US army worries Ukraine becomes North Korean missile test site
The US Army is concerned that Ukraine has become a testing ground for North Korean missiles. This marks the first time North Korea could test its missiles in actual combat situations, according to the Pacific Army Commander General Charles Flynn, as quoted by Bloomberg.
"I don’t believe that in my recent memory that the North Korean military has had a battlefield laboratory quite like the Russians are affording them to have in Ukraine," he said.
As General Flynn noted, this gives North Korea the opportunity to gain valuable information on technical issues, procedures, and the missiles themselves. The US will closely monitor how this unfolds.
Flynn emphasized that he and other commanders are concerned about the information North Korea may learn about its weapons, "they would otherwise not have access to absent a conflict."
North Korea supplied weapons to Russia
In December 2023, the White House announced that Russia had purchased ballistic missiles from North Korea. In early January, there was information that the occupiers had struck Kharkiv with North Korean missiles.
Vadym Skibitskyi, a representative of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, told RBC-Ukraine in an interview that North Korea actively supplied ammunition to Russia throughout the fall. According to intelligence estimates, the Russian army could have received around a million shells from North Korea.
Ukrainian Prosecutor General Andriy Kostin said that the Russians have already used at least 24 ballistic missiles of North Korean production to shell Ukraine.