But wouldn’t Su-35s divert money needed for flat-screens and ski resorts?

I could be wrong, but I doubt even Vlad Putin would violate U.N. Security Council Sanctions so blatantly as this:

North Korea made an attempt to purchase advanced fighter jets from Russia by sending a special envoy, a senior South Korean military official told the JoongAng Ilbo on Thursday.

“Choe Ryong-hae, who visited Moscow as a special envoy of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in November last year, asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to provide Sukhoi Su-35 fighter jets,” the military source said.

Little has been disclosed about the discussions between Choe and Putin. Choe, a member of the Presidium of the Political Bureau and secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of North Korea, met with Putin on Nov. 18 and delivered a letter from Kim, the Russian presidential office has said, without providing further details. The Kremlin said the meeting was not open to the press, and no press conference was arranged afterward. [Joongang Ilbo]

According to the report, the Russians gave Choe a tour of the factory in Khabarovsk where the jets are produced. The very fact that the Russians gave Choe a tour of a plant producing something that North Korea isn’t allowed to buy probably suggests what Putin’s real game is — to show much trouble he could make for us if he chose to, even as the Russian economy dissolves on his watch due to all the trouble we’ve made for him.

That would be Choe’s second international visit since a cryptically worded KCNA report caused some of us to speculate that he’d been sent on his final state visit … to the glue factory.

According to the report, “It is unknown how many jets the North attempted to acquire.” Starting at $40 million each, that would mean each aircraft costs about 40% of the one-year cost for the World Food Program to feed just 2.4 million of the kids and pregnant women that Kim Jong Un isn’t feeding.

Hat tip to The National Interest.