The General Staff Department of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) recently ordered engineering units to be dispatched to construction sites in North Korea’s provinces. The instructions follow a KPA mobilization order signed by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un at an expanded meeting of the Political Bureau of the Workers’ Party of Korea (WPK) in late January.
A source in the North Korean military told Daily NK on Wednesday that the General Staff Department handed down an order on Feb. 7 to engineering units attached to corps, commands, and training centers of the army, navy, and air force. The order told the units to report to nearby construction sites in various areas of the country by Wednesday.
At the Eighth Session of the 19th Political Bureau of the WPK’s Central Committee, Kim Jong Un put his signature as chairman of the WPK’s Central Military Commission on an order to mobilize KPA units to implement the politburo’s decision to “launch an industrial revolution in the provinces” and personally delivered the order to the chief of the General Staff Department.
Now, two weeks later, detailed administrative instructions regarding this order have been sent to units throughout the military.
The General Staff Department has assigned the Ninth Corps of the Army, the Sixth and Seventh Squadrons of the navy and a flight group of the air force to construction sites in North Hamgyong Province. Meanwhile, the Seventh Corps of the Army, the Third Squadron of the navy and a flight group and training camp unit of the air force have been assigned to construction sites in South Hamgyong Province.
In case there are not enough military engineers to work at the provincial construction sites, the General Staff Department has ordered that personnel from companies and battalions be temporarily organized into construction teams.
However, non-commissioned officers in boot camps will be exempted from the mobilization orders, a measure to ensure that the training of recruits continues as planned this spring.
Some puzzled by the mobilization orders
At the same time, the General Staff Department has instructed units not to be lax in the winter exercises currently underway.
“The General Staff Department has emphasized that the mobilization of engineering units for construction projects in the provinces and the organization of temporary construction teams must not disrupt the first round of combat and political exercises [winter exercises],” the source said.
Some soldiers are puzzled by the leadership’s decision to mobilize soldiers for construction projects at the height of the winter drills.
“It doesn’t make sense to talk about political tensions and readiness for war and then send the very troops that should be preparing for that war to construction sites,” one grumbled, according to the source.
Perhaps for this reason, the KPA’s General Political Bureau has had political departments in each unit hold motivational sessions aimed at instilling “confidence as a powerful nuclear force” following orders from the General Staff Department. But this has led some soldiers to joke that the nuclear and missile forces should be able to wage war on their own, the source said.
The North Korean authorities appear to have few options. They must raise tensions through the threat of war to promote domestic cohesion, but they must also mobilize the KPA to implement the policy of industrial development in the provinces.
“The General Political Bureau calls on the army to repay the trust of the Central Committee, which has entrusted it with building factories in the provinces, a critical task that’s directly linked to improving the lives of the people. But since the local construction projects are expected to take ten years, soldiers face the absurd prospect of potentially spending their entire military service on construction sites,” the source said.
Translated by David Carruth. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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