High body count may not deter North Korean forces fighting for Russia in Ukraine

SEOUL, South Korea — As North Korean troops storm into battle against Ukrainians in Russia, the high casualties they have reportedly suffered are receiving major attention, but the early losses may not be enough to change Pyongyang’s calculations about the value of the deployment, analysts said this week.

Using signal intercepts and drone and satellite imagery, intelligence agencies are closely studying the first large-scale engagements fought by the North Korean regime’s forces since the 1950-53 Korean War. Both the U.S. and Ukrainian governments have highlighted significant casualties suffered by the North Korean forces in their first engagements in Russia’s Kursk region.

Some early Western media accounts have focused heavily on the tally of dead and wounded — though no North Korean prisoners have been taken — rather than on how the North Korean troops have performed on the battlefield. A telephone call intercepted by Ukrainian intelligence indicated soaring casualties as Russia seeks to drive out a Ukrainian force that has seized and held land in Kursk since the summer.

“Yesterday there was a train with about 100 [wounded] people. Today there are 120,” a nurse at a Moscow hospital told her husband, a soldier, in the call, the Kyiv Independent reported Wednesday. “How many more are there? God only knows.”

She suggested that despite heavy losses, the North Koreans are crack troops: “Are they elite, or what, these Korean “We are freeing up certain wards for them.”

A day later, a senior U.S. official told the Associated Press North Koreans had suffered “a couple of hundred” casualties in their early operations, likely due to inexperience.

On the same day, South Korea’s National Intelligence Service told a parliamentary committee that of the 11,000 North Korean troops believed to be in Kursk, 1,000 had been wounded, including 100 dead, citing what NIS analysts said was unfamiliarity with drone warfare as one reason for the losses. The casualty toll was said to include senior officers.

According to a 2022 analysis by the combat research body the Dupuy Institute, casualty ratios in the Ukraine war are likely four to five soldiers wounded for every one killed. It noted that many commentators, apparently ignorant of medical advances and widespread use of 21st-century body armor, continue to cite the World War II casualty ratio of three-to-one.

Analysts say Western experience with wartime casualties cannot be compared to how the Russian and North Korean publics view the losses, however. Democracies have lost patience for long wars, despite combat losses being, in a historical context, extremely low. Commanders are pressed to minimize risks to troops, even in conflicts against lightly-armed enemies.

But Russia’s war in Ukraine, now approaching its third year, is being conducted at a higher tempo than any Western militaries have fought in recent decades. Minimizing casualties is not a priority for Russian officers — and likely even less for North Koreans, and a high tolerance for losses means commanders can focus on battlefield objectives.

Military historians have noted that it took an authoritarian state — the Soviet Union — to smash the bulk of Nazi Germany’s land forces in World War II. The cost to Moscow — 27 million dead — was likely higher than any of Russia’s democratic allies could have tolerated.

Since then, Western public acceptance of operational risk and casualties has weakened, while the size of their armed forces has shrunk.

“The value of life has changed over time in conflict, and is connected to one’s heritage, cultural values and the size and scale of one’s military,” said a Seoul-based Western military officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “Nowadays, the value of life is much higher than it was: In Afghanistan, if a Chinook [troop-carrying helicopter] went down, it was mission failure.”

In Ukraine, Western observers have denounced “meat-wave” Russian attacks that result in high losses in troops and gear, certain the approach is unsustainable. But despite the losses, Ukraine is on the defensive all along the 600-mile-plus front in eastern and southern Ukraine, while Russian troops continue to push forward despite their heavy losses.

A social culture that promotes nationalism and militarism, married to the Kremlin’s authoritarian governance, differentiates Russia from Western democracies. Similar factors are even stronger in the highly militarized, ultra-nationalistic fortress state of North Korea.

“North Korea is more authoritarian and much more of a dictatorship than Russia,” said Yang Uk, a security expert at Seoul’s Asan Institute.

Drone footage from Kursk shows troops thought to be North Koreans attacking across open ground, through heavy fire, in extended line formations. Video clips show small suicide drones hunting individual soldiers, while others show lines of bodies and the dead being evacuated by sled.

Even so, military analysts say the troops appear well disciplined. Their assault waves are spaced, and they utilize the few bits of dark cover in the white landscape effectively.

In a war in which objectives are often taken only after weeks or months of carnage, a Russian report on Telegram stated the North Koreans seized the village of Plekhove with “lightning” speed.

“They are not afraid to die,” said Mr. Yang. “The price of life is cheap in North Korea and that is why they can do this kind of operation.”

North Korea’s 1.2 million-strong, conscripted military is a hugely important component among a population of 26 million. All indications are that troops fighting in Russia are both risk- and casualty-tolerant.

“These soldiers might be better off dead — it will be good money for their families,” said Mr. Yang. “If you are just living in North Korea, fighting in a war may be kind of the only chance that you can get to make a fortune.”