SEOUL, South Korea — The flag-waving optics of this week’s historic meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un have given way to a key question: Is the “comprehensive strategic partnership” signed by the two men the start of a true bilateral military partnership?
The full text of the agreement was made public Thursday by the North Korean Central News Agency and summarized by Russian media, including the state-run Tass News Agency. The most important passage is a deal between the two sides to aid the other if it is attacked militarily.
But there is speculation in some foreign policy circles that the pact may be little more than a paper treaty.
Experts say that one key element in any alliance, the exchange of military equipment, is already in play. Conversely, two countries’ armed forces do not yet have the capability to operate jointly.
Prior experience — including the exiling of senior officers under the reign of Mr. Kim’s grandfather, and harsh crackdowns after another group of officers amid a suspected coup against his father — suggest Pyongyang may be wary of tight military-to-military ties with a nation such as Russia.
Whether North Korea and Russia plan to adopt actual joint military capabilities should become clear in the coming weeks and months, experts say.
Inside the summit
The Washington Times learned this week that Mr. Putin’s deliberate late arrival in Pyongyang had thrown off some of Mr. Kim’s greeting plans, while asserting Mr. Putin’s own perceived precedence in the relationship.
Sources said that Mr. Kim — who, unlike the KGB-trained, poker-faced Mr. Putin, has a somewhat readable face and body language — appeared uncomfortable during the joint press conference.
The sources note that Mr. Kim was constantly glancing at his sister and close aide, Kim Yo Jong, as if uneasy with the content of the agreement.
Multiple reports also noted the difference in language used by Mr. Putin and Mr. Kim. While Mr. Kim hailed the agreement as an “alliance,” Mr. Putin did not use that term.
The statement contains 23 separate clauses. It commits the two parties to upgrade economic interaction, and to cooperate on areas ranging from illegal immigration to mass media. Both signatories agree to cooperate in artificial intelligence, nuclear energy and space exploration — all technologies with military as well as peaceful uses.
The standout clause includes the wording: “If one of the parties finds itself at war due to an armed attack by one or more [countries], the other party will immediately provide it with military assistance by all means at its disposal.”
However, the addition of the “by all means at its disposable” phrase could be a potential out.
“The idea is that this is a defense treaty, but many big powers don’t want to make an unconditional commitment,” said Andrei Lankov, a North Korea expert at Seoul’s Kookmin University. “This is a conditional commitment.”
Other analysts were equally hesitant.
“I don’t know if this is a game changer,” said Chun In-bum, a retired South Korean general. “But the potential and possibility of all this, military cooperation, technical cooperation, is all bad news.”
What is clear is that since late last year, North Korea has been providing significant military assistance to Russia, now in its third year of a war against Ukraine.
South Korean Defense Minister Kim Won-sik told Bloomberg last week that North Korea has sent at least 10,000 shipping containers to Russia, enough to hold 4.8 million shells. In return, Russia has given North Korea military technologies, the minister said.
Can Russia and North Korea operate as actual allies?
Beyond procurement, another key issue for any alliance is joint operational ability. The current state of affairs suggests that, should the Ukraine war turn against Russia, it would not be able to call upon North Korean troops.
“If you look at the reports from Ukraine about the Chechen mercenaries, they had fought with the Russian military before, but dragging North Korean regiments to fight on the far side of the planet? No way,” said Lance Gatling, a retired U.S. military officer.
In modern warfare, interoperability means creating joint command structures and cross-linguistic communications over radio and online nets. It also entails the highly complex task of synchronizing the electronics suites of multiple modern arms, from ground radars to air-launched missiles to warship defense systems.
If the Russians and North Korean militaries decide to deepen their cooperation, there will be signals.
“Part of dealing with an ally is finding out the true capabilities they have: Not what they show on parade, but what they can actually field,” said Mr. Gatling, who spent much of his career building bridges between the U.S. and Japanese militaries. “An initial intermediary step is to exchange liaison officers.”
From that flows information and intelligence exchanges, leading to troop exchanges.
“In any burgeoning military relationship are all sorts of low-level cross-border exchanges: Rifle shooting, sending cadets to each other’s schools, training with the airborne and getting wings. This happens at multiple levels,” Mr. Gatling said. “What you want to be known is cheap and visible: Nice young men with straight teeth who can do a lot of pushups.”
After troop exchanges come joint exercises.
“Military drills won’t happen overnight,” said Mr. Chun. “These take at least a year to plan, though it depends on scale. They can do table tops and things like that, but it would take some time to do a sizable exercise.”
America has multiple treaty partners and most of its post-war conflicts — including Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan — have been conducted alongside multinational forces, granting the Pentagon extensive alliance-management experience.
Neither party to the Pyongyang agreement can say the same.
The Kremlin’s post-Soviet conflicts, in Chechnya, Georgia, and Ukraine, have been Russian-only affairs, its intervention in the Syrian civil war being the lone exception.
Pyongyang’s military is even more isolated as the regime has shown dangerous suspicions toward troops infected by overseas military contacts.
In 1991 and 1992, North Korean officers recalled from their study at Russia’s elite Frunze Military Academy are believed to have fermented a coup against second-generation North Korean leader Kim Jong-il. The plot was crushed with extreme brutality.
Earlier, in 1958, Chinese troops who had defended North Korea during the Korean War left. Their departures followed a 1956 purge by state founder Kim Il Sungewesw of senior officers aligned with China. Most fled into exile.
Today, China and North Korea maintain a formal mutual defense treaty, but their two militaries have no known contacts.
“Everyone is jumping on the North Korea-Russia treaty, but China has the same,” said Mr. Lankov. “Do you see Chinese officers hanging around Pyongyang?”
• Andrew Salmon can be reached at asalmon@washingtontimes.com.