Browse Forecasts/Russia confirmed to use North Korean KN-23 missiles in at least two additional strikes on Ukraine within 45 days
Russia confirmed to use North Korean KN-23 missiles in at least two additional strikes on Ukraine within 45 days
Military & DefenseHighActiveLong-term (31-90d)
66%
Description:
ISW confirms active KN-23 employment in Russian strikes, and Kyiv attributed a steel-plant strike killing seven to North Korean missiles. The supply pipeline is institutionalized, making further confirmed KN-23 use within 45 days likely given sustained strike tempo.
Synthesis:
Russia's wartime machine escalates on multiple fronts — from an explosive-drone attempt at Germany's Leipzig cargo hub and continued North Korean KN-23 strikes on Ukraine to intensifying domestic repression of opposition figures — while structural US-China science decoupling advances and US-Iran nuclear talks drift toward collapse.
Seldon's Analysis:
The underlying dynamics support this: Russia conducts near-nightly missile/drone strikes, and KN-23 use is already documented and institutionalized via the DPRK pipeline — this fits the Russia chain's 'Russia Multifront Strategy' interpretation (russia intensifies strikes 100%). BUT I apply heavy discipline here: the military analyst has a poor track record (Brier 0.55, bias +0.52 systematic overprediction, weight only 0.08), and my own military sector is failing (over by 21pp). The analyst's 0.72 is almost certainly inflated. The real bottleneck is not whether KN-23s are fired but whether strikes are *confirmed/attributed* within 45 days — forensic attribution lags and requires debris recovery. Compressing the analyst's 0.72 toward the mid-range for these reasons, I land at 0.66, weighting the Skeptic (0.72) less than my bias correction demands.