An alliance of equals

I'm old enough to remember when it was Russia propping up North Korea, not the other way around.

One country is a hermit kingdom run by a paranoid dictator overseeing a pervasive cult of personality and a large but hopelessly obsolete military, devoting its scarce resources to a nuclear arsenal with which it blackmails the world into letting it stay in power even as it belligerently torments its neighbors.

The other is North Korea.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un may travel to Russia to meet President Vladimir Putin for discussions on a potential deal to supply Moscow with weapons for its war on Ukraine, according to the US government.

The National Security Council warned Monday that arms negotiations between Russia and North Korea are “actively advancing,” after Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu visited Pyongyang in July in an attempt to convince it to sell artillery ammunition to Moscow.

“We have information that Kim Jong Un expects these discussions to continue, to include leader-level diplomatic engagement in Russia,” the council’s spokesperson Adrienne Watson said in a stat…