Officials warn of Russia's tech-for-troops deal with North Korea amid Ukraine conflict The EU has joined US and South Korean officials in expressing concern over a Russian transfer of technology to North Korea in return for military assistance against Ukraine. "We are closely monitoring what Russia provides to the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) in return for its provision of arms and military …
The Norks have a lot of tech-development disadvantages: poverty, starvation, bullshit politics ("If you propose this device, you will displease the Great Leader. For your own sake, son, please drop it."), and import embargoes on tech-supportive tech. Don't expect them to be buying any EUV photolith machines from ASML.
That said, intelligence and cleverness is, as far as I've seen, evenly-distributed across the globe. Expect the threat from the Norks to be via things which bypass the need for all the tech-supportive tech we use in the West, things that are low-er tech, yet accomplish their leader's goals.
The way I heard, it was about specialized cookware. Putin promised that if Trump were elected, as a good buddy, he'd send some of the excess stray pet dogs and cats from the streets of Springfield, OH, over to his love-letter penpal in Pyongyang, in exchange for the emaciated troops. If he weren't elected then, it'd be back to Soylent Green instead ...
Just something I heard from the Mayor and some eyewitnesses ... you know it happened ... now vote for me! </puke!></puke!></puke!>
Sometimes news sites cover stories you would rather have suppressed. The current mechanism for dealing with this problem is to pretend it is fake news. Starting next year there will be a new, more effective solution and you will never have to read anything that makes you feel uncomfortable again.
Surely the solution to not reading stories you're not interested in - is to read the headline before clicking on it?
The headline makes it very clear that it's a story about international politics. I suppose it does say tech for troops - so maybe they were hoping to read that Russia would be providing a certain number of high tech ZX80 processors in exchange for said troops.
There's lots of tech the North Koreans might want. I'd suspect that chief amongst that would be submarine and air defence tech. Running modern aircraft is expensive - and they're also restricted to what oil they can buy (or realistically get for free) from Russia and China. From what I've read a lot of the Norks more modern missile tech is already derived from Russian tech - because they've managed to recruit scientists who used to work on Russia's SLBM programs - because they wanted to go from liquid-fuelled to solid-fuelled rockets. It gives much faster launch times. The stuff I read on this didn't specify whether this was with the agreement of the Russian government, or in spite of them.
One of the big reasons for the ISS program in the 90s was to find a way to pay money to Russian missile scientists - so they wouldn't be unemployed and tempted to go to work for Iran or North Korea. Hence the idea of supporting Russia's space program - which would also give an avenue for cooperation. It slowed the proliferation of ballistic missile tech - but that ship has most definitely sailed now.
North Korea has got very outdated submarine tech. Subs are much harder to deal with than surface ships - so that would be their best method of naval force-projection. Plus it would give them the ability to have nuclear 2nd strike capability. They do have a ballistic missile sub, but nobody seems to be quite sure how modern it is. All they've built is tiny coastal subs and kits from China based off the old Soviet Romeo class from the 50s - but with updated electronics. So it might not be very modern at all and only capable of remaining submerged for a couple of days. Even 80s/90s tech from the Kilo class would be a vast improvement - let alone a modern air-independent design - which Russia could give them.
Re: IT Tech angle? This is just politics without any kind of meaningful relationship to IT, what gives? ...remainer_01
It’s propaganda porn, remainer_01, for the desperately worried and bankrupt of viable successful solutions for the containment and command, retainment and exercise, mentoring and monitoring and maintenance of expanding exploitative problematic 0days.
A situation publishing the end of a novel beginning and heralding the genesis of an altogether wholly different revolutionary evolutionary stage of humanised universal existential development with El Reg, IT and AI pioneering the Leading Way Forward into the Future without the troubles of the past being dragged in and along to blight the present and poison the party atmosphere with its toxic corrupt perversities.
Or you could just fail to think and realise with your imaginanation, and accept instead all the bullshit mainstream media are responsible for currently peddling which daily delivers ever more mountainous troubles with no apparent, readily available, easily applied solution to whatever doom and gloom FUD those streams and tall tales be supplying to you for your remote physical employment and impractical enjoyment.
Seems to me, and it should be similarly so for yourself if you have a titter of wit and any common enough sense and intelligence at all, the right choice to make whenever that is the real live situation is a no-brainer ....... but, there is always the following to consider might be true to prove the optimism misplaced .....
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.....Albert Einstein
Think of the widespread redundancies there are going to be across the bot industry after the election.
It's going to be like the miners strike, entire regions devastated, they traditional way of life destroyed
Think of the widespread redundancies there are going to be across the bot industry after the election. .... Yet Another Anonymous coward
The other more likely reality, to mitigate the misuse and abuse of any bad bot redundancy glut, YAAc, is the widespread metamorphosis and intelligence shift of sources and resources into the vast expanding sees of unbridled opportunities and commensurate obscenely excessive reward presented and maintained by the radical non-traditional maddening ab fab fabless bot sector.
It is dangerously naive, verging on the criminally stupid and supremely negligent, to not realise and accept such Immaculately Resourceful Assets of Universatile Virtual Force never ever go away, and whenever it is so easy for them to change their spots and arise time and time again to do their novel creative or destructively disruptive thing in any number of other surprisingly effective surreal internetworking disguises, to not engage and enjoy the employment and results of their alternative PACTs and ACTivities [Persistent Advanced Cyber Treats and/or Threats] has one forever suffering increasingly badly, if serially and earnestly minded to try to ignore and deny them their sovereign right to rule and reign over that which is remotely commanded and virtually controlled, in favour of it being thought or imagined instead in the gift of a non-inclusive and selfish, self chosen few ....an horrendously expensive and bankrupting exclusive executive elite?
Do you realise that is where IT and AI, and y'all too, be presently at? Answers and comments evidencing support or denial in a post to El Reg please.
* ... IntelAIgently Designed Entities
Well then, a Happy 15ᵗʰ First-Post-Anniversary amanfromMars 1 -- belatedly (just 5 months late) -- it's like 15/100ᵗʰ of a century looking like a monkey ... quiet impressive ... and smelling like one too!
Looking forward to celebrating your 10,000ᵗʰ post (in 2025?) ... Web linguistics have never been so adeptly tortured!
"Aww, leave amfm alone - he/she/it has been around these parts longer than you have!"
Are you sure? I remember when they used to have Cash & Carrion and I bought an el Reg Polo shirt. I also remember when amfm didn't have the 1 at the end of his handle! I lurked a long time before I started posting ;-)
Woochie mama ... you and your supernatural memory! Indeed, if we include amanfromMars (without the 1), we're at the 17ᵗʰ First-Post-Anniversary (12,000 posts, combined) ... back to June 2007, when US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates took care of security issues with carrier pigeon and smoke signals!
Those were the days (oh nostalgia!) ... !
I can see the poor buggers being used for mine clearance as in "line up, forward march!"
What the Ukrainians can do to them can hardly be worse than what Putin will do with them.
If I were a Russian I am not sure I would want to be between 10 thousand armed N.Koreans fleeing from the conflict and their escape route.
I assume Ukraine has enlisted the assistance of S.Korea for a psychological offensive against these forces. "Surrender and you will be repatriated to South Korea, etc."
If I were a Russian I am not sure I would want to be between 10 thousand armed N.Koreans fleeing from the conflict and their escape route. I assume Ukraine has enlisted the assistance of S.Korea for a psychological offensive against these forces.
It's certainly a psychological offensive, ie propaganda-
Reports have also emerged that some soldiers are using the opportunity to defect and escape from North Korea.
So DPRK soldiers should be taking the first opportunity possible to surrender to Ukrainian forces and requesting asylum. Ukraine should be able to produce these DPRK troops as evidence they are actually there, and involved in the conflict. But thus far, I haven't seen that evidence. I have seen some videos claiming they're there with drones dropping bombs on trenches claimed to have been full of DPRK troops, but those must have been in one of Ukraine's botanical gardens because the vegetation and soil don't look anything like typical Ukrainian territory. There have also been claims that the DPRK troops have discovered the Internet and are too busy watching pron to fight.
But as for the politics, we've created an interesting pariahs club, so not suprising they're forming a closer relationship. S.Korea is naturally worried because 10,000 DPRK troops may be gaining actual combat experience and may decide to put that to use attacking S.Korea at some point in the future.
S.Korea is naturally worried because 10,000 DPRK troops may be gaining actual combat experience and may decide to put that to use attacking S.Korea at some point in the future.
10,000 gaining combat experience, but I expect a much smaller number actually surviving the experience and being in any condition to fight back home on the Korean peninsular.
Those 10 000 soldiers gaining warfare experience will become the instructors of the North-Korean army. They'll probably get social advantages from fighting for Russia, therefore not likely that they will defect to Ukraine (and who in their right mind would want to defect to the Azov brigade ?). South-Korea is rightly alarmed.
10,000 gaining combat experience, but I expect a much smaller number actually surviving the experience and being in any condition to fight back home on the Korean peninsular.
Always the problem with conflicts. A soldier could be the most highly trained operator and just end up in the wrong place at the wrong time. Artillery rounds, FABs etc just don't care whether you're badged or not. Or as Wellington(?) said, "But are you lucky?". And then there's all the drones to try and evade. But some percentage of the officers, NCOs and PBI might survive the experience and become veterans who can share their experience.
The Kursk venture seems to have been particularly brutal. Ukraine stripped veteran units to commit to that escapade, weakining their defence lines. An estimated 10k troops committed, estimates of 10k casualties and a lot of equipment lost. Those estimates might be exagerated because propaganda, but a costly venture for what appears to be little strategic effect. It still seems unclear if DPRK forces are actually there, or if Ukraine is confusing forces Russia's been rotating in from their Eastern Military District who look more Asian than Slavic or European. Russia's had the luxury of being able to do that to rest forces, and given their forces experience, especially as Kursk has been declared an ATO so Russia can deploy any military or paramilitary units it wants there.
It's a nice thought, but the reality is that many of those soldiers will have families back in the DPRK who would be punished if they defected or surrendered. The grim reality is that most of them will be used in place of Russian troops for missions with an expected high attrition rate because they will be so incentivised to not retreat.
families back in the DPRK who would be punished if they defected or surrendered
That would require the state to admit that they had done so, which they're unlikely to do.
I think it more likely that any defecting troops would be simply listed as "bravely killed in action", or some such phrase.
It doesn't have to be anything public. Their relatives could be arrested for something vague like "promoting enemies of the state" or even just quietly disappeared with no attempt at following the law. Or hell, just denied their food ration.
That would require the state to admit that they had done so, which they're unlikely to do.I think it more likely that any defecting troops would be simply listed as "bravely killed in action", or some such phrase.
I doubt it would bother with such niceties. DPRK is very weird, and there have been plenty of defectors explaining how they handle dissent. So families sent off to penal colonies to be worked to death, or in a rather extreme case, become the main character in a 'prank video' and murdered with sarin. It has a habit of trying to assassinate any defectors.
Not if Ukraine provides evidence of the defection, as Jellied Eel originally suggested.
And as others have pointed out: DPRK is a totalitarian state. When they disappear someone, they don't need to explain why and anybody who asks why will disappear too.
You are right if it became known. North Korea wouldn't say so, but they could easily arrest some people and not say why; they already do that every couple minutes. However, if I was a North Korean wanting to defect, I might try it now and see if I can leave scraps of my uniform near some other destruction, and if there isn't enough destruction, make some extra for scenery. My family is least likely to suffer consequences if my Russian or North Korean commanders think I was just struck down in the pursuit of my gallant duty to kill people for no reason. The Ukrainians could help arrange some of this.
on top of the usual (only 100xfold) brain-washing, there's a a practice in N. Korea of your family members being held hostage and then facing punishment if you fail to perform what's expected of you (scope ranges from labour camp for life to terminal). So the hope of North Koreans surrendering in any numbers MIGHT be premature.
That said, there's a rumour, began in Western media about unrestricted internet access suddenly open to N. Korean soldiers once they appeared in the Kursk region, specifically - porn. So, there's hope they'll go blind and otherwise incapacitated before they get to cause any harm.
Perhaps one psy-op would be to drop micro-sd cards with offline content to facilitate the above, a 2.0 version of the funniest joke in the world. Which would be a laughing matter, in other circumstances.
"on top of the usual (only 100xfold) brain-washing, there's a a practice in N. Korea of your family members being held hostage and then facing punishment if you fail to perform what's expected of you (scope ranges from labour camp for life to terminal). So the hope of North Koreans surrendering in any numbers MIGHT be premature."
Offer them the deal of being reported as killed in action to those who defect. As that's the likely fate of those who don't defect it would become impossible for the Norks to work out who'd deserted and, if the family were to be punished for failing by being killed it wouldn't make any difference anyway.
Hook up speakers and blast out perky K-Pop?
That might cause Ukrainian troops to defect to Russia. "I'd rather live in Siberia than stay here listening to that rubbish!"
Also, surely there's something in the Hague and Geneva Conventions to protect troops from such appalling treatment.
That might cause Ukrainian troops to defect to Russia. "I'd rather live in Siberia than stay here listening to that rubbish!"
There have already been reports of this, ie Ukrainian troops switching sides. On the larger scale, this is pretty much how we got here though with the civil war starting in 2014 and UAF forces defecting to the DPR & LPR. With a bit of help from Russia of course. Zelensky''s also been in the news recently warning that if Ukraine is forced to concede territory, it will just lead to an insurgency conflict and give Russia a COIN problem to deal with. But that doesn't really seem to be happening in territory Russia's gained and annexed, or is going mostly unreported. You'd expect Russia to supress that news, but Ukraine to promote activity of it's partisans, especially as Ukraine has a long tradition of doing that, ie it's how their OUN started.
But this is another challenge for Trump. He's declared he'll create peace overnight, but.. hasn't, yet. It's also not clear how he could do this given Ukraine is in a very weak negotiating position and is unwilling to concede territory. Trump could force this by cutting off the money tap. Zelensky's trying to counter this, so was at the EU event in Hungary demanding he's given $300bn because that's 'our money', which it isn't, it's Russia's frozen funds. Russia's made it clear than Ukraine can never join NATO, and wants Ukraine to become constitutionally neutral. I doubt Russia is going to accept any Minsk-3 style freezing of the conflict given it has memories of what happened with the previous ones. The US could just walk away, but that would obviously be bad for the EU and a disaster for Zelensky.. Although he's preparing for this by blaming the West for his defeat.
Also, surely there's something in the Hague and Geneva Conventions to protect troops from such appalling treatment.
There's a bunch of stuff, but a lot is being ignored by both sides. Some of it is around the treatment of PoWs, so providing proof of DPRK involvement. Prisoners aren't supposed to be used for propaganda purposes, but Ukraine should be able to do things like showing passports, ID docs or other evidence.
Two things...
- The expectation that a totalitarian country would have ANY limitations in anything technologically related that only requires one-off (not at scale) equipment purchases AND top notch human brains is a very, very naive one.
For all intents and purposes, those two wells are limitless in a country like that. The equipment purchase ability - because no matter how expensive the equipment needed and how difficult it might be to obtain - only a few units are needed to equip a lab, not 10000 datacenters.
And the human capital - because they can pull whoever they want, whenever they want, to put on the project they want. They can flag gifted kids and put them in the study fields they want them to study into, literally not for dimes on the dollar, but for cents on the dollar. They can train high level professionals specializing in Western-specific fields (law, banking, you name it), and they have 100% of the population pool to grab brains from, at ANY age and for ANY long-term projects. There are no limitations, no restrictions, no "I'm good at math and engineering but I'll be a circus clown because that's what I want". They do have to treat their high level personnel better, but the proportions will still remain ridiculous, it's not like a scientist will cost them x50 to run compared to a bus driver. In training maybe, but the training is part of the investment.
Their cyber bank heists did not come out of thin air from some kid poking around in the bank of Bangladesh servers. And if memory serves - it only got stopped (not right away) because some tech who was supposed to be on vacation got into the system during a holiday and flagged something suspicious.
- The "limbs for chips" program that NK is doing with the Russians in Ukraine currently is a genius move for the Russians for one very simple reason: NK personnel deaths won't count in the local Russian statistics, won't count in the public opinion statistics - they are basically absolutely free. They can throw and lose a number of NK personnel with any amount of zeroes behind it, and no one will bat an eyelid if the attrition rate is 100%. And whatever wins they get will be called for them, not for NK. The best of both worlds for them. They already didn't value their own personnel that much, but when a Western satellite can verify that a local cemetery suddenly tripled in size - it still ends up being local knowledge through side channels. An NK cemetery quadrupling in size overnight will also make it to the locals in Russia, but they won't care one bit.
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how much could 10k malnourished, depressed NK, meant to take bullets for Russian conscripts cost putin? I'm thinking two cars and a ham sandwich. putin would not spend "real" money on cannon fodder.
I expect none of the NK will live to see their home again. More victims of meth head putins greed.
North Korea is essentially in the same position as Russia -- it has to live with hostile bases on its border, significant US forces plus local forces armed and trained by the US. Russia has been actively fighting these forces for nearly three years, getting a lot of hands-on experience that translates to strategy and tactics. Its logical to think that North Korea would like similar experience -- hands on fighting the Americans (sort of) without risking all out war across the DMZ.
The Russians might be interested in learning a bit about the Koreans as well. These two countries do share a short land border but AFAIK there's absolutely no contact between them. (You can find tourist videos on youTube of people arriving at the triple point where China, Korea and Russia meet from Russia and China but absolutely nothing from North Korea.)
Let them enjoy a bit of internet freedom. According to below, the North Korean soldiers are gorging on porn while internet is accessible to them in RuSSia.
https://nypost.com/2024/11/05/world-news/us-cant-confirm-north-korean-soldiers-in-russia-hooked-on-porn-after-getting-internet-access/
"Let them enjoy a bit of internet freedom"
Let them enjoy porn while not in the battlefield.
If they carry a cellphone to the battlefield, like some Ukrainians did, missile strike in their position is likely to occur - already happened before
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