Vladimir Putin bets on North Korean troops to retake Kursk from Ukraine

North Korea's ability to help make up Russia's numbers could cause Ukraine more problems, said Jack Watling, a senior research fellow for land warfare at the Royal United Services Institute. "They might have quite good cohesion. They might have reasonable morale. They might be able to operate at a scale that the Russians struggle to [achieve]," Watling said. "It's a pretty low bar to be better than what the Russians have at the moment."