Most modern militaries distinguish between military and civilian equipment, but not North Korea. Video from a recent parade honoring North Korean leader Kim Jong Un reveals an unconventional display. Instead of tanks or armored carriers, tractors pulled rocket launchers and launchers discreetly concealed within vehicles designed to resemble civilian trucks.
Matt Shoemaker, a retired intelligence officer with the United States military, explained that this action is typical of North Korea’s operating style.
“They are an incredibly poor country that focuses the vast majority of their economy on its military abilities,” Shoemaker said.
Shoemaker noted due to sanctions, North Korea faces limitations in producing the type of military hardware it wants. So, North Korea often resorts to taking advantage of dual-use technology.
“It’s meant to scare the West and show us that they can be quite creative. And they can use deception in order to attack us and to hurt us,” Shoemake said.
So, should the West be scared? Perhaps, but not necessarily because of these weapons. Shoemaker advised caution regarding the actual capabilities of the new launchers. He highlighted North Korea’s history of exaggerating its weapons technology, only for the truth to be revealed later.
“These things were absolutely unloaded,” he said. “They were not loaded with the missiles or anything like that. So, if [the trucks hauling the launchers] don’t have the horsepower, once they’re fully loaded… It’s just another example of the North Koreans pretending like they have better capabilities than they actually do.”
Even if North Korea’s new dump truck missile launchers are functional, Shoemaker said the U.S. and its allies have ample experience in dealing with similar threats.
“It certainly gives a lot of work to the military analysts… trying to locate where most of them are going to be stored, for example,” he explained.
So, for whom might North Korea be building these weapons? Certainly some will be retained for local conflicts, but a significant portion could also be destined for Russia.
Satellite imagery recently revealed a Russian ship carrying suspected North Korean weapons docked at a Chinese port. Additionally, United Nations sanctions monitors report that North Korean missiles were likely fired at Kharkiv from Russia in January.
“The fact that Russia even finds itself needing to call on the North Koreans for their own military equipment is, in the very least, an embarrassment for Vladimir Putin,” Shoemaker said.
Despite international sanctions, North Korea seems to benefit financially from such transactions. Shoemaker said it’s a challenge.
“We in the West, we are very legalistic in the sense of we like to follow the rules, or at least know what the rules are, in order to gauge our left and right swim lane,” he said. “A lot of the world, unfortunately, is not like that. Russian culture is certainly not like that, and absolutely North Korean Culture is not like that. So, to get them to adhere to [things like the Geneva convention] requires an outside strong man, if you will. And no one seems either capable or willing to do that based off of what the implications of that would mean.”
Reuters contributed to this report.
