It looks like South Korea’s military brass finally got tired of getting clowned on. After a deeply embarrassing incident in 2022 where five tiny North Korean drones casually cruised into South Korean airspace—with one literal leaf-blower-tier drone buzzing the presidential office while South Korean jets fired 100 useless shots and hit absolutely nothing—Seoul has decided to completely rewrite its playbook. Defense Minister Ahn Gyu-back dropped a massive announcement on Friday: South Korea is going to train all 500,000 of its military personnel to be absolute "drone warriors."

Minister Ahn isn't playing around with old-school tactics anymore. He straight-up declared that every single soldier, sailor, airman, and marine needs to be able to operate a drone like a "second personal firearm." Relying on lessons from the Ukraine meta, where cheap commercial drones are completely wrecking multi-million dollar military assets, South Korea is planning a massive, low-cost drone spam strategy. They want to buy 11,000 commercial training drones by the end of this year, ramp that up to 60,000 by 2029, and hoard over 20,000 disposable suicide drones by 2030.

Naturally, the tech pipeline is a hilarious loop of military plagiarism. Seoul is fast-tracking a domestic long-range loitering munition dubbed "K-Lucas." For those keeping track of the global weapon-copying meta: the K-Lucas is named after the American Lucas system, which was shamelessly reverse-engineered from Iran’s Shahed-136 suicide drone, which is currently being spammed by Russia in Ukraine. It's a copy of a copy of a copy, but if it works, it works. To make sure they don't get humiliated by cheap toy copters again, they are also investing in sci-fi counter-measures like lasers and high-power microwave weapons.

This high-tech pivot comes just as North Korea is unlocking new upgrades of its own. Thanks to a cozy new military alliance with Russia, Pyongyang has sent thousands of troops to fight in Ukraine. This gives North Korean soldiers direct, real-world combat experience in modern drone warfare, bypass-loading years of tedious R&D. Armed with fresh Russian battlefield telemetry, North Korea is looking more dangerous than ever, forcing Seoul to ditch its traditional military doctrine and embrace the remote-controlled future.

Meanwhile, Kim Jong-un is doing his usual routine, overseeing tactical ballistic missile tests and upgraded rocket artillery systems with a 90km firing range aimed right at the South's border. Kim also pledged to expand his nuclear arsenal at an "exponential rate," calling it the "most correct and unique way" to deal with the world. With North Korea flex-testing rocket systems and nuclear options, South Korea's plan to hand a remote control to half a million conscripts is the ultimate bid to level the playing field before things get out of hand.