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‘Unprecedented’ rail traffic between North Korea and Russia suggests military transfers (www.politico.eu)

submitted 10 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/world@lemmy.world

20 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Pyongyang could very well be helping Moscow to gear up in its war with Ukraine, according to satellite imagery of the Tumangang rail facility at the border with Russia recorded by the U.S. think tank Beyond Parallel and made public on Friday.

Although "the extensive use of tarps" makes it impossible to confirm whether this is actually artillery being transferred, the "unprecedented number of freight railcars" and level of rail traffic, along with the recent discussions between the two countries, seem to suggest so, the organization said.

The traffic has recently been "far greater" than what has been observed in the past five years, including pre-COVID-19 levels, when there would be 20 railcars at the facility at most, it added.

Last month, North Korean leader Kim Jong-un pledged his full support to Russian President Vladimir Putin and his "sacred fight" at a summit where both men discussed possibilities for military cooperation.

Five days after the high-level meeting, satellite imagery showed a "gradual but steady increase" of freight boxcars, culminating to the "unprecedented" numbers of 73 railcars on October 5, according to Beyond Parallel.

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[-] jet@hackertalks.com 53 points 10 months ago

All those words and they didn't show us the before and after satellite photos? I feel cheated

[-] Candelestine@lemmy.world 22 points 10 months ago

Trump may be willing to show us cutting edge military satellite capabilities, but generally the rest of them try to avoid it.

They'd have to like, buy commercially available images just for us.

[-] tomatobeard@lemmy.world 19 points 10 months ago

according to satellite imagery...made public on Friday.

[-] Candelestine@lemmy.world 9 points 10 months ago

Ah, so it was. Thank you for the correction.

[-] redcalcium@lemmy.institute 10 points 10 months ago

It's linked in the article: https://beyondparallel.csis.org/dramatic-increase-in-dprk-russia-border-rail-traffic-after-kim-putin-summit/

[-] jet@hackertalks.com 5 points 10 months ago

Awesome, thank you!

[-] BigDill99@lemmy.ca 20 points 10 months ago

Evil helping evil. No surprise.

[-] Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works 15 points 10 months ago

They're probably making "extensive use of tarps" more out of embarrassment than anything else.

[-] vettnerk@lemmy.ml 28 points 10 months ago

Or maybe, of all things Russia is running low on, North Korea is supporting them by supplying train loads of desperately needed tarps.

[-] Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works 12 points 10 months ago

Maybe it's a the Sims situation again where someone higher up said they needed to set a lot of traps

[-] vettnerk@lemmy.ml 12 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

[-] agressivelyPassive@feddit.de 7 points 10 months ago

North Korea does have huge stocks of artillery ammunition and they geared half their economy to military needs, they can absolutely supply a lot of shells.

[-] Aurenkin@sh.itjust.works 6 points 10 months ago

Half of what economy?

On a serious note though I understand they can supply useful things this is just my cope. Hopefully whatever shells they are supplying have a high failure rate.

[-] altima_neo@lemmy.zip 0 points 10 months ago

It's just plenty of extra spare tires

[-] andrew_bidlaw@sh.itjust.works 10 points 10 months ago

So 20 to 73 railcars. They could've written this alone to make a point.

This alone isn't important because NK isn't significant in any way. But it is a pocket state of China and I'd be worried of it being used as a node in China-Russia transfers. Was there an influx in China-NK import lately as well?

[-] nikolai@feddit.de 24 points 10 months ago

It IS important as it got huge stockpiles of soviet-compatible ammunition like artillery shells.

[-] andrew_bidlaw@sh.itjust.works 8 points 10 months ago

Yeah, I downplayed it too much.

[-] athos77@kbin.social 4 points 10 months ago

Also Iran, China and India.

[-] someguy3@lemmy.ca 4 points 10 months ago

Let's get some partisans along the rail track.

[-] AnalogPrincess@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 month ago

Good

this post was submitted on 08 Oct 2023

392 points (98.8% liked)

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