What are the DPRK military capable of?
🇰🇵🇷🇺🇺🇦 Based on South Korean intel, we can say that exactly servicemen from the 11th Corps of the DPRK army are being sent to Russia

"This is a very combat-ready unit with a rather formidable reputation. These are special forces. At first, when I heard the news, I thought that the North Koreans could foist off on the Russians some bullshit in the form of unfortunate infantry companies that help collective farms. But judging by the info, if not super-elite, then quite combat-ready units went there - stormtroopers," says orientalist and research fellow at Kunmin University in Seoul Fyodor Tertitsky

A 2021 report by the US Defence Intelligence Agency described the SOF as highly trained, highly motivated and fitted with the best equipment available to a pariah state such as North Korea, including chemical and biological agents, The Telegraph writes

Ahmed Hassan, the CEO of Grey Dynamics, stressed that SOF were deemed “special” by North Korean army standards and not the criteria for Nato or Russian special forces.

“If there is a ranking between one and ten, and let’s say one is a basic soldier and ten is let’s say Delta Force or the SAS, then the NK force sits at 5,” Mr Hassan told The Telegraph.

❗️Founded around 1968, the SOF is perhaps best known for a disastrous attempt at raiding the Blue House, South Korea’s presidential residence, that year, which ended in the death of 29 out of the 31 operatives involved.
Unlike the SAS or Israeli Mossad, little else is known about the intelligence service’s exploits, though some of its troops took part in a rare public event in 2017 that involved marching in formation alongside regular army soldiers.
In images broadcast by North Korean state TV, SOF troops were seen wearing black camouflage paint and dark sunglasses.

📌The North Korean army may encounter serious problems when carrying out combat missions in Ukraine

▪️Firstly, for a 12,000-strong contingent, they do not have enough Russian-speaking military. The Russian army is also unlikely to have many specialists who speak Korean

▪️Secondly, the DPRK army still has political instructors - they control the commanders, and their consent is required for almost any order

“When they are told to start shooting, they don’t say, ‘Yes, comrade company commander!’ They ask, ‘Comrade political instructor, do you confirm the order of comrade commander?’ Their regulations are designed to prevent, God forbid, a coup, and not to fight effectively,” says Tertitsky.

📌12 thousand people for the war in Ukraine is 'incredibly few', notes military analyst Yan Matveyev.
But in terms of the size of the North Korean army, Kim can easily afford to send several tens of thousands of people to the front.

❗️According to the IISS, about 1.2 million people served in the DPRK Armed Forces in 2018, which was the fourth largest in the world at the time. The number of special forces is estimated at 200 thousand people. At the same time, it's currently impossible to predict how many military personnel Kim is actually ready to send to the front.

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