November 11, 2014
Kim Jong Un's Tin Can Air Force
North Korea's resistance to change is punchline-worthy. It still operates a command economy, its population remains largely cut off from the Internet, and, with few exceptions, its military relies on old Soviet equipment. So the pictures of North Korean military units operating childish-looking unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) painted with red and orange flames seem ripe for mockery, especially when state-controlled media describe them as "kamikaze drones" ready to attack South Korea. All this makes it hard not to crack a joke. But North Korea's low-tech drones are, in fact, a military innovation -- one that has bested the U.S.-South Korea alliance on several occasions and has the ability to conduct military strikes on South Korea undetected.
Read the full piece at Foreign Policy.
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