North Korean troops recently deployed to Russia, reportedly from the KPA’s Storm Corps, have undergone intense ideological training since 2014 emphasizing their duty to sacrifice their lives for Kim Jong Un. These soldiers were likely ordered to fight in Ukraine rather than volunteering, following years of indoctrination to serve as a “fortress and shield” for their supreme commander.
According to a source in the country recently, soldiers with the Storm Corps are drilled in target practice, martial arts, sharpshooting and chemical warfare countermeasures, as well as in combat involving various weapon systems. But in addition to these military skills, they also receive a high degree of political and ideological education in the cult of personality around Kim Jong Un.
Given the extreme emphasis on loyalty to Kim in the Storm Corps, even compared to other units, soldiers in the corps exhibit a high degree of political and ideological unity, the source said.
The Storm Corps’ primary mission in the event of a war would be penetrating enemy lines to sow confusion and create a second front in the rear. As a result, their training focuses on destroying enemy command posts, assassinating or otherwise eliminating key figures, and carrying out political subversion.
“The Storm Corps is specialized in small unit combat. Since its primary missions are carrying out rapid raids with small units and striking weak points in major facilities in enemy territory, its units could have been given secret missions — indeed rather dangerous missions — to destroy major facilities in Russia’s war,” the source said.
Soldiers with the Storm Corps have been rigorously drilled in disruption, reconnaissance and surprise attacks in their combat exercises. The corps has set up a strict security system preventing individual units from learning about changes in other units’ exact missions.
The Storm Corps is an elite special forces corps that originated with the VIII Special Forces Corps. That corps, in turn, was established in 1969 around Unit 124, which carried out the daring suicide raid on South Korea’s Blue House on Jan. 21, 1968.
North Korea’s special forces were reorganized and expanded into the XI Corps in 1991. In 2017, the XI Corps was folded into the Special Operations Forces, an independent force inside the KPA.
The Storm Corps, which reports directly to supreme command, has developed a command structure that ensures the prompt delivery and execution of orders from the top through verbal, written, cable, telephone, postal, wired and wireless methods.
The very name Storm Corps carries symbolic value that reinforces the ideological cohesion of soldiers in the unit and their fighting spirit.
“If a war were to break out today, our army needs to be fully prepared to immediately suppress, mercilessly shatter, and fully pacify the enemy,” Kim said while visiting special forces presumed to belong to the Storm Corps on Sept. 11 and Oct. 2.
Daily NK works with a network of sources in North Korea, China, and elsewhere. For security reasons, their identities remain anonymous.
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