Analysis: What North Korea learned from Ukraine

If North Korea was looking for another excuse to go ahead with its nuclear weapons program, it just found one in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

That one of the few countries that voluntarily gave up a nuclear arsenal is now under attack by the same country to which it delivered its warheads will not go unnoticed in Pyongyang.

In fact, analysts say, Moscow’s actions have given the reclusive Asian nation a “perfect storm” of conditions to accelerate its program.

Not only will North Korea use Ukraine’s plight to bolster its narrative that it needs nuclear weapons to ensure its survival, but leader Kim Jong Un may find that, with all eyes on the war in Europe, he could get away more than ever.

Divided over Ukraine, the international community will likely have little appetite for sanctions on the hermit kingdom; indeed, even the unified condemnation of a recent North Korean ICBM test remains vague.

Furthermore, the boycott of Russian oil and gas could even open the door to reduced-price energy deals between Pyongyang and Moscow — ideological allies whose friendship dates back to the 1950s Korean War.

At worst, experts even wonder if this is the start of a previously unthinkable chain of events that could end with a return to inter-Korean conflict, perhaps even with the North invading the South – although most see this as highly unlikely.

As Professor Andrei Lankov of Kookmin University says, the lesson North Korea learned from Russia’s war in Ukraine is simple:
“Never, ever surrender your nuclear weapons.”

A nuclear lesson, from Ukraine to Saddam and Gaddafi

Moscow’s invasion of its neighbor reinforced a message that has been on Pyongyang’s mind for decades, Lankov said.

When Ukraine was part of the USSR, it was home to thousands of nuclear warheads. She voluntarily handed them over to Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, as part of a 1994 agreement with the United States, the United Kingdom and Russia that would guarantee Ukraine’s security, an agreement known as the Budapest Memorandum.

Ukraine now finds itself under brutal attack from the same country that signed the deal to protect its sovereignty – which now repeatedly refers to its nuclear arsenal to warn the West about intervention.

Would Moscow have invaded if Ukraine had kept its warheads?

Most experts – and probably Pyongyang as well – think not.

“Now (the North Koreans) have one more confirmation (of that lesson) after Iraq, after Libya,” Lankov said.

Pyongyang regularly uses the experiences of Saddam Hussein and Moammar Gaddafi, the former leaders of Iraq and Libya, to justify its nuclear program, both to its own people and to the world. Both strongman leaders lost their grip on power – and ultimately their own lives – after their own nuclear ambitions stalled.

The Russian invasion will reinforce that narrative, but in doing so, it could also have a “very negative impact” on the mind of North Korea’s own leader, according to Lee Sang-hyun, chairman and senior researcher at the Sejong Institute.

He says Kim is likely to respond in only one way: by becoming “even more obsessed with his nuclear weapons and missile capabilities.”

Pyongyang’s carte blanche

Even before the invasion, North Korea showed signs of increasing its nuclear ambitions.

On Saturday, it carried out its 14th missile launch of the year – up from just four tests in 2020 and eight in 2021. One of the missiles tested this year is believed to be an ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile) that is supposed to be capable of hitting the continental United States. This was the first ICBM test since 2017 and was widely seen as a harbinger of future tests.

Kim made clear his intention to move full speed ahead with his nuclear program in a military parade on April 25.

And commercial satellite imagery suggests Pyongyang is trying to restore access to the Punggye-ri underground testing site, according to South Korean officials and think tanks.

US officials told the CNN that North Korea may be ready to resume nuclear tests later this month.

In that context, the Russian invasion – and the international sanctions that followed – created a “perfect storm” of conditions for the Pyongyang operation, analysts say.

“There are some interesting, perhaps unintended consequences for the Western response against Russia in particular, which is that a Russia that has been completely isolated from the global economy and subjected to tremendous sanctions pressure. I think there are very few incentives to impose sanctions on North Korea,” said Ankit Panda, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Nuclear Policy Program.

A clear division between the permanent members of the UN Security Council – Russia and China on one side, the UK, US and France on the other – means that any unified decision to punish North Korea is impossible.

“It’s pretty clear that China and Russia will block additional sanctions, and frankly, it’s not clear what else you can sanction,” Lankov said.

Even a seventh nuclear test may not elicit Beijing’s usual negative response: “China won’t be happy enough about nuclear tests, but they’ll swallow it,” Lankov said.

Making money with an old friend

If anything, North Korea may even benefit financially as other countries boycott Russian oil and gas. The cash-strapped country would be more than happy to take some of the slack, potentially at a discount, and deal with a Russia no longer constrained by US-led sanctions against the North.

“I think Russia will provide more economic and energy support to North Korea,” said Ramon Pacheco Pardo, president of KF-VUB Korea at the Institute of European Studies at Vrije Universiteit Brussel.

“Oil and gas, certainly, but it could also include food, fertilizer, it could be all kinds of economic aid that North Korea wants.”

That Pyongyang will side with Moscow in a new world order is not surprising.

Relations between the two countries were forged by the Korean War of 1950-1953, and they shared a communist ideology for decades.

The former Soviet Union was a great benefactor to North Korea, financially supporting the Kim regime. While that task has been transferred to China, Russia’s return to President Vladimir Putin’s rule has given a new glow to the relationship.

“Pyongyang was kind of disgusted with the democratic and liberal or semi-democratic and semi-liberal Russia that existed, and they basically hailed Vladimir Putin as a leader who was leading the country in the right direction,” Lankov said.

Kim’s fleeting dance with the US — holding three meetings with former President Donald Trump, which ultimately yielded little — only reminded him that his most natural and profitable alliances remain with China and Russia.

Pyongyang, for its part, has made it clear where it blames the war in Ukraine.

“The root cause of the crisis in Ukraine lies entirely in the hegemonic policy of the US and the West, which surrender to arbitrariness and arbitrariness towards other countries,” said the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Would North Korea invade its neighbor to the South?

Since the invasion of Russia, North Korea’s rhetoric towards South Korea has changed.

Last month, Kim’s sister Kim Yo Jong warned that if South Korea were to militarily confront the North, its army “would face a miserable fate, little short of total destruction and ruin”.

Pyongyang’s threatening language is nothing new – a US official once described being publicly insulted by North Korea as a “badge of honor”.

What is new is that since the invasion, experts like Lankov have asked whether North Korea would consider an invasion of the South again — more than seven decades after its invasion in 1950 sparked the Korean War.

This question has been discarded for years. Most experts still view the changes as insignificant, but the fact that it’s being discussed is noteworthy.

“North Koreans are probably dreaming again of something they used to take seriously but in recent decades have almost forgotten. This is the conquest of the South,” Lankov said.

For now, the idea seems fanciful. But the future is another matter.

“Maybe, just maybe, the American president of the year 2045 or 2055 will not risk San Francisco to save Seoul,” Lankov said. “(Until then) the North Koreans could use ICBMs, perhaps nuclear-armed submarines to (terrorize) the Americans, to blackmail the Americans out of the conflict.”