The Meaning and Significance of North Korean Troops’ Deployment to Russia

The details of North Korea’s troop deployments to Russia will likely become clearer over time. However, the repercussions are clear: the North Korean army’s participation in the war will dramatically increase Russia–North Korea cooperation.

But why did North Korea suddenly take this step? There have been several occasions during the Ukraine war when Russia has been on the defensive. However, the recent situation does not seem particularly difficult for Russia. The true answer is to be found in North Korea’s own strategic objectives: Pyongyang appears to want to reshape the geopolitical landscape on the Korean Peninsula.

Since the Eighth Communist Party Congress in 2021, North Korea’s foreign strategy can be described as a ‘New Cold War Structure Utilisation Strategy’, which consists of an effort to refashion the geopolitical landscape on the Korean Peninsula. The beginning of this was the improvement of Pyongyang’s relations with Beijing by taking advantage of the rising tensions between the US and China. North Korea also strengthened its relationship with Moscow after Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. To all intents and purposes, Pyongyang viewed the rising US–China strategic competition and the Russo-Ukrainian war as a strategic opportunity. 

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s perception of the international situation is evident in his 2021 and 2022 ‘State of the Nation’ addresses, in which he referred to the current international situation as a ‘New Cold War’ and as a period of ‘multi-polarisation’. As seen from Pyongyang, the country’s old weakness of being overly dependent on China could be offset by better relations with Russia, thereby creating a trilateral relationship which may amount to the best international political situation for North Korea since the end of the Cold War in the late 1980s. This has the added advantage of providing Kim with the ability to rely on both China and Russia to diminish the importance of the UN sanctions regime on North Korea and effectively paralyse any international effort to monitor breaches of these sanctions.

Seen from this perspective, the prospect of Donald Trump’s electoral triumph, which already seemed very real in October, was dreaded in Pyongyang because it was clear that Trump was determined to bring about at least a ceasefire in Ukraine, and if this resulted in the end of the war in Ukraine, the future of North Korea’s relations with Russia would be uncertain. Kim’s policy of ‘strategic diversification’ would have come to nothing.

Moscow and Pyongyang clearly discussed the deployment well before the US election. Yet it is instructive to note that the official justification for North Korea’s entry into the war was the Ukrainian incursion into Russian territory in Kursk. This provided Russia with the excuse to invoke Article 4 in the newly-concluded Russia–North Korea security treaty; the Russian government chose to claim that the Ukrainian army’s advance into Kursk had created a ‘state of war’ in which Russia’s territory was ‘invaded’ from Ukraine, thereby activating the mutual defence provisions of the Russian-North Korean treaty. Of course, it was Russia that invaded Ukraine first, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a clear violation of Article 2, Paragraph 4 of the UN Charter, which prohibits the use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of other states. However, neither Moscow nor Pyongyang is bothered by such niceties.

The North Korean regime is likely to extract financial compensation for the lives of its soldiers that it has now sent into the Russian meat grinder. However, the most significant advantage for Pyongyang is that what it perceives as the entrenchment of a Cold War conflict structure serves its purposes because it makes the resolution of the North Korean issue virtually impossible.  

International Political Implications of Russian Troops Deployed in North Korea

The dispatch of North Korean troops may not have a significant impact on the war situation between Russia and Ukraine. Still, considering the level of North Korea–Russia cooperation, the war will likely cause changes in international relations. The participation of large numbers of North Korean regular troops, especially combat troops, in the Russo-Ukrainian war means that the conflict has turned into an international one. The participation of North Korean forces and the corresponding level of demand from Ukraine for South Korea’s support will also increase in direct proportion to one another. And if the nature of the war changes to an international one, the level of NATO’s involvement will increase, and the threat of a Russian nuclear attack will become more acute.

To start with, the dispatch of North Korean troops is a clear sign that North Korea and Russia are joining forces on the anti-US front and that North Korea could become one of the core countries in the non-Western Eurasian security structure that Russia has vowed to build.

It is still unclear what the Eurasian security structure promoted by Russia entails. Still, if North Korea, as a country with nuclear weapons, participates in this structure, there is a concern that this will create a new nuclear state alliance that also encompasses Belarus, where Russia’s tactical nuclear weapons have already been deployed, and Iran, whose nuclear ambitions are growing.

Moreover, it is fully anticipated that, in return for its military participation, North Korea will demand to join the Russian-led Collective Security Organisation, as well as other international organisations such as the BRICS or the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, and Russia will no longer be able to dither on such membership applications. Should these steps be taken, they will likely increase North Korea’s status and role in the anti-US or anti-Western camp under a multipolar order, which could be an opportunity for North Korea to break out of its diplomatic isolation.

In addition, there is a concern that North Korea’s status as an ‘unofficial’ nuclear state could be established as a fact, leading to a crisis in the international non-proliferation regime. The trend is already apparent. In September this year, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov publicly stated that Moscow viewed the notion of  ‘denuclearising ‘ North Korea as a  ‘closed matter’, claiming that Russia understood Pyongyang’s logic of relying on nuclear weapons as the foundation of its defence. 

The Russia–North Korea New Treaty specifies in its Article 10 ‘cooperation’ between the two countries concerning ‘peaceful nuclear energy’. If Russia proceeds with nuclear energy cooperation with North Korea – which has violated the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and developed nuclear weapons – this will constitute an approval of North Korea’s possession of atomic weapons. The creation of a new Russian-led nuclear alliance or even Moscow’s acquiescence in North Korea’s nuclear development will pose a threat to the international non-proliferation regime that has been maintained since the end of the Cold War.

Impact on Security in Northeast Asia and the Korean Peninsula

The dispatch of North Korean troops implies a direct link between matters on the Korean Peninsula and the Russo-Ukrainian war. The more pressure that is exerted on Russia in Ukraine, the more opportunities will be created for North Korea, making the Korean Peninsula more susceptible to the effects of the current European war. In particular, with North Korea’s growing leverage over Russia, there is concern about the direct impact of the close relationship between the two countries. Even in the case of conventional armaments, the high degree of complementarity between the weapon systems operated by North Korea and Russia suggests that the synergy in the two countries’ cooperation will be very high. Russia possesses all the core technologies for the development of strategic and tactical nuclear weapons, which North Korea claims to have developed but has not yet completed.

Furthermore, the fact that the North Korean army’s deployment to Russia is justified by Article 4 of the Russia–North Korea Security Treaty, which refers to a mutual security guarantee, must mean that – at least in principle - the same collective security article could be invoked by Moscow to justify a greater Russian involvement in any potential future conflict on the Korean Peninsula. Thus, Russia and North Korea, functioning as a de facto military alliance, could face off against the South Korea–US alliance, increasing the nuclear-based character of such a potential future confrontation. This will further strengthen North Korea’s current position of defining inter-Korean relations as ‘hostile relations between two countries’ (it is no accident that North Korea’s constitution has recently been modified to include precisely such a definition) and will inevitably lead to a prolonged period of political and military tension on the Korean Peninsula.

In addition, the dispatch of troops could become a new channel for North Korea to earn foreign currency and an essential opportunity for the North Korean military to gain combat experience. This will considerably increase the security threat to South Korea. In particular, Pyongyang’s accumulation of technology and expertise in operating inexpensive and effective weapon systems such as drones will lead to a different practical threat. At the same time, it should also be admitted that the dispatch of North Korean combat troops could be an opportunity to assess the combat effectiveness and training level of the North Korean military, which would be of interest to South Korea and the militaries of many Western countries.

Outlook and Challenges

However, it is necessary to consider that the ripple effect of North Korea’s appearance on a European battlefield will vary, depending on North Korean troops’ participation method. 

The most direct and explicit method is for North Korean combat troops to participate in the war as an independent operational authority. This is likely to change the nature of the war to an international one, and it is also a method that will require Russia to pay a higher future political and economic price for North Korea’s involvement.

Alternatively, the North Korean regime may choose to reduce the burden of escalation by having its troops participate in the war as part of the Russian military or as individuals in a ‘private military company’ such as the Wagner Group. However, if the recent report that Kim Young-bok – the deputy chief of staff of the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army – is in charge of the North Korean troops deployed to Russia is accurate, it is likely that the North Korean troops will not be content with participating in the war as individuals.

The challenge facing Seoul and all Western governments is that, in the short term, there are limited means to effectively restrain the North Korean military’s participation in the war or to punish Pyongyang for it. Therefore, governments need to take a longer-term view and rely on experience and diplomatic assets accumulated since the end of the Cold War to produce workable responses.

For example, after the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia’s position on the Korean peninsula was the most pragmatic among the four surrounding powers; it simply re-adjusted its relationship with North Korea to a normal state relationship, notwithstanding Pyongyang’s accusations that Moscow was ‘selling off’ its interest to the ‘US dollar’. Needless to say, relations between Russia and the West are likely to remain frosty for a considerable time after the Russo-Ukrainian war. Still, Russia’s relationship with the West does not necessarily have to be a reason for South Korea and Russia to live in hostility.

Thus, it remains crucial for South Korea to present a vision for the post-war relationship with Russia. Undoubtedly, it won’t be easy to significantly improve relations with China and Russia in the short term. Yet, it is imperative to establish policy measures that can restrain China–Russia–North Korea relations. Seoul also needs to consider a roundabout approach, leveraging its relations with Central Asian countries that are closely linked to China and Russia. 

Yet none of this obviates the need, in the short term, to continue warning the international community about the risks to global security that the deployment of North Korean troops poses. It is equally important for Seoul to lay out its own ‘red lines’ regarding the cooperation between Russia and North Korea. In particular, Seoul needs to reiterate Russia’s international responsibility as a permanent member of the UN Security Council and as a  NPT ‘P5’ member, and to continue raising global awareness about the transfer of advanced military technology, including nuclear weapons, that the Moscow–Pyongyang relationship entails.

This commentary is based on a more extended Korean language study published by the Institute for National Security Strategy (INSS) in early November. In 2015, RUSI proudly became the first non-Asian learned institution to conclude a memorandum of cooperation with INSS.

RUSI is grateful to Sang Hun Seok, our Indo-Pacific Visiting Fellow, for his help with the editing of this English-language version.

© Choi Yong-whan, 2024, published by RUSI with permission of the author

The views expressed in this Commentary are the author’s, and do not represent those of RUSI, the INSS or any other institution.

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