Kim Jong-Un's alliance with Putin intensifies as tensions rise

"If war breaks out, the Republic of Korea will be erased from the map. Because it wants war, we are ready to put an end to its existence," stated the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) this week.

The statement was issued in response to propaganda leaflets dropped over North Korea, which Pyongyang accused its southern neighbours of deploying. As evidence, KCNA published blurry photos of balloons and leaflets, but the government in Seoul assured that it had nothing to do with the action. If the leaflets were indeed sent from the south, South Korean activists might be responsible.

This would not be the first such incident. In the past, activists from the south have sent balloons with attached propaganda materials to the north, informing North Koreans about the state of the North Korean camps and showing what life is like for citizens in South Korea. For example, in 2020, the leaflets compared Kim Jong-un's starving subjects to the smiling citizens of South Korea.

North Korea reciprocated and continues to do so—in the last four months alone, it has sent over 6,000 balloons to the south filled with various waste. Some even contained faeces. In response, South Korea began broadcasting world news and K-pop music via loudspeakers.

This time, however, the "balloon war" has had more severe consequences. The North Korean army has blown up sections of two unused roads connecting the two countries, and artillery and missile units have been deployed near the border. Pyongyang has also placed border garrisons on heightened alert.

KCNA reported that over 1.4 million young people volunteered to join or return to the Korean People's Army as a supposed spontaneous response to the "serious provocation" of the leaflet action.

Placing the army on alert and blowing up various facilities is also nothing new. In 2020, North Korea demolished a liaison office building built right on the border. At that time, the army was also put on alert, and students, pupils, and farmers enlisted en masse. Even earlier, in 2017, KCNA claimed that nearly 3.5 million people volunteered in response to US pressure on the North Korean nuclear programme.

Then, as now, Pyongyang portrayed this mass enlistment as a demonstration of national unity motivated by the desire to defend the country and retaliate. Seoul responded similarly by putting its own units on alert, and the Ministry of Defence in Seoul warned that if any South Korean citizen is harmed in any clash, North Korea will witness the "end of its regime".

Recent events are part of a series of defiant actions by Kim Jong-un.

In early October, the dictator warned that he might use nuclear weapons in potential conflicts with South Korea and the United States. According to him, both countries are responsible for escalating hostilities on the Korean Peninsula.

"We will not hesitate to use all offensive capabilities against our enemies," Kim Jong-un announced.

Also troubling are the changes in the North Korean constitution. It now includes a clause stating that South Korea is an enemy nation. Previously, North Korean doctrine envisaged peaceful reunification of the two states and the introduction of communism. Now the constitution explicitly describes South Korea as a hostile state that needs to be conquered by force.

South Korean experts note that Kim decided to take this step because he felt emboldened after forging closer relations with the Russian Federation. In June, Russia and North Korea signed a treaty on a comprehensive strategic partnership. The agreement between Putin and Kim Jong-un includes a mutual defence clause under which both parties are to provide each other with support in the event of external aggression.

One manifestation of this closeness is the delivery of artillery shells to the Kremlin and the dispatch of several thousand North Korean soldiers to Russia. They are currently undergoing training and may be deployed to the front or border areas with Ukraine by the end of 2024.

The regime, with Russia's nuclear power behind it, has decided to brandish its strength. However, as Prof. Kang Dong-wan, a professor of political science and diplomacy at Dong-a University in Busan, emphasised, escalation will not occur.

"The North Korean regime is based on a politics of fear and needs an external enemy," assessed Prof. Kang in an interview with the BBC. "Whenever tensions rise, North Korea emphasises external threats to increase loyalty to the regime."

Kim is also aware of his army's weakness and restricts himself to provocations such as shelling uninhabited islands or blowing up roads. This is merely posturing because, in a direct confrontation, the North Korean army cannot compete with its southern neighbour. In most areas, the development of its armed forces ceased in the 1970s.

The over-one-million-strong army is the fourth largest and looks quite capable on paper. The Global Firepower ranking, compiled solely based on numbers, places the North Korean army in 36th place and the Navy even in the top ten. However, a closer inspection reveals it is not so impressive.

The main type of tank is the Chonma-ho vehicles in versions from 1 to 3, of which Kim Jong-un has about 1,200. The Chonma-ho of these versions are modelled on the Soviet T-62, whose production ended 40 years ago. The Koreans also have about 1,000 original Soviet T-62s. The remaining vehicles are original T-72s or their local variants.

The situation is much worse for mechanised units, which practically do not exist in the north. The Koreans primarily have old Chinese VTT-323s and Soviet BMP-1s. Artillery development also halted decades ago. The main weapon is the M-20 howitzer, dating back to the 1930s, and the D-74, two decades newer, produced in Korea under licence.

The Air Force is truly outdated, with its backbone consisting of 120 Chengdu J-7s and 106 Shenyang J-5s. The former are licensed MiG-21s, and the latter are MiG-17Fs. The Koreans also have about a hundred Shenyang J-6s, Chinese-produced MiG-19s. The aircraft have not been modernised for over two decades and thus present no combat value. Similarly, the 80 bomber H-5s, licensed Il-28s, are antiquated.

Mobilising such an army against the well-organised and modern South Korean army could end in disaster and the actual collapse of the Kim dynasty regime. Kim Jong-un is aware of this, so he only waves his sabre, having Vladimir Putin as an ally.