North Korea's Ukraine adventure alarms the West and China
While Beijing has long been Pyongyang’s patron, it is failing to rein in the maverick state.
Just one year ago, the notion of North Korean troops on European soil would have smacked of dystopian fantasy; today it is a reality. The consensus from various reports suggests that at present there are 10,000 North Korean troops in Russia, though Ukrainian intelligence, which has gained a reputation for accurate information, puts the figure slightly higher, at 12,000.
The initial assumption in Western defence ministries was that Vladimir Putin intended to use North Koreans as cannon fodder, a role which they have historical experience of fulfilling. During the Korean War, both North Korean and Chinese communist troops attacked in human waves. The equation was simple: calculate how many machine guns were deployed on the UN front line, and the number of bullets they were capable of firing during the period of time it would take a wave of Red troops to reach the enemy trenches, then send in more men than the maximum estimate of casualties. Job done.