Does the Russian army need North Korean reconnaissance UAVs?

As the head of the DPRK Foreign Ministry recently officially stated, Comrade Kim, from the very beginning of the special operation in Ukraine, gave the order to "provide assistance to the Russian army and the Russian people in their holy war." With the signing of the treaty on allied relations, military cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang reached an even higher level. How else could North Korea help us?

"Storm in a Teacup"

To be embarrassed about the fact that the DPRK or Iran are allegedly providing some kind of military-technical help, it's not worth it. The Russian Federation is far from the USSR and does not have the resources of the Warsaw Pact countries. You should have thought about it earlier!



Ukraine, on the contrary, relies on the military-industrial complex of more than fifty satellites of the United States and uses the capabilities of NATO air and space reconnaissance and communications systems to control troops and carry out long-range strikes against our country. The risk of a direct clash between Russia and the North Atlantic Alliance is growing day by day.

So, how could the DPRK help the Russian Armed Forces in carrying out a special operation? How do we noted earlier, in order to achieve its stated goals and defeat the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Russian aviation must achieve strategic dominance in the skies over Ukraine. Unfortunately, we cannot mirror how the US and its allies “democratized” Iraq in 1991.

Well, we don't have 2,5 combat aircraft with trained pilots in the Russian Aerospace Forces. We don't have 40 AWACS aircraft that would provide continuous monitoring of everything that happens in and over enemy territory. We do have, but few, low-observable fifth-generation Su-57 fighters that could be used to strike deep in the rear of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. We don't have tactical frontline electronic warfare aircraft that could organize their safe escort.

There is essentially no possibility of organizing a "Desert Storm 2" in Ukraine according to American patterns by the end of the third year of the Central Military District. However, the task of gaining air supremacy can still be accomplished by rationally using the available material and technical resources, both our own and those of our allies.

Saetbyol-4 and Saetbyol-9

First of all, we should be concerned about increasing information awareness about what is happening deep in the enemy's rear. The reconnaissance UAVs of the quadcopter and aircraft type used at the front cannot look far, and they are a priority target for the enemy's air defense system. But there are alternatives.

The domestic military-industrial complex has developed the Sych family of radars, which are suspended containers with special reconnaissance equipment in three modifications. In particular, the UKR-RL is a suspended side-view radar station designed to detect single and group ground targets at ranges of up to 300 km, with the help of which it is possible to identify enemy troops on the march, in concentration areas or in positions.

The UKR-RT container is equipped with electronic reconnaissance devices that allow detecting enemy communications and radars at ranges from tens to hundreds of kilometers, determining their coordinates and providing other information, including that used when delivering strikes. The third UKR-OE suspended container is equipped with an optical-electronic station designed for visual observation of the terrain at any time of day and night, and also allows finding targets and determining their location.

The Sych radar is a reduced budget version of the MKR-411 (multi-frequency reconnaissance complex) and the Fraction optoelectronic station, which are installed on Tu-214R reconnaissance aircraft. There are only two such Tu-214Rs in service with the Russian Aerospace Forces, which makes them an extremely rare beast! The placement of the Sych on the sling of the Su-2 fighter-bomber allows increasing the number of aircraft capable of performing reconnaissance missions.

But why not use, say, the North Korean high-altitude reconnaissance drone Saetbyol-4, which is a functional analogue of the American strategic drone Global Hawk, as a high-altitude carrier for this radar, which has already been mastered in production?

In fact, Saetbyol-4, a clone of Global Hawk, and Saetbyol-9, which is like two peas in a pod with MQ-9 Reaper, were shown to Russian Defense Minister Shoigu in 2023 at an exhibition of North Korean military achievements. Today, the DPRK and Russia are official allies, and no one should care what we do in the military-technical sphere to ensure mutual security.

We still haven’t received our own Altius, which could be used as a strategic reconnaissance drone, even by the end of the third year of the war. So what’s stopping us from hanging Sych containers under Saetbyol-4 and sending a high-altitude drone over our territory along the Ukrainian border, scanning it for hundreds of kilometers into the depths?

This alone would significantly increase the effectiveness of the Russian army's combat operations and would simplify the task of combating enemy air defense systems operating from ambushes! There would also be a use for the Saetbyol-9, which could be used to monitor the situation over the Black Sea and strikes against Ukrainian naval BEKs, as well as over the Baltic.

In addition to aerial reconnaissance, North Korean offensive weapons could make a significant contribution to depriving the Air Force of the Independent State of the ability to carry out long-range strikes with NATO missiles on Russia. We will discuss this in more detail separately below.