Russia is deploying “human waves” of North Korean soldiers, the U.S. said Friday, and at least one soldier captured by Ukraine died of his injuries.
According to White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby, some North Korean soldiers have taken their own lives rather than surrendering to Ukrainian forces.
These suicides, he said, were “likely out of fear of reprisal against their families in North Korea in the event that they’re captured.”
South Korea’s National Intelligence Agency had confirmed on Friday that the North Korean soldier captured the previous day had died.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a statement on Telegram Friday that at least 3,000 North Korean soldiers have died or been wounded in Russia’s Kursk region, where Ukrainian forces mounted a lightning incursion in August.
But Russia has since amassed thousands of troops in a counter attack.
Kirby quoted a lower death toll among North Koreans, saying more than 1,000 soldiers have died just in the past week.
That’s on top of the more than 1,500 Russian soldiers being wounded or killed each day, according to Britain’s defense ministry, which estimated that there were over 45,000 casualties in November, the highest since the start of the war, adding that the number “is likely reflective of the higher tempo of Russian operations and offensives.”
To supplement its counterattack, Moscow turned towards its ally, Pyongyang, who, according to estimates by the U.S. and its allies, had deployed an estimated 11,000 soldiers in Ukraine.
Kirby said the North Koreans are conducting “massed, dismounted assaults against Ukrainian positions in Kursk.” While these “human wave tactics” were ineffective, he acknowledged that Russia’s grinding assault on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure was making it difficult for Ukrainians to weather the winter.
Neither Russia nor North Korea have publicly acknowledged the troop deployment.
The North Korean troops are being treated as “expendable,” ordered by their leadership on “hopeless assaults against Ukrainian defenses,” Kirby said.
“These North Korean soldiers appear to be highly indoctrinated, pushing attacks even when it is clear that those attacks are futile,” he said.
While the exact number of North Korean soldiers who killed themselves to avoid capture is unclear, on Friday, Zelenskyy said that while “several” North Korean soldiers were captured they were “seriously wounded and could not be resuscitated,” and suggesting that some of them may also have been killed by comrades.
These troops were being sent to fight with “minimal protection,” he said, and were suffering a “great deal” of losses.
Still, Ukrainians have been unable to capture them as prisoners, he added. “Their own people are executing them.”
