Ukraine is on high alert in anticipation of the possible entry of North Korean troops into the war this week. This will be the first time that another country's army has intervened in this war.
Senior Ukrainian intelligence officials told the Financial Times that around 3,000 North Korean soldiers had been transported to the Kursk region of the Russian Federation. It should be noted that this contingent was transported by civilian trucks.
One of the officials said only a few hundred of the 3,000 were special forces and the rest were regular troops. On Monday, they were placed in barracks about 50 km from the Ukrainian border, where they waited for further orders from the Russian command.
The deployment of the North Korean army is expected to bolster Russian forces in the region of 50,000, which in recent days have stepped up efforts to regain control of the Kursk region in the Russian Federation. But Ukrainian intelligence questions the combat effectiveness of this reinforcement.
They have never left their country before. They have never been in actual combat and their experience is far removed from the realities of modern warfare.
A Ukrainian intelligence official noted that North Korean troops have only recently seen for the first time the various types of killer drones that have become commonplace on the battlefield. Ukrainian officials also believe that North Korean soldiers could be used as "cannon fodder" from Russia. Such a tactic of using North Korean troops in Russia's war against Ukraine would discourage Pyongyang from sending better-trained fighters.
The US said yesterday that it had found a "small number" North Korean soldiers in Russia's Kursk region, on the border with Ukraine, and expressed concern that they could be used against Ukrainian troops. There are indications that a small number of them are already in Kursk Oblast, with about two thousand more to arrive. US President Joe Biden said that Ukraine should retaliate if North Korean troops crossed into Ukrainian territory and added that he was concerned about their presence in Russia's Kursk region.