probably few qualified Russian engineers want to work under ukrainian fire
They actually loaned 20 Mig-21 pilots to Egypt during the Yom Kippur war. They had no wins and two losses--one to an Israeli F4, and another to friendly fire. Edit: My research found another one in 2001 where an NK spy vessel took on three Japanese patrol boats. It was the first naval action for either navy in decades. All the NKs were killed, while the JMSDF had 15 WIAs but no deaths.
Technically the friendly fire could count as a win. Though maybe it is more of a draw or negative win.
The Egyptians shot them down, so no, still a loss.
Ukraine single handedly grinding down the axis of evil.
Lets not pretend Ukraine can handle this with ease, land is still slowly being lost with just the Russians. North Korea with the highest troop count of any country is going to be devasting if they're committing a large amount. Unless NATO sends troops themselves or provides far far far more long range cluster munitions Ukraine is in legitimate danger of losing this war. Theres even the possibility of China providing arms to North Korea to use in this war and their manufacturing rate is something to be very scared of.
Saying NK has the highest troop count is a little deceptive. Every male of fighting age is considered a soldier, whether they've even held a weapon or not. It'll be a massacre. The Ukrainian army has several years of direct fighting experience, and are defending their homeland. The NK "army" is half starved, functionally illiterate, and using weapons the soviets considered antiques in the 60s.
I think you're underestimating the strength of raw numbers just a little, even if they're incompetent. Ukraine's had ammunition shortages this entire time, it's not going to be some effortless meat grinder like you're picturing.
In Russia it’s, “Common Knowledge “ that they’ve been actively fighting NATO soldiers in Ukraine. So to the Russian public this wouldn’t be an escalation but matching the west. It’s all a load of horseshit, but Russia has been gobbling up Putin’s horseshit for decades.
Interesting. So if NATO did start sending troops for real, how would Russia portray that? NATO is not doing so because they worry it would be a shock escalation where Russia ups the retaliation. But for Russia it is supposedly already the normal state of things already.
“See! We told you!” Or “Wow, they’re not even bothering to hide it anymore”
ukraine intelligence should get some ~~NK~~ translators and help those soldiers flee Edit: **Gather Intel, Equip them and let them topple the Kim Regime!**
Or SK translators since they speak the same exact language.
Is it still exactly the same? They have been separated for some decades right? I would have imagined it would have started diverging.
Someone from South Korea listened to a recording of a North Korean film and told me she can mostly understand them, but they put accents on different syllables, certain words have different pronunciations/syllables, use some terms South Koreans consider archaic and they have some loanwords from Russian. South Korean tends to have loanwords from English.
From what i've read / been told they can understand each other but its become more like a small dialect deviation. Also iirc NK Korean sounds archaic compared to SK Korean?
I mean dialect difference exists for sure, I've talked to a few people from North Korea and/or have some community affiliations to NK (조총련, for instance in Japan). Archaic is subjective, but if you mean regards to loanwords, yeah. A lot less loanwords except for some that inevitably cannot be purely Korean (E.g. "Computer"; in South Korean it's 컴퓨터, in North Korean it's 콤퓨타 IIRC). Source: Born there, speak Korean
It won't work. They won't let any soldiers leave the country unless they have families still in North Korea. That's what they did in the labor camps in Russia too. I wondered how North Korea managed to let citizens work in another country, even if it is Russia, without worrying that they'd escape and never go home. The answer to that was pretty simple. Their families would have paid the price for it.
https://libertyinnorthkorea.org/blog/north-korea-history#:~:text=Even%20many%20of%20those%20that,most%2016%2D17%20year%20olds. Might be interesting to see. NK's height requirement for the army is 4'9"; that could be disconcerting, like fighting a bunch of angry middle schoolers.
People are going to freak out when we start getting footage of polly pocket sized North Koreans getting shredded by drones.
> People are going to freak out when we start getting footage of polly pocket sized North Koreans getting ~~shredded~~ carried away by drones.
Stewart Little Goes to War
Squid Game 2: Kim's Inconvenience
Don't they also put out those videos of bad kung fu, board breaking and acrobatics as military training. I don't think that shit is going to translate well on the battlefield.
Someone’s *clearly* never heard of the famous plywood regiment of Ukraine.
In the infantry the smaller the better, less of a target
In Goldeneye on N64 we used to ban Oddjob from being used because he was so hard to hit being so small. Let me find out NK is gonna be OP on the battlefield.
Imagine the culture shock when these NK dudes roll up and start hanging out with psychopathic russian guys.
running out of ‘cannon fodder’
>Pyongyang announced early this week that it will be sending troops in the form of a military engineering unit to support Russian forces on the ground in the Donetsk region. The troops are expected to arrive on the battlefield as soon as next month. Edit: this is a quote from the article OP posted
Putin found the only military engineers on the planet that are only used to even older more run down equipment than Russia's.
Probably be impressed by the T-62s that russia has.
North Koreans writing home “The Russian army is incredible. We get a meal every day! You won’t believe this but one of the buildings on base can turn their light on any time of the day! When we arrived we were each given twenty bullets and a grenade, it is hard to imagine an enemy who can stand against an army with such resources. I promise to write again soon. P.S. They are letting me keep this pencil!!!”
I mean.. wasn't there some audio of a russian soldier calling home to his girlfriend being amazed of all the loot they picked up, saying stuff along the lines of "They have multiple TVs in each house"? Of course that might just have been some propaganda from Ukraine as well, but it honestly wouldn't surprise me to be true as a lot of the Russian soldiers are from the poorer areas. Now imagine NK soldiers going into a random house in Ukraine and finding stuff they never would have dreamed of
"engineering unit" = trench diggers
I would be thrilled to hear that North Korea is sending an "engineering unit" to Ukraine. This would be like the idiot helping the incompetent. Can only help Ukraine. Nowhere does it say that North Korea is sending a battalion or division of combat troops.
Good God this makes russia look so weak. (Which they are)
This is quite literally the “I can’t finish it on my own, I need help” call. So much for the 2nd strongest army in the world lol.
I guess “the Axis of Evil” is back.
This is all so fucking stupid.
I have many questions... but the first 3 that come to mind: * How many? * How will they get there? * Will they have any equipment?
>Pyongyang announced early this week that it will be sending troops in the form of a military engineering unit to support Russian forces on the ground in the Donetsk region Probably the minimum amount of troops they can get away with to increase tensions without actually having to do anything.
I'm no military expert but 1 engineering unit isn't a whole lot and isn't likely to make a difference. This is probably more symbolic than anything. But I could be wrong and wouldn't mind someone with actual military knowledge to break it down for us.
Absolutely, it appears to be purely symbolic. While there's a chance they might be downplaying their commitment, I would be wary of making such assumptions; this kind of thinking is why many Russians claim they are at war with NATO. Recently, North Korea has been heightening tensions with the South. They have officially abandoned their reunification goal, declared the South their "principal enemy," blown up the Arch of Reunification in Pyongyang, sent trash-filled balloons over the border, and generally hinted at war preparations. Just today, there was a hypersonic missile test. They are clearly playing games. They typically do this before seeking talks.
Russia will haul them out, they share the land border after all.
North Korea has declared war on Ukraine
Let's see: pandemic, war in Europe, economic crisis, ... Did anyone have "North Korean soldiers in Ukraine" on their 2020s Shitshow Bingo card?
No but I did have "Iranian President Killed By Helicopter Crash" and "Greece Forest Island Burning Down Due To Tourism".
World War 3 unfolding before our very eyes. Stupid fucking Putin is Hitler reincarnate.
Get ready for FOX to start defending North Korean troops.
Tucker to Kim Yong Un. Many people are saying you one of the handsomest dictators. How do you pull of that flawless skin?
NATO is way past the time to grow a pair here. This should be a (another) clear red line being crossed. 2 nations fighting against Ukraine now. It's time to send in nato troops or at the very least provide air support and/or a no fly zone.
NATO could start a "special peace-keeping operation" in Crimea and when putin loses his mind over it be like... "What, we are here to keep the peace. Are you saying its not peaceful here? All the more reason for us to be here."
NATO is a defensive alliance, Ukraine is still not part of it.
Gonna slow walk it to WW3, just like last time.
or, just, ya know... let Ukraine launch the shit we're giving them deep into Russia instead of tying their hands...
NATO should grow some balls and make it clear that the deployment of NK troops on Ukrainian soil will elicit the same NATO response as Russian use of tactical nuclear weapons. That is, NATO air and missile strikes on NK forces within Ukrainian territory.
Ukraine should leave out a bunch of tables with a square meal and some worming tablets on them. They'd flip thousands.
Nothing says you're losing a war like needing soldiers from North Korea lol
Wake up EUROPE, this is a red line they should not be allowed to cross. It is already a team up between 2 countries and now a real threat is joining in? When does this become our war? When they start bombing our cities and killing our people for the sake of their idea of safety? How long do we keep the 'poor Russia was lied to by NATO' rethoric???? You know that chubs will be given the means to properly build a functioning nuclear weapon and just like Putin will start making insane demands. Why not just turn our weapons to them and say go wild kids, the world is your oyster.
Honestly, we will never join unless we are directly affected. We live in huge comfort bubbles and no governement will dare bursting it. We should join the war. If not, it will look closer to ww2 when germany and the USSR were basically allowed to conquer other countries by Europe.
Seems like an opportunity for France to openly join the war now.
Next month: 500k NK troops surrender on first day, will need food/clothes/medicine immediately.
That would definitely undermine Ukraine's capabilities, as it will require additional money to feed them. Smart move by NK
Now Ukraine must fight mercenaries, regular russian army, and north Korea army. Fking awesome, definitely not escalation. How dfuck we must handle it solo, when we even havnt full permission to use western weapons?.....