Yuriy Bondar, who served in Ukraine’s 80th separate airborne assault “Galician Lions” brigade, writing on Facebook said his unit was one of the first of Ukraine’s armed forces (AFU) to engage with North Korean troops in the Kursk region, adding that Pyongyang’s troops should not be underestimated:
“They are extremely resilient, extremely well-trained, and morally stable.”
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He went on: “Their level of small arms proficiency is extremely high – ten years of military service yields results. The number of defense force drones that the enemy managed to shoot down just using small arms is seriously surprising.”
He then went on to corroborate reports, based on a notebook recovered from the body of a North Korean soldier killed, of the tactic they were using to take on Ukrainian drones which he put down to their “psychological resilience.” He said one of the group will act “as bait” to attract the attention of the drone while the others try to ambush it, shooting it down with their personal weapons.
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Much of what Bondar wrote was supported in comments made to the New York Times (NYT) by “anonymized” Ukrainian soldiers at the weekend, who said that since the North Koreans had arrived fighting in the Kursk region had become “far more ferocious than before.”
An AFU lieutenant using the call sign “Alex” said, “The Koreans … are quite skilled in shooting, they have repeatedly destroyed drones, obviously they were primarily trained for this, so they try to destroy everything in the air.”
A platoon leader, identified as “Oleksii,” told the NYT: “The situation worsened significantly when the North Koreans started arriving. They are pressing our fronts en-masse, finding weak points and breaking through them.”
Bondar said that DPRK troops carry out dynamic attacks, often catching Ukrainian defenders “off guard,” capturing positions even when outnumbered. He said that one of the commanders in Kursk told him, “… compared to the soldiers of the DPRK, the Wagner model of 2022 are just children – and I believe him.”
He said that the DPRK soldiers rarely surrender. If they are wounded, their comrades just step over them leaving them where they lie and they use grenades to blow themselves up as Ukrainian troops approach. He added that the dead are doused with flammable liquid; their faces burned to disguise their identity.
To date Ukrainian authorities say they have only managed to capture three North Koreans, since they arrived in the Kursk region, one succumbing to his wounds shortly after being apprehended and the other two, who were also wounded, have been moved to Kyiv for questioning.
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