Before doing background reading on this incident, I had not fully appreciated how vulnerable Seoul is considered to be–within range of North Korean artillery.
Yep.
If the balloon ever does go up for real Seoul will be a smoking hole inside of a few hours. Which, incidentally, is why the war has never reignited. Even if the South Koreans win (which depends entirely upon whether or not China sits it out) they will have a Pyrrhic victory at best and they know it.
So it’s not just the middle easterners who don’t believe everything that comes out of Washington.
It is kinda hard to imagine that it was not detected, after all this is a region where you would have thought there would have been very sophisticated equipment to detect any missiles or torpedo’s heading it’s way.
It just all sounds a bit ‘fishy’ to me.
They’re only evidence are some NK markings in felt pen???
is that the so called conclusive evidence!!
Have you even read any articles on the subject?
North Korea had the proximity to the Cheonan (since it was sunk close to the maritime boundary), North Korea had the motive (avenge past naval skirmishes or shore up the regime’s/heir’s standing within the inner circle), North Korea had observed submarine activity a few days before and a few days after the incident, and then, of course, the torpedo just happens to be of a type and contain markings that the North Koreans use. The only thing “fishy” is that you could look at these circumstances and suspect that the US was really all behind it - particularly since South Korea is a key ally and there is no evidence whatsoever that would even hint at US involvement.
This is, as I see it, one of the very few places I’d consider acceptable to nuke, all things considered. Note that it may not be the maximally efficient way to do things, but if I had this sort of problem, I’d strongly consider setting things up to nuke the NK wall of artillery.
It’d probably be more effective to drop a few tens of B-52 loads of thermobaric weaponry, assuming it is dug in.
Does anyone have any good analysis of the NK Line of Death? I’m kind of interested in it as an abstract sort of issue. The SKs are going to have to solve it one day.
… kekekekeke is not a viable answer!
Well, here’s a site that is almost certainly a dug in artillery position. Zoom out a bit to see how close this is to Seoul, and check out the area around it for more of the same.
It’s really going to be a matter of how quick and how precise the counter-battery fire is and how quickly the jets can reach the area. I figure the boys at this site are dead within 10 minutes, but they can still do a fuckload of damage in that time.
I’m not sure you could call it over when the ROK was still involved in Kaesong — that investment being, in reality, a pure subsidy to the North. But yes, fair enough, they were already moving away from the Policy reasonably quickly.
I know you love a good conspiracy theory, especially when it makes the US look bad, but that’s really not likely in this case. Ignoring that this little upset is going to turn out badly for everyone involved, it was very in line with North Korean actions — most recently with a North Korean ship attacking a South Korean ship. (It lost the engagement.)
Also, if your reference to the Saudis comes from that article you linked to the other day, you’ve badly, badly overstated what the article said, and if you’re trying to hijack the thread, please don’t.
Of course, much depends on the quality of the troops manning these positions, and how well the artillery pieces have been maintained. I wouldn’t want to bet Seoul on these guns being manned by undertrained personnel who couldn’t be bothered to maintain their equipment - but such things do happen. shrugs
Oh…well, that’s different then. I mean, they should have probably called you in to tell them that, seeing as how you have seemingly not read much (to be generous) about this situation, yet are able to detect the flaws with your eagle eyed perceptions despite being ignorant of just about every aspect of this situation! Imagine if they briefed you in, what your contribution could be THEN! I mean…wow! Bam! Bing! KAPOW! BIFF!
Dunna nanna nanna nanna…Marmit Lover!
-XT
Speaking of “fishy,” one hypothesis to explain the incident is that the N. Korean naval personnel, to supplement their meager incomes, have taken to crab fishing in those disputed waters.
Well, it just keeps getting better. If you have a terrible definition of “better”.
I wonder what exactly the South means by “proactive deterrence”?
It is kind of interesting. Kind of a reverse of the “Only Nixon can go to China” thing. As in, only a strong conservative anti-communist could seek reproachment with China and be taken seriously. In this case, only a “Socialist” (as he’s mistakenly called) and “Liberal” can take a hard line with the North Koreans and be taken seriously, and not have the nation up in arms about how wreckless and insane this is. If Bush was taking the same steps, heads would be exploding and people would be in the streets accusing him of actively seeking a third war.
Personally, I think it is an interesting new tactic, one I fully endorse, of basically calling the NK bluff on their actions. They don’t want war any more than we do, but until now we’ve allowed them to run the game and make us constantly back down and mollify them, tolerating intolerable actions and still giving them rewards for fear of much much worse.
Whether this is good or bad in the long run remains to be seen.
Hell, half of Americans don’t believe anything that comes out of Washington!
Why would you think so? And who specifically are “they,” vis-a-vis the North Koreans? Surely the ordinary people have no say.
I think a mistake to think of the North Koreans in terms of them being “communist” in the same sense as, say, Brezhnev’s USSR or Tito’s Yugoslavia. What you’re dealing with here is a totalitarian Stalinist state, of the same ilk as the pre-WW2 Soviet Union where millions of peasants were deliberately starved to death as a matter of policy.
Here is something for you to read, Marmite Lover. It’s the translation of the South Korean President’s adddress to his country.
like I said only a few markings as evidence?