Attitudes inside North Korea toward serving in the border guard have shifted completely. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, soldiers could collect bribes for turning a blind eye to individual smuggling. Service conditions were relatively good, and the posting was popular.
Since the pandemic, tighter border controls have cut off that smuggling. The border guard is now considered an undesirable posting.
A source in Ryanggang province told Daily NK on Thursday that conditions for border guard soldiers stationed in Hyesan have changed “180 degrees” compared with before the pandemic. Before, the source said, soldiers looked neat and had healthy complexions. Now, the situation is entirely different.
According to the source, the border guard was once a preferred posting across social classes. It drew children of cadres and children of ordinary people alike, and training was less intense than in regular army units. Soldiers could also build a financial foundation through bribes tied to smuggling in the border region.
The source added that before the pandemic, many soldiers saved more than 50,000 Chinese yuan, or about $7,380, during their service. They used the money to buy home appliances such as refrigerators and televisions. The goods were sent home before the soldiers were discharged.
Since the pandemic, tighter border controls have shortened the intervals between guard shifts. Workloads have increased, and soldiers can no longer collect bribes. Some are going hungry, the source said, adding that, as a result, the border guard’s popularity has fallen sharply.
Falling rations, rising hunger
Soldiers with the 25th Border Guard Brigade, stationed in Hyesan, once ate well. Before the pandemic, when individual smuggling was widespread, they had rice mixed with other grains at a ratio of seven to three. Every meal came with at least two or three side dishes.
At the time, soldiers rotated daily meal duty. The soldier on duty used money collected from smugglers to buy ingredients. He then asked local households to prepare side dishes and bring them back to the unit, according to the source.
Meals were technically the unit’s responsibility, but food supplies fell short. Soldiers made up the difference with money earned by looking the other way on smuggling, the source explained.
After the pandemic shut down individual smuggling, soldiers lost that source of income. Meals have deteriorated sharply as a result. Recently, soldiers have been eating corn with no rice mixed in. Their meals are rounded out with a few pieces of salted radish and soup that is close to salted water, the source said.
“Before the pandemic, border guard soldiers rarely felt hunger,” the source said. “Even when they were hungry, they could go to local homes to get or buy food, so they never thought about starving.”
The source added that meals are now poor. Access to local homes is strictly controlled, and soldiers cannot easily supplement their diets from outside the unit. As a result, hunger has become common.
Parents steer children elsewhere
The source said soldiers assigned to the border guard in this year’s spring conscription were almost entirely the children of workers and farmers. No children of cadres were among them, the source said. Life in the border guard is now little different from any other unit. Soldiers must ask their parents for spending money just to get by, according to the source.
Ahead of this fall’s conscription, some parents are reportedly using bribes and connections to steer their children away from the border guard. Instead, they are aiming for units known for better service conditions. In the past, parents paid bribes to get their children into the border guard. Now, the source said, some are paying to avoid it.
“Soldiers here serve almost 10 years, so parents will pay bribes to send their children somewhere with even slightly better conditions,” the source said. “Some parents are already making moves ahead of this fall’s conscription. But almost none of them are paying to get their children sent to the border guard the way they used to.”
The source said even officials in the Military Mobilization Department, which oversees conscription, have taken to saying the border guard “has had its day.” Its popularity is unlikely to recover, the source added, unless individual smuggling becomes as widespread as it once was.
Reporting from inside North Korea
Daily NK operates networks of sources inside North Korea who document events in real-time and transmit information through secure channels. Unlike reporting based on state media, satellite imagery, or defector accounts from years past, our journalism comes directly from people currently living under the regime. We verify reports through multiple independent sources and cross-reference details before publication.
Our sources remain anonymous because contact with foreign media is treated as a capital offense in North Korea — discovery means imprisonment or execution. This network-based approach allows Daily NK to report on developments other outlets cannot access: market trends, policy implementation, public sentiment, and daily realities that never appear in official narratives.
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