One school of thought is that Putin started attacking Ukraine with the “NATO meme” to distract rank-and-file Russians from the egregious suppression of civil liberties he was implementing. It wasn’t the cakewalk he promised, and now he’s riding that tiger with no way to get off. Despite the constant domestic propagandizing, there’s got to be considerable unrest due to all the body bags coming home. (BTW it’s a felony in Russia to publish lists of the dead - did you know that?) Using NORK troops would ameliorate that for a while.
Ukraine ping
Chad: [One school of thought is that Putin started attacking Ukraine with the “NATO meme” to distract rank-and-file Russians from the egregious suppression of civil liberties he was implementing. It wasn’t the cakewalk he promised, and now he’s riding that tiger with no way to get off. Despite the constant domestic propagandizing, there’s got to be considerable unrest due to all the body bags coming home. (BTW it’s a felony in Russia to publish lists of the dead - did you know that?) Using NORK troops would ameliorate that for a while.]
And death benefits amounting to $150K represent decades of income. It’s 30 years of firefighter pay at $400 a month. This may be in part be why we keep seeing these grisly videos of maimed Russians killing themselves with grenades or their personal weapon. As cripples, they become lifelong burdens to their families, many of whom are barely making ends meet, in a Russia where injured vets get neither treatment nor adequate disability payments. Their self-sacrifice is how they get their families set for life.
The Koreans would fill a big fiscal hole. I expect they’re not getting $2K a month, and the death benefit is likely a fraction of what’s available to Russian draftees.
The issue for Russia is that it is fighting a big war with a counterinsurgency budget. The supplemental budget is about $50b, roughly what the US used individually against insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those were conflicts in which negligible amounts of US equipment were destroyed and not much in the way of expensive munitions was used. Much of it represented transportation cost, of moving men and equipment across oceans, paying tolls to insurgents because we weren’t allowed to eliminate or move hostile populations who straddled our supply routes and flying strike aircraft from distant air bases, which required parts replacements on an accelerated basis, due to flying hours racked up.
Whereas Russia has lost thousands of artillery pieces and tanks, averaging perhaps $1m and up. In peacetime, Russian servicemen got $400 per month. Combat pay has jacked that up to $2K. Assuming 1m Russians in Ukraine, that’s $20b of Russia’s $50b annual war supplement. Assume 100K annual KIA (under 300 a day), due to these massed infantry charges, and that’s another $15b out of the $50. So $35b out of the $50b supplement is combat pay and death benefits.
When you stack up (1) munitions usage ($1m ballistic and hypersonic missiles), (2) fuel requirements for shuttling men and equipment back and forth, (3) arming, feeding and watering men on the battlefield, (4) supply and equipment attrition from Ukrainian attacks, there’s not much left for new weapons development or even production of existing weaponry.
Putin is fighting this war on a shoestring. His military budget, including Ukraine, is 10% of GDP. Germany’s prewar military budget, 2 years into Hitler’s rule, was 10%. Deep into WW2, it peaked at 70%.
For Putin, the upside of such a small war supplement is it limits the sacrifices incurred by the Russian population. Unlike WW2 Russia, no one is starving to death due to forcible government requisitions made to feed the war machine. This means Russia has the means to fight on for years, maybe decades, at this pace, without any threat to Putin’s tenure. The downside is he may have to fight for years, maybe decades, to win in Ukraine. His principal hope is of (1) a sudden collapse in Ukrainian morale, (2) a lucky streak on the battlefield or (3) a collapse in the willingness of Ukraine’s allies to fund its war effort.
Since the biggest issue with the war effort is Putin’s decision to limit spending so as to minimize risks to his continued tenure, he will continue to tinker at the edges, cutting costs where he can. If the Korean men are being taken on at a significant discount to what’s paid to Russian servicemen, this initiative may be a way to cut personnel costs to open up room in the budget for more and better equipment.