T2K Today: Korea

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by headquarters

As it stands today - the US/ROK could not satisfactorily win a second Korean war .I will explain what I mean by "win" - but in essence what Web says - you might kill most of their troops,down their MIGs and get three major damage results to each T-55 they have .They will still need to be invaded and pacified at a cost geater than Iraq and other operations combined.there is little in the way of natural resources to help pay the bill .And drastic measures such as a draft AND/OR an enthusiastic coalition of allies with big contributions is needed.In todays economy this doesnt seem possible.

Well, the ROK Army could quite successfully repel an invasion by the North. Reunification is quite another matter -- the primary unifying force would have to come from the North Korean and South Korean people themselves, just as it did in Germany. You can't force democracy on anyone -- that pretty much goes against the very definition of democracy, and democracy won't take root unless the people of a country are ready for it and want it. That's something Bush and Cheney didn't bother to think about during their ill-conceived and unnecessary invasion of Iraq, and it won't work in Afghanistan either.

[headquarters]

Originally Posted by pmulcahy11b

Well, the ROK Army could quite successfully repel an invasion by the North. Reunification is quite another matter -- the primary unifying force would have to come from the North Korean and South Korean people themselves, just as it did in Germany. You can't force democracy on anyone -- that pretty much goes against the very definition of democracy, and democracy won't take root unless the people of a country are ready for it and want it. That's something Bush and Cheney didn't bother to think about during their ill-conceived and unnecessary invasion of Iraq, and it won't work in Afghanistan either.

I agree. The ROK could repel an invasion- at great cost to their nation .So my statements will only be true if the war takes another form .If the NK come screaming across the DMZ in force ,and the USAF and USN could respond quickly enough ,they would be slaughtered.
Reunification through force would be another matter .

[Jason Weiser]

The latest:

http://english.yonhapnews.co.kr/nati...05600315F.HTML

http://www.businessinsider.com/chine...he-curb-2010-5

[Webstral]

For the moment, let's assume that the North Koreans have some understanding of what they are up against in terms of Allied (my term, for simplicity's sake) firepower. Let's assume that they either know they'll get their fourth points of contact kicked and therefore won't do much more than rattle sabers or that they have a game plan more nuanced than lining up their forces in neat rows on the MSRs to be pounded to hamburger and flaming ruin by the Allies. If I’m wrong, then the North Koreans are defeated in three days or less and everyone who thinks brute, albeit precision, fires will win the day can say they said so. If I’m right, we need to think about more than Tomahawks and F-16s lining up to hit the latest version of the Highway of Death.

If the North Koreans are just rattling their sabers a bit more vigorously than usual, we can go back to worrying about the economy in a little while. If there’s a different story, it may play out in a number of ways.

We don’t know a lot about what goes on inside North Korea. This lack of intelligence means that we don’t have a good grasp of power politics in the North. I’ve read that Kim Jong-Il is anxious about getting his son set up as the next leader. If there is a succession crisis brewing, a war is a wonderful way to unite the population—at least for the time being. A war of aggression may not be practical, but a defensive war—that’s gold. An escalation of incidents that leads to an Allied bombardment of the North could be just what the doctor ordered to get truculent but hard-to-replace Communists in line behind Kim’s son. Whether it’s a good idea or not is irrelevant. It’s about what the Dear Leader believes. As for provoking an Allied bombardment of the North, the People’s Democratic Republic has a wide variety of tools besides outright invasion of the ROK.

A series of escalating incidents, perhaps moving through the use of chemical weapons against the South, may provoke an Allied invasion of the North to put an end to the affair. In this arena, the Allies may find themselves hard-pressed. If Kim’s objective is to solidify his passing of the torch to his son, heroic defense of the homeland under the increasingly visible leadership of his son may fit the bill. Kim is a totalitarian dictator. He may be willing to countenance massive destruction and loss of life in his nation to secure his dynasty. I don’t know. I don’t know who knows, which is part of the problem.

Going forward, Kim may believe that massive casualties among the ROK populace and Allied troops may bring the Allies to the bargaining table when the northward offensive runs out of steam (assuming it runs out of steam). Maybe he’s right. Maybe he’s not. If he’s right, then he wins—despite whatever damage the PDRK suffers. If he’s wrong, then maybe he loses his head. Someone new takes control of the PDRK. Maybe the PDRK can’t be held together once the chocks have been knocked out. If it can, we’re stuck with an unknown in power in Pyongyang. If the PDRK collapses, the Allies are left holding the bag. There are many way for that to get quite ugly.

How much of this Kim has considered is hard for anyone to say. Ruthless dictators can be very tight-lipped about such things. How likely Kim considers any of the myriad of possible outcomes is also very difficult to say but absolutely crucial in predicting where all of this might be going.

Heck, it might not have anything to do with the Kim dynasty. Maybe the sub that fired on the ROK corvette didn’t mean to do it. Maybe Kim did mean it for some other purpose entirely. Maybe a replacement leader hopeful somewhere in North Korea ordered the action to discomfit the Dear Leader as part of the chess game at whose configuration we can only guess. Maybe Kim got bored. Maybe Kim is looking to leverage the West for more of something that he needs. So far, such a strategy doesn’t appear to be paying off, but that doesn’t mean the strategy can’t still pay off or that Kim hasn’t miscalculated badly.

I bring all of this up because an intelligent discussion of where the current crisis might go should move beyond the idea that the USAF and the USN (with its tomahawks) are going to pulverize the southward-bound NK Army on the roads and destroy critical targets and infrastructure with precision bombardment. If Kim is a complete fool, we’ve got him. If not, or if he listens to his generals, then he’s got something more nuanced than lining up his troops and facilities like ducks in a shooting gallery.

Simply put, North Korea has strengths. If the NKs have been paying attention to their Sun Tzu lessons, then they will try to maneuver the Allies into choosing between giving the North what it wants or forcing the Allies to operate in the North’s area of strength and not the other way around. Since we’re all more-or-less in agreement that a straightforward invasion of the ROK is untenable, let’s think of what else could be in the works.

Webstral

[Eddie]

JFTR, North Korea continues to dig new tunnels daily. The Highway of Death Revisited is a pretty unlikely occurrence, IMO.

Like other nations, our intel might not be so good on the inside of his country, but his intel on the outside is fairly good. I'm sure he's realized that large masses of assets will make good targets.

That said, other than a two-hour briefing/lecture from MG Tucker that I mentioned in another thread, I don't have any more real answers than Web does.

[jester]

Here are two other things that I haven't seen mentioned, or have I missed them.

the Norths Nukes. How many do they have? Will they use them? Most likely. That is a deterent and as we have seen in the last few years a chip that is used to blackmail aid and to wratchet up the brinkmanship, so they crank it up, extort aid and then return to the status quo.

China; in reguards of Immigration.

I have read reports that China has as big an immigration problem with N. Koreans fleeing their own country and sneaking into China as we here in the US have with the states on our Southern Border.

So, if there were a confligration I would imagine that alot of civilians from the North would pour into China from N. Korea. Can China handle such an influx when they are having economic troubles of their own? And would they stand for it? An unstable N. Korea where they would have to pour more aid into than they already are, with a population that is flooding their country and provinces and most likely wreaking havoc there. Would they either send in masses of troops to lock the border down? Or would they send forces into Korea to establish their own puppet leader, or aid the North?

We must also remember that in Asia the idea of "Face" is important. And has been the cause of some of the issues that the US has had with China in recent years, 2001 the colission of the Electronics Survielance plane and the Mig, the shadowing of US vessels by Chinese Submarines, the "lost" Chinese Submarines operating in Japanese waters.

Those are efforts of China to expand their sphere of influence. Since they are making efforts to expand their industrial capacity and their military capacity. After all, the US and its bases are a bit of a slap in the face to China, as we were the big dog in the area, and a loss of face.

So, how does "face" come into play with the Chinese in the event of hostilities between the two Koreas? Would they take direct action aiding the North? Move in on their own against the North? Take a truly passive stance? Take a semi passive stance against the North? Take a semi passive stance against Western Support and intervention of the South?

[Raellus]

Originally Posted by jester

I have read reports that China has as big an immigration problem with N. Koreans fleeing their own country and sneaking into China as we here in the US have with the states on our Southern Border.

So, if there were a confligration I would imagine that alot of civilians from the North would pour into China from N. Korea. Can China handle such an influx when they are having economic troubles of their own? And would they stand for it?

This is a good point. Waves of refugees would give China a fait accompli to invade N. Korea, perhaps just to create a "buffer" a few miles deep. Presumably, this would include the seizure of that port Matt mentioned.