North Korea supplied Russia with military aid worth up to $14.6 billion, report finds

North Korea has supplied Russia with military assistance worth a total of between $7.67 billion and $14.4 billion, according to a new report by South Korea’s state-funded Institute for National Security Strategy cited by Bloomberg. The estimates cover the period from August 2023 through December 2025. According to the report’s author, Lim Soo Ho, the first arms shipments began arriving in Russia in August 2023, and large-scale deliveries got under way the following month.

The report says Russia has paid Pyongyang mainly by transferring sensitive military technologies and precision components that are difficult to track by satellite. Those transfers account for between 80% and 96% of the total compensation, the report says. The authors attribute the wide range in the final estimates to limited data on the composition and volume of the ammunition shipped.

The estimate in the current report is lower than that in an earlier study conducted by the state-run Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, which put North Korea’s income from participating in the war at 28.7 trillion won, or $20 billion, for the period from July 2023 through March 2025. Military cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang increased dramatically after an agreement was signed by Putin and Kim Jong Un in 2024 during the Russian president’s first visit to North Korea since the year 2000. Kim described the pact as “the strongest ever treaty” in the history of the countries’ bilateral relations, while Putin said it was a “breakthrough document.”

Taking part in the war has allowed North Korea to accelerate its economic growth. According to the Bank of Korea, the country’s GDP grew by 3.7% in 2024, its biggest increase since 2016. At the same time, the report notes that North Korea’s economy remains extremely small in absolute terms. The country’s nominal gross national income in 2024 totaled 44.4 trillion won, about 1.7% of South Korea’s corresponding figure.

The first group of 1,500 North Korean special forces troops arrived in Russia between Oct. 8 and Oct. 13, 2024, at the port of Vladivostok aboard four landing ships and three frigates from Russia’s Pacific Fleet. Under the strategic partnership treaty signed by the two countries, each side is obliged to provide the other with military assistance “by all available means” in the event of an armed attack. At the time, the formal reason cited for the move was the incursion by the Armed Forces of Ukraine into Russia’s Kursk Region.