Whoa, so many questions in only 6 lines of text.
I will answer in two posts, because I hit the 5000 characters limit (5332 long).
The Afterburn explosion effects (= the big fireballs with ~50-100 frames, seen in AO) were stolen. These pyrotechnic effects were made by both IskatuMesk and SgtHK.
See
here
See also fyi
there
and there
Official IskatuMesk site
http://www.gameproc.com/
(much of the old stuff is still missing here - he had *tons* of pages and images and videos and music and other files, scattered on multiple sites)
AO download page
http://www.campaigncreations.org/starcraft/armageddon_onslaught
Official release statement for 3.0
http://www.staredit.net/topic/7613/
The Armageddon concept (note : AO2 was never done AFAIK)
http://www.staredit.net/topic/4863/
About the removal (and rarely re-addition) of his old stuff from the web
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=5735
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=6951
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=6921
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=6662
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=6032
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=4738
More lost stuff (1999-2004)
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=2387
Creation and anxiety : deep into an artist's mind, and into his strong feelings
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=6648
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=2354
About modding with Blizzard's stuff : an individual's point of view
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=3062
Past projects (only main stuff he currently wants to be remembered)
http://www.gameproc.com/index.php?id=about-iskatumesks-past-projects
(I never tried his WC3 stuff btw)
UPDATE : found references to older stuff here
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=6931&sid=6b67cd67fab691a2e907960da4356068
A few scraps left on youtube (includes AO test stuff - you can see some of the pyrotechnics here)
https://www.youtube.com/user/mancatcher
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9NICj1MaQ0ow6b18CSnYcA
The Doackendium - *much* to explore here
http://www.campaigncreations.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=45
(too bad nearly all the images are gone - maybe the Wayback machine can help ?)
About your thoughts regarding Koreans ; well, I am French and I hang a lot on English sites. Just think about it. :)
Everybody learns English these days. Also, do not forget translation software.
I myself occasionally visit sites having a character set different from Latin-1 from time to time, thanks to Google Translate.
Also, Koreans advertise their mods on English sites too, you know
http://www.moddb.com/mods/burningground
(just an example among others ; imho incredible graphics and groundbreaking programing techniques here)
(and yes, they "borrow" stuff from IskatuMesk)
Everybody can use software to rip stuff if he wants to, not specifically Russians. Just look around.
What people do with that ripped stuff is a different matter, though.
IskatuMesk is not Korean AFAIK
There is much to discover and learn from other cultures. And we have all the technical means to do it, if we want to.
Please send dummy PM so I can avoid double-posting
continues on next post...