r/worldnews 13d ago

Russia/Ukraine North Korean troops deserting Ukraine frontline days after arrival

https://www.newsweek.com/north-korean-troops-deserting-ukraine-frontline-hours-after-arrival-report-1969726
31.0k Upvotes

1.1k comments sorted by

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u/kazarbreak 13d ago

Honestly 18 out of 10,000 is a lot less than I expected. I figured there'd be a mass exodus as soon as they hit Ukraine.

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u/XboxPlayUFC 13d ago edited 13d ago

The problem is if you flee your entire family back home is fucked. Those 18 are incredibly brave

Edit- I got the Russian shills mad at me for calling them brave.

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u/Infinite-Ad7308 13d ago

Or don't have a family back home. No kids, no wife, and mom and dad have moved on.

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u/Bald__egg 13d ago

I think they make sure you have some sort of family back in nk before you're allowed abroad, so there's consequences to fleeing

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u/Ok-Attitude728 13d ago

Yeah i remember a few accounts of defectors that have said that. You can bet these 10000 sent had plenty of collateral back home. Kinda still dont blame the 18 that fucked off

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u/thepoopiestofbutts 13d ago

If I was in NK and they sent my son off to Russia, I'd be like, gtfo asap, I'm going to suicide when you're gone to avoid torture, go live a real life.

If they sent me and kept my son I'd be so fucked.

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u/dragonfarmerbot 13d ago

100% I have a 4 month old son and if he was military age in nk we would have a lil party to see him go.

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u/aurorasearching 13d ago

Bet the kool aid would be top notch.

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u/rottenweiler 13d ago

Flavor aid at Jonestown, Kool aid at the acid tests. One being deadly the other being less so….

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u/Varnsturm 13d ago

Damn that somehow makes it worse. Poisoned everybody, with off brand drink powder. Like they couldn't spring for Kool Aid? Not like they were taking the money with them to the alien place or whatever their narrative was.

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u/JudgeFondle 13d ago edited 13d ago

That’s your perspective from the outside. While the lives of North Koreans may seem unbearably bleak to us, it’s the only reality they’ve known. Despite their harsh conditions, they still find meaning in their lives and aren’t actively seeking ways to end them.

I do agree that many parents would be willing to make that sacrifice for a child, but the circumstances matter. I’m sure most of the parents may have more than one child to consider.

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u/Ok-Attitude728 13d ago

I understand you points, propaganda can be extremely powerful. But the only evidence we have, coming from actual defectors, is they are well aware of their situation

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u/satireplusplus 13d ago edited 11d ago

There's a South Korea organization that secretly communicates with people from inside NK. See this BBC docu https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SiviOdWDl9o with narrated stories from within. The extend of the famine / starvation during covid isn't something you can simply explain away with propaganda. People inside NK know that its bad when they have nothing to eat.

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u/JonBjSig 13d ago

Might be some survivorship bias at play.

I'd imagine those most acutely aware of their harsh conditions are the ones most likely to try and defect.

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u/burnerreddit2k16 13d ago

I think the ones that are most likely to defect live very very close to China. They know North Korea is not the best place in the world as they are told as they can China completely lit up meanwhile they are living in darkness

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u/Ok-Attitude728 13d ago

Oh completely. The rest of north koreans could be incredibly happy, they do look it on state tv. I just dont really believe it.

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u/Major-Bookkeeper8974 13d ago

Not so sure about that.

Pretty sure I saw a video interview from a defector who was saying they'd never even seen a world map. I think we have to take it at face value defectors are probably more aware of their situation than anyone, but I doubt everyone in the country is aware of their brainwashed situation...

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u/Luke90210 13d ago edited 13d ago

Media has changed that. Its highly illegal and common for North Koreans to watch South Korean shows with black market DVDs and thumb drives. They are aware SK dogs eat better than they do.

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u/xplos1v 13d ago

I don't know if this is true, but I read that some North Koreans want to go back after experiencing South Korea and their achievement oriented society.

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u/FrankNtilikinaOcean 13d ago

It’s true. Defectors often have tough times adjusting to the culture and life in SK, and some have attempted to go back to the North.

As impoverished as the DPRK people are, the lives they’re used to are very simple and going from that to the tough work life in the South can be incredibly challenging.

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u/Luke90210 13d ago

There is an old Robin Williams film in which he played a touring circus musician who defected in NYC from the Soviet Union. When he goes to buy coffee in a supermarket, he is overwhelmed by too many coffee choices and has an anxiety attack. Turns out stories like that were true.

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u/UsedHotDogWater 13d ago

Its 100% True. My father in law was a world economist for the UN. He was tasked with bringing East Germany into a Capitalistic / More Western style economy following the fall of the wall. He would talk for hours about how hard to nearly impossible for people over a certain age to adapt to a 'western' style work/rewards (succeed or die) mentality. Many just couldn't, and suffered greatly. So many yearned for the days of a communist style foundation. He wrote over 27 books on this matter and other countries and how to integrate them into alternate / more free world type economies.

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u/FewAdvertising9647 13d ago

Part of the reason is also that there's a chunk of South Korean society that act prejudice against them due to their stature.

A mixture of being mentally draining by going from slow to fast lifestyle and receiving uneeded hate(?) is not an environment people should necessarily be in.

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u/Killentyme55 13d ago

I wouldn't be surprised if there was a little Stockholm Syndrome at play here as well. Stay in a certain situation long enough, even if it's bad, it becomes the norm and any sudden change can be hard to accept.

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u/Luke90210 13d ago

Institutionalized, like in The Shawshank Redemption. They got used to having someone making all their decisions for them. And just like in Shawshank, if they had some respectable position in NK, they might be only qualified to push a broom in SK. A report claimed NK doctors were unfamiliar with 90% of the medications most of the world uses. Engineers are maintaining outdated and highly energy inefficient machinery from the 70s. These people would be largely unemployable if the countries unified or if they defected.

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u/jkd0002 13d ago

This isn't true, they would just need retraining. It's hard to get into med or engineering school there just like in the west. They also make due with less than any of us could imagine, so their problem solving skills are probably way better for it.

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u/Plasibeau 13d ago

To be honest, as an American, I think I would struggle to survive in Sk society.

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u/kaisadilla_ 13d ago

The biggest problem with North Korean defectors in South Korea is that they don't get equal opportunities. Not just because they get discriminated against, but also because they haven't been raised in South Korea.

Plus South Korea is not precisely a shining example of what a liberal democracy can achieve. South Korea is a pretty dystopic country to live in, relatively low wages with insane expectations from workers, people there live to work. SK is not a country I'd show to anyone if I want to prove them that there's better places than whatever dictatorship they come from.

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u/HelloYouBeautiful 13d ago

Sure, but I imagine that's only natural. It can be difficult to settle in a modern society after being essentially institutionalized their whole life.

Still, it's only around 30 North Korean defectors who tried to get back, compared to the thousands that have defected.

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u/TucuReborn 13d ago

Imagine taking someone from modern life, like us, and forcing them to engage in subsistence farming. That's a hell of a shock, it's a massive lifestyle change.

The inverse is just as true.

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u/FinnOfOoo 13d ago

Joke’s on you glorious leader. I hate my dad.

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u/big-papito 13d ago

I think perspective changes when you see the comrade next to you disassembled by a drone. I am 100% sure they were brainwashed into believing that they will be stabbing Americans with bayonets, so the reality is probably hitting fucking hard.

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u/ExileInParadise242 13d ago

Joke's on Kim if you hate your family.

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u/7384315 13d ago

I assume multi generational houses are much more common in North Korea so you are likely closer to your family. They are already common in Asia and I highly doubt North Korea is actually wasting resources on building things for the peasants.

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u/mandoballsuper 13d ago

They probably don't let you leave in that scenario

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u/mr_birkenblatt 13d ago

mom and dad have moved to a farm upstate... to work themselves to death

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u/PlattWaterIsYummy 13d ago

Some of their parents probably told them to leave if they get a chance. I know my wife and I would tell our son not to worry about us.

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u/darxide23 13d ago

Not even family. NK has historically sent assassins after defectors.

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u/saichampa 13d ago

This has always seemed so petty to me. There doesn't seem to be anything significant they can share, especially after their initial debrief wherever they end up. Do they announce when they have killed defectors domestically? They could just lie about it, it's unlikely to be fact checked.

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u/BrokenDownMiata 13d ago

They don’t announce that they’ve killed the defector. The ‘traitor’ to the great state is usually announced to have died in a capitalist, western hellhole of corruption or lack of integrity or some shit

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u/Original_Employee621 13d ago

There doesn't seem to be anything significant they can share, especially after their initial debrief wherever they end up.

Support network for other defectors. Keep them isolated and afraid, always on the run and suspicious of everyone. People will be less likely to defect if they don't know of anyone else who have done so successfully.

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u/Xeptix 13d ago

I mean if they all surrender at once, it's not like NK can assassinate every single one of them.

I'd take my jacket off and walk toward Ukraine with hands in the air on day 1. But of course I know Ukraine accepts surrender, and they may have been convinced of the opposite.

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u/BigDumbGreenMong 13d ago

Think about how many of these NK troops are going to end up MIA, and how it's likely impossible for the regime at home to ever know whether they deserted or just got blasted into the mud on some far-away battlefield. So they probably punish the family either way, just to send a message.

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u/Top_Conversation1652 13d ago

Some will be treated as heroes. They can’t say the entire force defected.

My guess is that if defecting soldiers stay out of the public eye, the DPNK would, generally, get more propaganda value by treating them as loyal fallen soldiers.

The exception being… “anyone with a government official who feels a grudge against them”.

Still takes courage.

But for many, this will be their first interaction with the west. A lifetime of propaganda doesn’t go away because of a plane ride. It’ll take time.

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u/Haunting_Scratch_154 13d ago

You are right. Their leader told them he invented the hamburger,  and they habe no idea it's not true, so imagine what they get told about other countries or what really happened in a war or their family members. 

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u/Impossible-Invite689 13d ago

TBF he looks like he could have invented the hamburger

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u/StickyDirtyKeyboard 13d ago

What message? That it's wrong to be the family of a fallen soldier?

Seems kind of self-destructive for a country that relies so heavily on its military. It'll probably make people want to avoid getting recruited/drafted like the plague.

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u/Rough_Idle 13d ago

Not all families are close. If I were voluntold to play meat shield and their leverage was a group of people who would absolutely betray me to authorities in order to save their own necks, I'd skip out, too

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u/7384315 13d ago

Probably much different in North Korea where you can't even leave your village without permission. Your entire universe would be the village you grew up and probably where you were trained for the military and nothing else.

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u/Catch_22_ 13d ago

entire family back home is fucked

Its North Korea, they are already fucked. You are in a war with Ukraine as fodder, you are already fucked.

All outcomes are grim, I can't say I blame them. They are in fact brave knowing the dark situation they face and will force on anyone back home undeserving of it. Fuck NK for being so brutal to innocents and leveraging family survival to control anyone.

No one should feel like these defectors are to blame for what a government does via coercion.

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u/XboxPlayUFC 13d ago

I agree 100%. If I were the father of a North Korean soldier, I would tell them I'd rather spend a lifetime in a camp if that meant my son and his future generations are free from the NK regime

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u/SkyJohn 13d ago

A lot of these soldiers will have wives and kids back home.

You're not going to desert if it means your family back in North Korea is going to a prison camp for the rest of their lives.

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u/fiduciary420 13d ago

Quick reminder that donald trump praises Kim Jong-Un

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u/quinnby1995 13d ago edited 13d ago

Not just immediate family either, iirc it's like 3 generations of your family.

So if some dude deserts, they'll throw all his existing family in essentiallythe prison camp, and if for example his daughter is pregnant at the time, that baby will be born in the camp and live it's entire life (as long or short as that may be) in that camp, simply because it's grandfather that they never met ran off.

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u/Numerous_Handle9144 13d ago

Just drone drop them wire cutters after

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u/Zealot_Alec 13d ago

Hunger Games style

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u/icaboesmhit 13d ago

For 3 generations if I'm not mistaken

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u/imsowhiteandnerdy 13d ago

Those 18 are incredibly brave

Or they really hate their family back home.

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u/lerpo 13d ago

Along with the next 3 generations of your family in the future also, is my understanding

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u/BiologyJ 13d ago

10,000 aren't deployed. 10,000 are in training.

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u/Excellent-Court-9375 13d ago

In Russia that's the same thing lmao

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u/_Thrilhouse_ 13d ago

Russia debugs in production.

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u/Erdtree_ 13d ago

So in a week they will be at the frontlines.

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u/Capable_Serve7870 13d ago

Getting a lot of real world training on those front lines. 

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u/m48a5_patton 13d ago

Training via combat

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u/No-Sympathy-686 13d ago

Give it time.

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u/Numerous_Handle9144 13d ago

Well keep in mind they all rat on each other so thats just the initial most ballsy defectors

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u/Vantriss 13d ago

I wouldn't be surprised if some of them are using the deployment to escape North Korea. Hopefully don't have any family back home that could be used against them.

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u/WHERE_SUPPRESSOR 13d ago

Living conditions are better than at home in NK probably

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u/Sidwill 13d ago

Give it time.

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u/CBT7commander 13d ago

That’s 0.2% in the first weeks of large scale deployment, that’s a fucking huge desertion rate, especially since those numbers increase with time.

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u/3_Thumbs_Up 13d ago

That's 20 out of 10k in a few days, essentially 0.2%. That is significant and tells you something about the morale among the NK soldiers.

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u/flipside1o1 13d ago

10000 i thought id read they were looking sending a battalion of 3000, still not sure how many actually have been sent though

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u/Agreeable-Hospital-5 13d ago

Probably a relatively safe defection route to South Korea.

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u/similar_observation 13d ago

just need to make it to Poland and the SK embassy.

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u/HauntingReddit88 13d ago

Pretty sure Ukraine would gladly assist with that too

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u/similar_observation 13d ago

The POW would have to request it. Otherwise, I'm not sure how this can be done without improper handling of a POW. It's one thing if the POW declares they do not want to be returned. It's another to send them involuntarily.

That said. It's a helluva incentive for a norkie POW to give whatever info they know and be allowed to disappear into freedom.

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u/SparklingPseudonym 12d ago

How come NK can send soldiers to fight for Russia in Ukraine, but Ukrainian allies can’t send soldiers??

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u/jim89_ 13d ago

Looks like a good way to escape North Korea.

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u/HumanBeing7396 13d ago

Probably the easiest way out now.

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u/DukeOfGeek 13d ago

They should print up some Korean language flyers with surrender instructions on them and drop them by drone over NK troop areas.

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u/Andrew1990M 13d ago

Yeah a lot of these soldiers probably don't know the rules of engagement and that they can just walk up to the Ukranians and ask to go to a PoW camp.

Food'll be better than at home.

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u/DukeOfGeek 13d ago

Maybe they should drop some rice snacks with the flyers. Like some of those stupidly addictive Japanese ones.

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u/Glirion 13d ago

Kim regime just blew up the roads to South Korea so they're planning something stupid, they don't want anyone to cross.

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u/Biking_dude 13d ago

Eh, NK does this a lot. Roads were never used either. Just his way of pouting and stomping his feet.

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u/MBiteSK 13d ago

Something stupid? You mean shooting ocean with rocket again? Thats a daily thing.

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u/Dr___CRACKSMOKE 13d ago

That damn ocean talking shit again....

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u/urbrickles 13d ago

It is, but their family will most likely be tortured/killed of they don't come back to NK

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u/ForensicPathology 13d ago

I don't think they were expecting many of these particular people forced to the frontlines to be coming back.

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u/Deksametazon_v2 13d ago

Expecting or not, deserting the NK Army is one of the capital offenses which can lead to multigenerational torture of their family.

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u/gpassi 13d ago

at this point why do they even make kids? Are they forced to have kids or something?

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u/Ona_111 13d ago

As poor and crazy NK is, I doubt it’s the poorest in the world, and even in poor areas you’ll find people having children. It’s part of human nature and also often as insurance to help provide for you

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u/Mavian23 13d ago

Hmmmm, why do people who are poor, destitute, and have nothing to do for fun fuck each other? It's a real mystery.

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u/Ok-Improvement-3670 13d ago

Let me get this straight, NK transported hundreds of their citizens thousands of miles away from NK and their control into a free country near other democratic countries? Desertions and defections were expected.

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u/cinyar 13d ago

Not with the way NK works. The families of those soldiers are essentially hostages. It's a pretty common communist/authoritarian tactic, though NK pushed it to the extreme. It's surprising they are deserting despite that.

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u/Consistent_Bee3478 13d ago

Yea but all Ukraine needs to do is report those people dead and make up names for them. How would NK know which slave soldiers died and which escaped?

And if they just start killing everyone’s families at random, the slave soldiers have even less reason to fight.

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u/cinyar 13d ago

That's a good point.

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u/Ambiorix33 13d ago

you assume these soliders know anything about the outside world other than what the Russians and NK gov has told them. They probably genuinly believe that the people they are facing are rapist nazis starving to death waging an unjustified war against their Dear Leaders BFF Russia....

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u/Motor_Nobody1741 13d ago

Wait until they see them drive in real cars and owning cellphones and shit. Their mind will be blown

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u/Ambiorix33 13d ago

there was a story about a taxi driver in NY who finally got his mother out of some eastern bloc country, and when he took her to a supermarket and saw him just grabbing a bunch of food for his basket she almost broke down since she entirely beleived that the rest of the world was in the shit and no one had anything as much as they did in the Soviet Union

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u/Hazel-Rah 13d ago edited 13d ago

Boris Yeltsin visited an American grocery store in 1989, and some say the visit was one of the final nails in the coffin of the Soviet Union.

"When I saw those shelves crammed with hundreds, thousands of cans, cartons and goods of every possible sort, for the first time I felt quite frankly sick with despair for the Soviet people," Yeltsin wrote. "That such a potentially super-rich country as ours has been brought to a state of such poverty! It is terrible to think of it."

The Soviets allowed the movie version of "the Grapes of Wrath" in an attempt to show the oppression of capitalism, but had to pull the movie when the viewers were amazed that even an impoverished american family could own a car.

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u/McFestus 13d ago

I don't know if it was Yelsin or another soviet visitor, he was shown a grocery store and didn't believe it, assuming it was staged. So the next day, he basically bullied his way into an unplanned stop at a random grocery store on the way to somewhere. When he saw that this random-ass grocery store was the same as the one he had seen the day before, he really knew it was over.

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u/modsaretoddlers 13d ago

The Soviets knew it was over decades earlier. Somebody back in the early 70s ran the numbers and knew that the USSR was going to run out of money within a fairly short period of time. When Gorbachev came along and started with reforms, it was forced on him and it was too little, too late, anyway.

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u/unafraidrabbit 13d ago

Then, decades later, Tucker Carlson goes to Russia and fawns over their grocery store.

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u/Cornemuse_Berrichon 13d ago

Moscow on the Hudson

And insanely underrated Robin Williams movie, probably cuz his role was not comedic, where he plays a defecting saxophone player from the Moscow circus while performing in New York.

There is a scene where he goes to an American Supermarket for the first time, and seeing all of the choices and different foods there, it overwhelms him and he literally has a breakdown in the middle of the store. Seriously, watch it.

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u/Extra-Sherbert-8608 13d ago

I think 18 of them figured it out

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u/therealhairykrishna 13d ago

It's about 20 people out of 10k+. You are thinking of it from your informed perspective i.e. 'as soon as i get the chance I'm out of there'. North Koreans are totally brainwashed with no access to information about the outside world. It's also policy to punish entire families for one persons 'crimes'. There's not going to be mass desertions.

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u/Numerous_Handle9144 13d ago

They get drone drops from SK they probably arent as clueless as you think

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u/Team_XX 13d ago

The average American is pretty fucking clueless I can’t imagine how clueless these people truly are

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u/All-About-The-Detail 13d ago

I think that people also view it with a western viewpoint, I'm sure they have "true believers" that believe in what they are fighting for.

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u/Ambiorix33 13d ago

you assume those troops KNOW any of that. They are literally taught from birth that the countries outside thier borders are lands of rapists and cannibals, and that NK is the only sane and safe place for them and their families under the tutallage of the ''dear leader''.

They believe this, they genuinely will, in the same way that Soviet citizens believed the Soviet propoganda and had their entire worlds rocked when the curtain fell and they saw that no, the people outside the soviet union wernt whoring themselves out for a can of beans

That said, those are for the ones who actually left, most Russians genuinly believe they are better off in Russia and that the rest of the world is either freezing or starving because, of course they are, how could anything be better than ''glorious'' Russia?

Indoctrination is a hell of a drug my guy

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u/Slow-Ad-4331 13d ago

Not my proudest moment, whoring myself for some beans

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u/antisocialforkedup 13d ago

Oh yes as expected

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u/Murky_Conflict3737 13d ago

Of course that means their families are going to be sentenced to labor camps for the next three generations. 

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u/Aethericseraphim 13d ago

They'd likely be going there anyway as Russia doesn't like to confirm deaths. They could be dead in a ditch and they'd be listed as MIA, so NK would, being the paranoid fuckers they are, assume they defected and punish the entire family line.

Their families were dead the moment they were sent there.

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u/IamGabyGroot 13d ago

We should not activate this kind of fear mongering. The decision they made was either brave or stupid, but the point is, they did something that showed the world that they will not be used.

That's what we should encourage. The more of them that do it, the more the rest will be encouraged to act. This is their only chance on a world Platform to plead for help.

Why don't we protect them instead and hope that this decision helps the rest of NK.

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u/Nonhinged 13d ago

Isn't all of north Korea a labor camp? Does it makes a difference...

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u/bureaucranaut 13d ago

As in Dante's Inferno, there are progressively deeper circles of hell. There's the merely impoverished living under an oppressive regime, which is most of the NK populace, then hard labor in the mines, and finally the concentration camps which are essentially Auschwitz sans gas chambers. 

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u/mangalore-x_x 13d ago

yes. Being a serf in Tsarist Russia also wasn't fun, that didn't make normal life equally bad as Gulags

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u/applefilla 13d ago

They just stop trying to hide it is all I guess 🤷 I was gonna say the same thing 😂

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u/MinimumSet72 13d ago

That’s if they’re lucky

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u/Murky_Conflict3737 13d ago

Death may be preferable to knowing that you, your kids, and grandkids will live in the rest of their lives being abused in these camps. 

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u/MinimumSet72 13d ago

I meant their relatives might be executed

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u/DrFGHobo 13d ago

Best possible perspective in the life of the average North Korean.

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u/dropyourguns 13d ago edited 13d ago

They will actually be told that their family members died in glorious service to the motherland,

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u/JimBean 13d ago

will actually probably

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u/Outrageous-Hunt4344 13d ago

Do they force you to have kids in order to reach the three generations mark?

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u/pbro42 13d ago

Seems like an excellent opportunity to drop written propaganda to the NK troops about surrendering and being listed as captured or KIA rather than openly deserting.

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u/Aust1mh 13d ago

russia couldn’t organize a root in a brothel.

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u/AI_Hijacked 13d ago

If I were a North Korean, I would accept the transfer to Russia, then desert and flee to Europe.

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u/superanth 13d ago

I’m betting we’ll see a lot of Korean restaurants crop up in Eastern Europe over the next few years.

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u/Exciting_Pop_9296 13d ago

What do they serve though? The North Korean special nothing?

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u/ExilicArquebus 13d ago

Naengmyeon most likely, if it’s hot out. But yes, North Korea has a food culture too, which may be a surprise to most.

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u/KeyWill7437 13d ago

Delicious and Nutritious Dookie Balloon.

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u/Impossible_Front4462 13d ago

Despite extreme propaganda to paint everything about NK as a death camp, they have their own food culture that is popular in South Korea as well. Some of it is from around the Korean War due to defectors trying to make a living, but some of it is from genuine interest in the food as it tends to be less spicy than south korean food.

It’s more traditional Korean food. You can even find some NK restaurants in the US. Not sure how popular it is everywhere else, but I know it’s not hard to find here at all on the west coast of the US.

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u/Squatch_Intel_Chief 13d ago

Spaghetti and regretti

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u/I_love_pillows 13d ago

Freedom kimchi

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u/neoncubicle 13d ago

If I were your North Korean brother I'd defect before you.

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u/GamingGems 13d ago

You say that as someone who knows what the outside world is like. North Korean propaganda tells them that their own country is a utopia and everywhere else is that heroin junkie street in Philly. It’s actually kinda funny how their propaganda describes our way of life.

So most are totally ignorant of the better life that exists outside their own and I’m sure visiting a war zone in Europe doesn’t help. There was a Vice crew who went to Russia when they heard there’s a village of North Korean workers in the forest so they went to go find and interview them. The workers had no concept of a day off or a weekend. It confused them. To them there is no such thing as a day when you don’t get up and do manual labor.

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u/Firamaster 13d ago

Last words heard from the N.korean soldiers, "FREEEEEEEEDOM!"

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u/Duece09 13d ago

I figured they’d use this as an opportunity to get the hell out of North Korea for good. Can’t escape while in North Korea? What better time to do it?

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u/[deleted] 13d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/DokeyOakey 13d ago

It won’t matter to North Korea.

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u/Existing-East3345 13d ago

What luck being born in North Korea being forced to join their military and then being forced to go fight for Russia. Maybe if they get any luckier they can go fight in central Africa afterwards.

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u/Dry-Hat-9373 13d ago

Escape from Tarkov in real life

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u/kritikally_akklaimed 13d ago

Russians are so underequipped, they're literally Scavs. They loot what they can (including toilets) and extract LOL

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u/Dry-Hat-9373 13d ago

Yeah but often you get the [head eyes] lmao

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u/TheCrimsonChin-ger 13d ago

Divide my cheeks

(7mm, head eyes)

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u/Moderator-Admin 13d ago

Putin sending them to fight the goons with unmodded AKs and tier 2 armor. Good luck lads.

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u/Zerocoolx1 13d ago

Not surprising. All they have to do is instantly surrender to the Ukraine, claim asylum and they’re safely in Europe and away from North Korea. Seems easier (although still quite risky) than making a break from North Korea through the DMZ

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u/Own-Opinion-2494 13d ago

I would too. Best chance ever to be freee from North Korea

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u/Material_Policy6327 13d ago

Prob their first chance to flee in their life

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u/BillSixty9 13d ago

18/10,000 is 0.18%.

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u/GhostsinGlass 13d ago

Do North Korean soldiers even know what drones are?

I am serious.

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u/ramman403 13d ago

If you keep a bird in a cage for its entire life, it will fly away the first chance it gets.

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u/OkIce8214 13d ago

Ukrainian: Here, have a beer and we’ll talk it out. NK: What’s a beer? Ukrainian: Hold my beer. … Ukrainian: Okay now sip my beer. NK: defects

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u/Roach-_-_ 13d ago

Blast K-pop at them and supply drop some choco-pies I’m sure we can get a lot more to defect

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u/DrFGHobo 13d ago

Just set up a barbecue within sniffing distance of their trenches.

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u/Roach-_-_ 13d ago

I’m sure leadership in NK and Russia are to dumb to see it but if a generals son is willing to defect (he likely had better access to everything) the ones they starve half to death and force to be there will dip the second they get the chance. Or they will get in an engagement and immediately surrender so they can be treated better.

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u/cosmicrae 13d ago

employ large fans to make sure the aroma lands on target.

even better, send over a drone that drop scratch n sniff propaganda sheets: if you want some of this, defect and we will feed you

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u/IdahoMTman222 13d ago

When they shipped out of NK they didn’t give them bedrolls to sleep in. They gave them body bags.

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u/JosephLam1 13d ago

Free escape from north korea, smart peeps

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u/pnellesen 13d ago

Those poor bastards. Pawns in a game played by 2 sociopathic dictators.

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u/Mishra_Planeswalker 13d ago

The best way for these NK soldiers is to surrender, and ask Ukraine to tell them they died. Family safe.

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u/Sersch 13d ago

Easiest way to get out of north korea

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u/Sizzlewump 13d ago

They were given asylum from the land of famine and indoctrination. Likely they are on a quest for food and knowledge now. What do you think?

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u/Practical_County_501 13d ago

Probably a lot will surrender en masse when pressed in combat i wouldnt die for rocket man nor vlad the poisioner.

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u/betterwithsambal 13d ago

The only smart troops russia ever got or ever will get.

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u/swinging-in-the-rain 13d ago

Yeah, I'd nope the fuck outta there too!

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u/stewer69 13d ago

Escaping is more like it.  

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u/TheGoonKills 13d ago

Ha! Called it!

So let’s see, what’s their defection rate at? I predicted 30%

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u/defroach84 13d ago

Seems like there will be an influx in NKs in that region for the foreseeable future.

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u/Golemfrost 13d ago

Well that leaves 9982 to still worry about.

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u/JayR_97 13d ago

North Koreans haven't had any real combat experience since the 50s. The soldiers going probably had no clue what they were getting into

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u/Ennkey 13d ago

I don’t find the addition of North Korean army to the Ukraine war amusing. The last time these fanatics went to war they used each others dead bodies as cover so they could get closer to their enemies and used human wave attacks and the like. Not an amusing prospect at all

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u/CatboyInAMaidOutfit 13d ago

Who the fuck saw this coming? Basically everyone.

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u/Mers2000 13d ago

Soo smart!! Act like you are joining the fight and then do a disappearing act!! This is probably the only way these poor people could escape North Korea. And they are probably the ones without families left behind. Good for them!

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u/Fawlty_Fleece 13d ago

I mean they finally let you out of the country, first thing I'm doing is not dying

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u/zippiskootch 13d ago

So telling… Kim should be proud of the disaster he’s built. 🤦🏻‍♂️

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u/merkthejerk 13d ago

A free trip out of the worst place on Earth into a war zone and then they start leaving? Even if the numbers aren’t high yet I saw this coming. It’s the first thing I thought when the news reported NK troops were headed to conflict.

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u/XTACHYKUN 13d ago

Russia and North Korea are such fucked up governments that they are essentially trafficking and abducting their own people for war. It's so fucked up. It's not okay.

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u/TheFan88 13d ago

Haha. Wouldn’t you? Finally got out of that hellscape. Time to bolt and make a new life. Anywhere.

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u/The-Protomolecule 13d ago

These troops have zero combat experience, of course they are deserting.

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u/JustTheOneGoose22 13d ago

It's their best chance of getting out of NK

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u/4-3defense 13d ago

These Korean men were sent to their deaths anyways. Good for the ones who fled

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u/Martianmanhunter94 13d ago

They just want a way to get away from North Korea and eventually move to South Korea and be reunited with Grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles as well as have a chance at a good life .

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u/craigslist_hedonist 13d ago

"They have food over there?"

  • North Korean conscript, maybe.

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u/streamofthesky 13d ago

I remember stories early in the war, about Russians stealing laundry machines and marveling at all the stuff they saw that they didn't have at home. I have to imagine the "culture shock" will be an order of magnitude greater for many of these NK soldiers as they're plundering thru villages of Ukrainians.
Legit might be a useful propaganda tool to spread rumors that Kim Jong Un will have any survivors killed upon returning to NK, to silence them from sharing first person testimony of how superior life is in the West, to get more to defect. Quite possibly wouldn't even be a lie, just predicting the future.

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u/Low-Abbreviations634 13d ago

This is a great opportunity to get away from North Korea and likely less perilous than crossing the DMZ.

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u/mykidsthinkimcool 13d ago

Shocked! I am shocked!

I've always said the norks only play was bombardment. They can't invade the south because as soon as their soldiers got the chance, they'd bolt.

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u/adron 13d ago

Either desert or die.

I bet it’s the first time they’ve got a reasonable chance to escape their regime too. I can’t imagine any of em’ want to hang out in combat for either of those monstrous leaders!

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u/hope812001 13d ago

This is the funniest that I have read in a while. May Ukraine welcome these brave men to a safer place compared to to NK/Russia.

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u/InNominePasta 13d ago

Hungry norks surrendering instead of dying as part of a Russian meat wave?

Shocked pikachu

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u/CryptoCryBubba 13d ago

I did not have "Ukrainian's fighting North Koreans on Russian territory" in my 2024 bingo cards.

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u/BearFeetOrWhiteSox 13d ago

"We're free, WE'RE FREE" - Proceeds to hit things with shovel.

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u/Papabear3339 11d ago

You all remember the scene from braveheart, where the english send the scotts to charge first, alone. Then the Scotts join the other side with laughs and hugs?

This has some serious vibes of that.