Private Ri had the kind of dreams common to young men from educated families — to go to university, study and support his sick parents. Instead, he spent a decade as a conscript of the North Korean People’s Army.
Even as a skilled sniper in an elite unit, he endured extreme cold and harsh discipline. In ten years he did not once see his parents face to face. And, months from being discharged, he found himself sent to a place of unimaginable hardship — the front lines of Kursk, fighting alongside Russian soldiers against Ukrainian forces.
