Lessons from North Korea in Kursk

What was the DPRK doing in Russia?

The Western media is conveniently ignoring the participation of North Korea in Russia's defense of the Kursk region – after going on and on about hordes of North Korean troops carrying out human wave attacks all over the Ukraine and dying by the thousands.

As it turned out, North Korean participation involved a fairly small number of Korean special forces as well as testing Korean equipment, such as the Korean KN23 short range ballistic missile based on the Russian Iskander .

The Russians have more than enough missiles of their own – just as they have more than enough troops, with an army twice the size of the US’s.

So what exactly were the Koreans doing fighting for the Russians against the Ukrainians?

Very simply-- learning.

Korea’s special forces are, yeah, “special” - that is, elite units—which will be invaluable in reconfiguring and passing on what they learn to the rest of the Korean military when they return home.

Nothing beats combat experience.

That applies to the development and use of weapons too. Battlefield experience with the KN 23 is helpful to further refine its successor— the KN25.

Most important of all is the simply the practical application of the Russian-Korean military alliance in a real war, which provides a model for future military collaborations with other countries.

Changing the Balance of Power

Russia has its CSTO- the Collective Security Treaty Organization, similar to NATO in concept which has its own Article 14 and consisting of Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan. But it is hardly unified, nor militarily very strong. And just as encumbered by regional politics.

By contrast, Russia has had a long relationship with North Korea: bilateral and simpler to manage. With the recent rapid development of North Korea, economically, industrially and militarily, plus North Korea’s strategic position, the alliance now tested on the battlefield, changes the balance of power in the Asia Pacific region, reaffirming Russia’s position as a major Asia Pacific power with regional interests.

North Korea has even launched a new, large frigate with 74 missile launchers, with another being built.

Geopolitical relationships are algorithmic not heuristic. They are complex. Changing one variable can change the whole equation in profound ways. Changing a set of variables more so. Americans like shortcuts of course, so they like heuristics. But this kind of thinking looks backwards rather than forwards.

Putin is showing he honors Russia’s historical friendship with North Korea and the Koreans can depend on him. The Koreans are reciprocating.

That is encouraging to countries like Iran, another country isolated and ostracized. . It also sends a message to the less committed members of the CSTO—as well as to countries in the Global South.

For example, Libya where Russia’s Africa Corps, the successor Wagner, is altering the balance of power, supporting the Libyan National Army (LNA) led by Khalifa Haftar, as it increases its foothold in the Sahel region and increases its control of oil resources. To the south, countries like Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso see Russia as a liberator.

The US wants hegemony. Hegemony is the enemy of freedom and independence. Africa in particular understands that only too well.

Special Article: “Bob’s yer uncle”

Bob has kindly cleaned up the article so it’s even easier to read.

As I said, I consider this a must-read for anyone intending to use or actually now using LLMs like Deep Seek, Grok, or ChatGPT. These are new information technologies but they take a degree of skill to exploit their capabilities fully. I call it “dialectical analysis”. If you can master that, there are many possibilities.

Well, at least, I learned a lot from it!

I will finalize the mailing list tomorrow . And provide links to coffee buyers.

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Article 4 of the Putin series should be finished soon after this.

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