The War in the Ukraine

It may be corps level artillery for North Korean formation only since they're already familiar with it, not intended to hand over to Russians for their use. If true it would suggest North Koreans are about to hit the front in large formations.

Koksan is being retired now in North Korea, when it was still widely used in service one use for it was targeting city sized (read: Seoul) targets for deterrence. I can think of a few city sized targets on the front now that Russians might want to hit.

It would be curious to know what Russians offered to get North Korea to throw these into the war. Maybe it's even Su-57!

North Korea designed 170mm Koksan with same purpose as Soviet Union/Russia did with 203mm Pion.
Thus expect former will be used like latter, not as effective in terms of destructive power, but still substitute.

plawolf said:

While the non-US part of the NATO alliance has basically burned through all of its vast military inherence from the Cold War, Russia has not received any purely military supplies and assistance from its biggest de facto ally China.

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Let's not overstate things. NATO sent most infantry served weapons they had on the shelf to the Ukrainians. The only ATGMs left in NATO are probably the ones of French and Israeli make. Most of the ex-Warsaw Pact or Soviet armor and artillery was also funneled into Ukraine. A huge chunk of NATO artillery has also melted into Ukraine including the expensive SPGs. And now they are sending Cold War NATO tanks and fighters. The expensive stuff. But they still have a lot of Cold War era armor from tanks to IFVs they could send. Thousands of them.

Temstar said:

It may be corps level artillery for North Korean formation only since they're already familiar with it, not intended to hand over to Russians for their use. If true it would suggest North Koreans are about to hit the front in large formations.

Koksan is being retired now in North Korea, when it was still widely used in service one use for it was targeting city sized (read: Seoul) targets for deterrence. I can think of a few city sized targets on the front now that Russians might want to hit.

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Exactly. It was meant to serve a deterrence effect by threatening to turn Seoul into rubble. There a lot of large cities in Northern Ukraine which could be targeted including Kharkiv and the like. At this point this weapon is basically obsolete for North Korea because they have the large diameter nuclear tipped rockets like KN-25 which serve the same deterrence purpose.

Footage of attacks by Russian kamikaze drones "Lancet-51" on two Ukrainian tanks Leopard 2A4, made in Germany, has been published. The tanks were used by the 33rd separate mechanized brigade of the Ukrainian army, technical information is on the channel. The tanks were attacked in the Kurakhovsky direction, near the settlement "Dachny", possibly the settlement "Dalniy". As a result of the attacks by the "Lancet" drones, both tanks were damaged, the extent of the damage is unclear, it is also unknown what happened to the crews.

pendragon said:

A relatively small vehicle for such a massive gun; I doubt it's mobility is great!
Also, if you need range, just use grad or tornado MLRS.
Russia should still have enough SPG's in storage; even after replacing damaged/destroyed items.
So no actual NEED for anything new in the logistics.
Puzzling! Like in old British series . . . "come and see next week!"

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Maybe they are potentially on shortage of Pions....

RottenPanzer said:

Maybe they are potentially on shortage of Pions....

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You can add that with these 170mm gun, they can tap into another stock of ammunition. So the North Korean troop deployed could use their own type of ammunition and not tap into Russian troops stockpiles but also they would use system that they are trained for.

Temstar said:

It may be corps level artillery for North Korean formation only since they're already familiar with it, not intended to hand over to Russians for their use. If true it would suggest North Koreans are about to hit the front in large formations.

Koksan is being retired now in North Korea, when it was still widely used in service one use for it was targeting city sized (read: Seoul) targets for deterrence. I can think of a few city sized targets on the front now that Russians might want to hit.

It would be curious to know what Russians offered to get North Korea to throw these into the war. Maybe it's even Su-57!

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I don’t think it will that as dramatic as that.

The Russians are winning comfortably, there isn’t any reason for them to throw NK formations wholesale into the fight. Especially when those NK troops, equipment and tactics have not been battle tested. Do you really want to risk having whole sectors fold if the NK troops are not up to snuff?

Not saying the NK troops will do badly necessarily, but the Russians themselves have plenty of history and knowledge about how unreliable allied armies can be more of a hindrance than an asset from their battle histories fighting the Germans.

If Russia wants to deploy NK troops to the fight, it would make far more sense to deploy them slowly and as part of larger Russian formations so that they can both evaluate their combat worth, as well as pass on hard won experience and knowledge.

What better way to start than with NK artillery? You have very easily slot a few batteries of them into the order of battle while keeping them relatively far from the front lines to ease them into things. At the same time you can embed some NK artillery forward observers in Russian frontline units to build trust and learn how to best co-ordinate their joint efforts.

Only after such trials have been completed and the inevitable teething issues resolved would you want to progress to giving NK forces responsibility for whole sections of the front.

As for compensation, I don’t think Su57s are needed. Some Su35s will already be a quantum leap for the NK air force.

Actually, there were hundreds of 203mm 2S7-Pion.

And an immeasurable number of 152mm 2S5 Hyacinth-S. So if the transfer of UAS from NK is confirmed, it will have little effect on the overall picture. Unlike the appearance of, for example, UMPK.

Perhaps the NK is getting rid of the exclusive 170mm calibre. It seems that this calibre lives only with them.

Do you think that in Kursk the Ukrainians got themselves massacred by the Russians? I take note of that, but it doesn't seem to me that the Russians are doing well...it's just that they don't give a damn about losing men and means: it's enough for them to advance.

In memoriam

The only volunteer in Ukraine's army from China killed in action


P.S.
On the bright side, once Scholz is out of the chancellor's office, there is a high probability that Ukraine will be given a Taurus and unleashed