Soldiers march in a parade for the 70th anniversary of North Korea’s founding day in Pyongyang, North Korea, on Sept. 9, 2018. (Ng Han Guan – File / AP)
By Samuel Short October 25, 2024 at 9:31am
The consequences of President Joe Biden’s weak foreign policy continue to plague the world as Ukraine’s war with Russia escalates.
Reuters reported on Wednesday, the United States has evidence that 3,000 North Korean troops are in Russia to aid in the fighting against Ukraine. White House spokesman John Kirby said, “If they do deploy to fight against Ukraine, they’re fair game” for Ukrainian troops.
According to Kirby, the U.S. was able to determine these troops left North Korea in early October.
After arriving in Vladivostok, he said they were taken to military training sites located in east Russia.
Kirby commented on the soldiers further, saying, “They’re fair targets, and the Ukrainian military will defend themselves against North Korean soldiers the same way they’re defending themselves against Russian soldiers.”
While 3,000 soldiers are nothing to disregard, South Korea said, according to Reuters, North Korea had promised more than 10,000 for the war effort.
On Tuesday, Reuters reported Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy urged his allies “not to hide” in response to earlier indications that the North Korean military could be providing his nation’s foe with soldiers.
This news comes a week after South Korea’s National Intelligence Service “confirmed that North Korea began its participation in the war by transporting special forces to Russia via Russian Navy transport ships from Oct. 8 to 13.”
That confirmation concerned an estimated 1,500 special forces soldiers.
Will the war in Ukraine soon grow into a larger conflict?
Looking at Europe and the world before February 2022, it is hard to fathom how dangerous this situation has become on a global scale.
That month, Russia President Vladimir Putin felt emboldened by the United States’ weak leadership under the Biden-Harris administration to impose his will on a neighboring country.
Biden and Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris’ botched withdrawal from Afghanistan in August 2021 showed Putin how incompetent United States leadership is in one of the worst foreign policy disasters in recent memory.
While a global conflict is bad enough, Americans have been left footing the bill with billions being spent on Ukraine’s war effort.
With Biden serving his last few months as a lame duck president, his successor could be his current vice president, who holds as much responsibility as he does.
North Korean soldiers being “fair game” is not moving this war towards a diplomatic solution.
The North Koreans aren’t in Russia to negotiate; they are there to fight.
A Harris presidency won’t get us off this train.
Sam Short is an Instructor of History with Motlow State Community College in Smyrna, Tennessee. He holds a BA in History from Middle Tennessee State University and an MA in History from University College London.
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