What would a war with North Korea look like if it happened today? And are there any recent wars that are comparable to the size this one would be, showing the full might of the US Air Force, etc? Has it ever been used to its full capacity in its modern form?
A completely uneducated guess but perhaps it’d be something like Iraq except the insurgency would = Everybody.
I think Melon has the general idea, but here’s some pure and unadulterated speculation:
Air superiority would be the first step, followed by interdiction to stop NK from shelling across the border. NK has some relatively modern equipment, but like Iraq most likely lacks modern tactics and experience. The US has a proud tradition of radiation suppression, so AWACS and ground based radars would quickly be hunted down and destroyed. This is naturally supposing that the Chinese don’t lend logistic support (like allowing use of their radar installations, or allowing NK AWACS flights over Chinese territory), I doubt that China would wish involvement though.
I think that the NK air force would be suppressed quite effectively, but that the entire conflict would come largely to a standstill once it came to a land battle. Small territorial gains might be made, and no-man’s-land might be extended further into North Korea, but forcing a change in regime would be messy and expensive, and far beyond what the US can afford or has the heart for at this point in time.
I would say that the conflict in general is very unattractive for the US, with mostly nothing to gain and a ton to lose. I think that US involvement would only occur upon a proper invasion of South Korea.
Edit: To answer the OP, I think that the NATO bombing of Serbia might be comparable, as well as Iraq.
Hard to figure. Any scenario ends with the destruction of the DPRK.
Most likely of course would be an attack from the North on the ROK. In this case, the PDRK would have the advantage of surprise. Such an attack would be marked by huge civilian casualties in the Seoul megaplex. The few PDRK armored units would make good progress on the right (east) but would stall about on the second day in the face of UN airpower.
That cleared up, the ROK would then try to roll up the artillery positions pounding Seoul from the center. That would be nasty. USAF airpower would peak on or about M+7, call it D+4. US ground troops would move into the fight on M+14 or so. Of course the US 2nd Infantry Division would have a very rough time of it.
PDRK special forces would stage huge ‘terrorist’ attacks in the South, Japan and perhaps the US.
Starting by about D+7, the PDRK would be facing serious internal problems as the front reaches equilibrium. Eventually, the leadership would be cut off from communications and then killed by the military leadership. Call it D+30 or sooner.
Then we go to the hard part, dismembering the PDRK. Again this is hard to noodle out, but I am an optimist. Moving slowly, ROK special forces and humanitarian relief would fuel a spasm of the officials destroying documents and at least local revolts against the Party and remnants of the state.
The north of Korea remains a backwater for a generation due to minimal support from the ROK. This leads to unpredictable political effects.
The DPRK would not fight unless China was on its side, and China would not be on its side unless it thought the status quo intolerable and was willing to risk just about everything. As a result, it wouldn’t be the Korean War II. It would be World War III with a focus on the East Asian theater.
However, it’s difficult to imagine what China could gain from war. Its economy is rumbling along fine, its people don’t seem to need much incentive to stay docile, and nobody around it looks hungry enough to challenge it.
North Korea is playing the same game it’s played for decades. It knows that it could be crushed, but it also knows that it isn’t going to be unless it breaks out of its current role. In its current role it can guarantee the leadership a high standard of living, the middle class a certain amount of comfort, and the lower class at least a nonzero chance of survival. That’s all it wants.
What Derleth said - war would be catastrophic for everyone, the problem is that Kim Jong-Il knows this and is happy to dance along the edge, leaving it to South Korea, America or China to see that he doesn’t slip.
One thing that hasn’t been mentioned - North Korean artillery fire into Seoul would send millions of refugees pouring south, so the war would start with a massive humanitarian crisis. The South Korean authorities might have to choose between deploying troops to the relief effort and sending them to actually fight the war.
They gave us a run for the money in 50’. Some say we lost and indeed we almost did on a couple of occasions. We were dam glad to call a truce. But we were fighting China at the time. Now China doesn’t want to support a war there. China wants NK to stay put and not run over the border for lunch. I say a war is very improbable. The people are starving. Their poverty could drive them to start something and then the soldiers would be OHHHH so glad to surrender. The people of the north and south are the same. They are relatives. Something needs to happen to bring them together. That something has to be a total collapse of the north. If it has to come from some sham of a war, tremendous damage could be inflicted on Seoul in a day by a Saddamm like leader on his way to hell. I guess another option could be a takeover by China. Then China would want the whole peninsula.
North Korea, even with nukes can’t win a war. It’s dirt poor. You need money to win a war. Even now North Korea only gets by by relying on China. The last thing China wants it the USA on it’s doorstep.
But let’s say for the sake of argument a war did break out.
First thing North Korea would attack Seoul. This city is about than 30 miles form the and has over ten million people. North Korea could do horrible damage to those people very easily.
North Korea could bomb, invade and attack Seoul and cause massive damage. But this wouldn’t last very long. The massive part would only be, because the great population of Seoul.
So North Korea attacks Seoul, and the South Koreans and USA send in troops.
Now what?
Most likely China will invade form the north and throw out the current North Korean government and then make the new government will sue for peace ASAP and get it. China doesn’t want South Korea. They have good economic relations with the South and want to keep it that way.
So a war with North Korea, would consist of a huge thrust by the North at Seoul and a lot of damage in that city. Then peace would follow with a change of regime in a week. Then one would pick up the pieces in Seoul and all of North Korea
Just a small tweak to your '50s history: Phase One of the Korean war was, we (US/UN and ROK) trounced DPRK forces, and were driving them north.
Phase two: China unofficially enters the war, pushes US/UN/ROK forces back to Pleiku. 85% of ROK land is overrun by the north.
Phase three: We counterattack, Inchon landing and all that, and drive them back north, invading the North again. Net result: after much negotiating, the status quo ante is for all practical purposes restored.
why this is significant: Even with the DPRK having some modern weaponry, “we” can kick ass and take names against them. Them in isolation.
China will not get involved unless given intolerable provocation. We would have to be very stupid to give them such provocation.
Unfortunately, the history of the last decade or so does not leave me overly optimistic that we will not be that stupid.
I wonder. Seoul is close, but the South Korean and Americans obviously know it’s a target and I’m sure have a good defensive strategy. Seems like American airpower and armor could suppress any invasion force pretty easily. North Korea has a technological edge precisely nowhere.
If I can offer up a random prediction, it’s that North Korea wouldn’t last a week. And I wouldn’t worry about insurgency. If the North Koreans have been schooled in anything, it’s in obedience, and obedience post-surrender is good. Look at the examples of Germany and Japan after the end of World War II. Barely a peep!
You obviously meant “Pusan”, not “Pleiku” which is in Viet Nam.
It’s a source of constant puzzlement to me as to why China hasn’t bitch-slapped NK for their behavior, i.e., taken out the little troll and installed someone who does what he is told. NK starting a war can only be disruptive to the Asian/world economy, which China can ill afford.
Actually, it went more like:
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NK forces invade and drive ROK/US forces back to the Pusan perimeter.
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US forces stage a break out in conjunction with landings at Inchon.
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ROK/US forces pursue NK forces north to the Yalu River.
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MacArthur forgets that the Yalu turns into a road in winter. ChiCom forces trounce US forces at Chosin Reservoir.
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Lines eventually stabilize along the current border.
Sorry, but your history is a bit off. NK nearly conquered the entire south to begin the war, and Inchon was before Chinese intervention. The history is more like:
Phase one: NK launches a surprise attack on SK and routs SK’s army. The U.S. intervenes in increasing numbers and barely holds on to a small portion of SE SK around Pusan.
Phase two: U.S. lands at Inchon behind NK’s lines. The U.S. roundly defeats NK’s army, and pushes all the way to the Chinese border.
Phase three: China infiltrates NK in large numbers and launches massive surprise attacks all along U.S. lines. The U.S. is roundly defeated and pushed back across the 38th parallel.
Phase four: The U.S. army stiffens, checks the Chinese advance, and eventually regains territory beyond the 38th parallel. This is where the fighting ends and the ceasefire comes into effect.
Obama would be foolish to assume that the NKs don’t have some sort of nuclear weapon. A war against NK would last all of 5 mins - the vast fields of artillery pointed at SK get nuked. The military ports get nuked. The NK nuclear facilities get nuked, and key targets like Kim himself, assuming they’re in civilian areas, get visits from Stealth Bombers carrying GPS-enabled conventional ordnance.
When the dust settles, the SK and American troops roll north.
This would, of course, kill a lot of people, but rather less than a conventional war. And there’s a good chance it would be beneficial in the longer term for world peace: those thinking of developing the Bomb, like Iran, will likely think again.
Right. I’d add Phase 2.5 – MacArthur makes a lot of loud talk about going on in and finishing off Red China and brags about kicking Chinese ass. Chinese listen to this politely, then kick the ever-loving crap out of him in Phase 3.
MacArthur’s role was not unlike an armed man on your front porch banging on your door and yelling that he’s going to kill you.
Looking at the relative causality figures and where and how the lines stabilized, I’d have to say that stating that the Chinese managed to ‘kick the ever-loving crap’ out of him and the US is like saying that I beat the snot out of you by repeatedly hitting you with my face. Certainly the Chinese forced the US to retreat (our logistics was completely over stretched as it was because Mac was trying to finish off the NK’s and was too blind to heed the reports he was getting of the Chinese massing in the area), but the cost to the Chinese was horrendous…and they were only able to push us back until our logistics caught up to our movements and we were able to stabilize along a defensive line.
As to the OP, I think that in the opening phase of the war the NK’s would probably have strategic surprise on their side (presumably because they would be the ones attacking), but it wouldn’t do them much good. They would pound the crap out of the SK capital as long as they could keep us from bombing the shit out of their dug in arty tubes…maybe a week, tops. Any army they pushed into SK would get cut up pretty badly, with it’s logistics tail getting the crap pounded out of it by US and SK air. Along the same lines, the NK’s would be having their infrastructure beaten up as well, which would make supplying their army (let alone keeping their people quasi-fed and supplied) would become increasingly difficult. At some point whatever forces the NK’s had in the field would start to die on the vine (I personally doubt they could push their old crap even as far as Seoul, even if they had strategic surprise and did a full court press).
I think the way it would play out is a lot like what happened to the Germans after Normandy (except that, unlike the Germans, the NK’s will also have the crappy equipment)…they wouldn’t be able to move or support the movement of large forces because coming out into the open will open up those forces to continual air attack. They wouldn’t be able to keep enough supplies getting to the front line forces to keep them going or make up for the huge losses they’d be taking. It would only be a matter of a fairly short time before whatever forces they did manage to push into SK got cut off and cut up. Meanwhile, back on the home front, their logistics and infrastructure would be toast. I’d give them a month at most and then they would implode like crushing an empty beer can.
Of course, the cost to South Korea would be pretty bad. Seoul, at least, would take it on the chin. I don’t the SK or US army in the field would get hurt to bad, except along the DMZ, where the NK’s would have local overwhelming force and probably over run many of the defenses initially. But the real disaster would be in the north where, having their logistics and infrastructure broken, their people would start to have some serious food and supply issues almost immediately. In good times the average NK isn’t exactly over supplied…during something like this I could see literally millions fleeing North into China (which would be a whole other set of issues and problems).
In the end, as others have noted, NK and lil Kimmy and his merry men would be no more. But it would be horrifically costly in the short term, with SK getting hurt and the average NK citizen probably roaming the country side looking for some grass or tree roots to boil as their entire political, economic and military structure came crashing down around their ears.
-XT
I’m increasingly unconvinced that getting rid of NK would be a bad thing, even in the short term, for everybody (except NK, obviously). I see the cost of having NK around making more nukes to be something we shouldn’t toy around with.
Sure, Seoul would get hit, but it would be a week’s worth of shelling followed by cleanup and rebuilding. Better that than let all the speculation about Kim having nukes be proven with a mushroom cloud.
And I don’t get China. Who cares of millions of NK’ers try to get in? China’s not known for their nice civil liberty protections. Whats to simply stop them from arming their border and shooting anyone that tries to get in? I see the “China’s afraid of NK refugees” argument as extremely weak but I’ve heard it for years. In my eyes, China should want to destablize NK and get rid of the crap shoot that is Kim and install someone more controllable. Barring that, their next best move isn’t to try and stabilize the Kim government, its to destablize them, run them into a civil war/coup, then come in and sweep up the remains. Nobody likes NK, nobody’s going to rush in to defend them. Even the US will only help SK because of a mutually agreed defense pact. I doubt the US will shed one tear of China tomorrow decides to bomb the entire NK and take over the country. I honestly don’t see a downside for them
And then China nukes the southern end of the peninsula.
Now what?
I think you are underrating the level of destruction here. Leaving aside the nukes (which I personally don’t think the NK’s would use in an offensive role anyway), the NK’s have literally 10’s of thousands of tubes and mountains of shells. The tubes are dug in and zeroed in (they have had decades to do both). It would be incredibly costly to Seoul if war broke out. If you’ve seen WWII video footage of places like Stalingrad or some of the burned out German cities, well, that’s the level of destruction we’d be looking at.
As I said in another thread, would YOU want to be the one responsible for the potential deaths of millions of NK men, women and children? That could easily happen. And this leaves aside the damage to SK, plus whatever damage the NK’s manage to inflict on trade using their subs or other naval assets (while they are still alive). That area is one of the most heavily used trade routes on earth, and it’s in an area that has incredible population densities. Japan would almost surely be hurt as well.
What’s not to get? China has had a love hate relationship with the NK’s for decades, but to the old guard NK acts as a shield or buffer between China and SK (and consequently The West).
The Chinese do. This has been a periodic and recurring problem for them for quite a while now, and they would most certainly care if a fresh wash of starving refugees were storming across the border looking for food and shelter and a place to hide.
Their border with NK IS armed, and they keep it patrolled and manned. IIRC, they have several divisions that are staged fairly close to the border in case the NK’s are feeling froggy (which has also happened periodically), or in case hordes of starving NK citizens come searching for snacks. I don’t that the Chinese would simply open up on fleeing civilians, however, but they might try and turn them back at the border. Regardless, it’s going to be a big mess for the Chinese.
-XT