North Korean troops in Russia should not be underestimated, former soldiers tell BBC

What Haneul remembers most about his time in the North Korean military is the continuous and persistent hunger. He lost 10kg in his first month of service, due to a diet of cracked corn and moldy cabbage.

Three months into training, he says almost his entire battalion was severely malnourished and needed to be sent to a recovery center to gain weight.

When they were later sent as frontline guards on the border with South Korea, rice replaced corn. But by the time it reached their bowls, the rear units had diverted much of it and sand-cut the rest.

Haneul says his unit was among the best fed, a tactic to prevent them from defecting to South Korea. But he failed to stop Haneul.

In 2012, he defied death and crossed the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), the strip of land that divides the North from the South.

His experience and that of other military defectors helps shed light on the condition of thousands of North Korean troops deployed on the front lines of Russia’s war against Ukraine.

Pyongyang has He reportedly sent around 11,000 soldiers to help Russian forces retake part of their Kursk region taken by Ukraine in a surprise summer offensive.

Earlier this week, Seoul, Washington and Kyiv said He said soldiers had now entered the fight “in significant numbers” and reported the first casualties, with South Korean officials estimating that more than 100 had already been killed and more wounded. This figure has not been confirmed.

However, defectors and other military experts have told the BBC that these troops should not be underestimated.

According to South Korean intelligence, most belong to the elite Storm Corps unit and have “high morale” but “lack understanding of contemporary warfare.”

Only the tallest, most athletic men are selected for the Storm Corps, says defector Lee Hyun Seung, who trained North Korea’s special forces in the early 2000s before defecting in 2014.

He taught them martial arts, how to throw knives and make weapons from cutlery and other kitchen utensils.

But although the Storm Corps’ training is more advanced than that of regular North Korean units, soldiers are still undernourished and even malnourished.

Online videos, purportedly from troops in Russia, show younger, “frail” soldiers, Haneul says. They are a stark contrast to Pyongyang’s propaganda videos, which show men freeing themselves from iron chains and breaking blocks of ice with their bare hands.

During his entire time in the military, Haneul says he fired only three rounds in a single live-fire training session.

The closest he came to combat was when a hungry farmer entered the DMZ in search of vegetables. Haneul says he ignored instructions to “shoot intruders” and let the man go with a warning.

It is difficult to know how much has changed in the decade since Haneul defected, given the paucity of information from North Korea. It appears that the country’s leader, Kim Jong Un, has directed much of his limited resources toward missiles and nuclear weapons rather than his standing army.

But according to another soldier, Ryu Seonghyun, who defected in 2019, the first three years in the military are “incredibly hard,” even for special forces. The 28-year-old, who worked as a driver in the Air Force for seven years, says that during his service conditions worsened and rice gradually disappeared from meals.

“Soldiers are sent into the mountains for days with a small amount of rice and told it is part of their survival training.”

Since these troops have been trained to fight on the mountainous Korean Peninsula, defectors wonder how well they will adapt to fighting on the plains and in the trenches of Kursk.

Fundamentally, the Storm Corps is not a frontline unit. “Your mission is to infiltrate enemy lines and create chaos deep in enemy territory,” Ryu says.

But, he adds, Kim Jong Un has no choice but to send special forces, since regular soldiers spend most of their time farming, building or chopping firewood.

“Kim Jong Un had to send men who could demonstrate at least a certain level of combat capability, to avoid damaging North Korea’s reputation in Russia.”

The language barrier appears to have created an additional obstacle. On Sunday, Ukraine’s defense intelligence unit said communication problems had caused North Korean soldiers to accidentally fire on a Russian battalion, killing eight.

With these assessments, it could be easy to dismiss the troops as “cannon fodder” and a sign of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s desperation. But that would be a mistake, the defectors say. Your loyalty to the regime and your fighting spirit will count for a lot.

“Most Storm Corps soldiers come from working-class or farming families, who are very obedient to the party and follow orders without question,” says Haneul, whose father and cousin were in the special forces.

Intense ideological “brainwashing” sessions, held every morning, will further ensure they are mentally prepared, Lee adds. He believes North Korean troops will “get used to the battlefield, learn to fight the enemy and find ways to survive.”

Although the soldiers will not have been given the option to be deployed, Ryu believes that many will have wanted to go. Ambitious people will see it as an opportunity to advance their careers, he says.

And given how difficult it is to serve in North Korea, some will have relished the opportunity to experience life abroad for the first time.

“I think they will be more willing to fight than the Russian troops,” he adds, admitting that, in his situation, he would also have wanted to be sent.

Chun In-bum, a former South Korean special forces commander, agrees with the defectors’ assessments. “Just because they lack food and training does not mean they are incapable. They will acclimatize quickly. We should not underestimate them.”

While 11,000 troops are unlikely to turn the tide in a war of attrition (Russia is estimated to be suffering more than a thousand casualties a day), experts and officials believe this could be just the first leg, and that Pyongyang could potentially send up to 60,000. or even 100,000 if rotated.

In these numbers, Chun believes they could end up being effective.

Furthermore, Kim Jong Un will be able to withstand heavy losses without affecting the stability of his regime, former soldiers say.

“Those who have been sent will be men without influence or connections; to put it bluntly, those who can be sacrificed without problems,” says Haneul.

He remembers being surprised to learn that there were no children of high-ranking fathers in his frontline unit: “That’s when I realized we were expendable.”

He doesn’t expect much resistance from the families of the deceased, whose children, he says, will be honored as heroes.

“There are countless parents who have lost a child after sending him to the army,” he adds, remembering his deceased second cousin. His aunt received a certificate praising her son for his heroic contribution.

The loyalty of soldiers and their families could dampen Ukrainian and South Korean hopes that many will simply defect once they enter combat. kyiv and Seoul have discussed conducting psychological operations along the front line to encourage men to surrender.

But it seems they don’t have access to cell phones. According to Ukrainian intelligence, even Russian soldiers’ phones are confiscated before they meet North Korean troops.

Thus, possible infiltration strategies include spreading messages through loudspeakers or using drones to drop leaflets.

Both Ryu and Haneul decided to defect after reading anti-regime propaganda sent across the border from South Korea. But they have doubts that this will work so far from home.

They say it takes a long time to develop the desire and courage to defect.

In addition, Haneul suspects that the officers will have been ordered to shoot anyone who tries to flee. He remembers his comrades opening fire as he made his daring dash across the DMZ.

“Twelve bullets flew just three feet above my head,” he says.

Even capturing North Korean troops may prove a challenge for Ukraine.

In the North, being a prisoner of war is considered extremely shameful and worse than death. Instead, soldiers are taught to take their own lives by shooting themselves or detonating a grenade.

Ryu remembers a famous military song titled Save the Last Bullet. “They tell you to save two bullets, one to shoot the enemy and one to shoot yourself.”

However, Lee, the former special forces trainer, is determined to help. He has offered to go to the front to communicate directly with the soldiers.

“It is unlikely that they will defect in large numbers, but we have to try. Hearing familiar voices like mine and others from North Korea could affect their psychology,” he says.

Haneul just hopes they return to North Korea. He knows there is a possibility that some of his relatives may be among the troops sent to help Russia.

“I just hope they make it and come back safely.”

Additional reporting by Jake Kwon and Hosu Lee