The DPRK soldiers are expected to be used in the fight for the Kursk region of Russia
Summary
North Korean troops sent to Russia to support its war in Ukraine remain sidelined due to poor training and logistical issues, according to Western officials.
These soldiers are expected to relieve Russian troops in secondary positions to free up forces for frontline battles in regions like Kursk, though they are unlikely to see combat in eastern Ukraine.
The war continues to take a massive toll, with over 700,000 Russian soldiers killed or wounded since February 2022, while both sides face challenges replacing losses.
Russia’s reliance on poorly trained recruits and prison conscripts highlights its growing manpower issues.
Also, probably malnourished. They may have gotten decent rations since they were conscripted (North Korea has a “military first” policy), but up until then they would have grown up with a calorie deficit.
Exactly, if you grow up with a calorie deficit , you don't develop the way you should have. This is not something you can revert by suddenly eating decent food.
There's probably a base level of competence someone who grew up in modern society has without training that the North Koreans don't have.
Like even if a convict has never operated a drone, there's probably a good amount of them that have played FPS games. That experience can be used as a launching board into proper training.
Meanwhile the North Koreans might have absolutely zero experience with video games and smartphones, and extremely limited experience with computers in general. There's so much you'd have to teach them before you can even start drone training.
North Korea has smartphones. Now idk if the sort of people they send to die in Ukraine have ever used one, but they do have them, and apparently they’re awful
NK has developed an entire cybercrime network even
I feel like tv and movies do more than we think for giving a base-layer of military training. I'm not saying it's LIKE military training, but people have at least seen what they're going to do before training
Training people can be harder when the trainees have to unlearn bad habits or knowledge. Ask anyone who has tutored previously self-taught students an artform or craft.
In some ways, media exposure can help to introduce broad concepts, and sometimes there are excellent examples in media (My Cousin Vinny and Legally Blonde have been used in some US law school course curriculum to show how the parts of the judicial system are supposed to operate, iirc), but oftentimes preconceived notions can hinder training for the real thing.
I thought they had already been getting killed fighting in Ukraine? I haven't followed the news too closely recently though so I'm probably wrong, just seen some headlines around the place.
IIRC the NK soldiers have been fighting (and dying) in the Ukrainian occupied parts of Russia, and haven't been deployed to the Russian occupied parts of Ukraine yet.
I had thought so too. Apparently there have been a bunch of false reports on them being involved in fighting. Which makes sense, because their involvement in this conflict was entirely political theater to begin with - they were sent over to try and scare the western allies into backing down or else risk a wider global conflict. USA and others called their bluff and the NK soldiers have been sitting in Russia ever since. They can't fight and they almost certainly don't speak any Russian or have enough translators to be an effective assault force in a combat scenario.
Must be a fucking wird ride for these soldiers. First porn and now learning that you actually have been fucked by your own government by not even training you the way you are supposed to be trained.
Yah, the rumor is that the north Koreans got ahold of cellphones with open web access for the first time in their life. So they immediately started watching all the porn and jacking themselves raw.
Supposedly, once they got across the border and got access to Russian smart phones, they quickly discovered porn. There were several reports (though TBF, they could have been propaganda), that the NK soldiers kept getting caught masturbating by the Russians they were working alongside, and some were incapacitated due to the fact that they had masturbation-related injuries. Like the NK soldiers just used every single opportunity to whip out their new phones and beat their meat until it was bloody.
It would be… something if the NK troops fucked up and killed a bunch of Russians with friendly fire. The Russians would slaughter them to a man in anger. And then… 🍿
While I think that the south korean army would be superior in every way, it‘s also safe to assume that Kim send the most expendable soldiers of his army to russia.
Ass an example, in the photo, if I was the flash, I could kick each one in the balls. They didn't think that march thru! Rule #1 protect your balls. No balls? I bet the crutch still hurts if you're a woman or asexual. Yeah, bad move NK!
"according to Western Officials", i.e. the people who are (formally or informally) at war with Russia and have been isolating North Korea. They are a very biased source