liquid

Don't forget that NK is an excuse to have a massive US military presence on China's, Russia and India's doorstep...

Sakpo

And what's the motivation for the U.S. to have a massive military presence on the doorsteps of these countries? Massive military presences cost massive amounts of money (and the military industrial complex can be fed in much easier ways).

Syphor

Those US troops do need to be there; they act as a stabilising force in the region. No prizes for guessing what would happen if they were withdrawn.

Amen-Moses

What?

The price of having a "stabilising force" in Saudi was 9/11, was the price worth it?

Personally I prefer that the stabilising force be provided either by the UN (i.e a mixture of various countries) or by the locals themselves. If you take the money expended in keeping a US force in the region and give that in aid to the locals then it would probably stretch a lot farther anyhow.

Amen-Moses

Gurdur

Precisely. Seoul is only 50 km and 5 minutes from a devastating artillery bombardment that would kill many thousands of civilians.

Therefore the answer is airstrikes against nuclear power plants (want to think about the fall-out, and the fall-out, from that one alone ?), nuclear storage plants, and all artillery and armour concentrations within a 100 km radius from the DMZ, as well as all airfields, rocket sites, oh, and large infantry concentrations, oh, and then keep a very watchful military eye on North Korea for a long while (if not invade).

ho hum, possible ? perhaps, only a thin perhaps.
Risky ? hey, just look at the odds.

Would China intervene ? Possibly in case of an invasion - China never did take kindly to the thought of outsiders pushing into its spheres of influence.
Does China feel threatened enough by North Korea to happily agree to anything ? No

Are the North Korean leaders mad ? No. Let's leave the empty, childish rhetoric to one side.

So what's going to happen ?
Short-term,
North Korea has just markedly imporived its odds at the bargaining table, or perhaps the blackmailing table.
Long-term ?
Anyone's guess, but it's a bad time to buy real estate in Japan or South Korea.

Any good answers ? No

Loren Pechtel

The price of having a "stabilising force" in Saudi was 9/11, was the price worth it?

Personally I prefer that the stabilising force be provided either by the UN (i.e a mixture of various countries) or by the locals themselves. If you take the money expended in keeping a US force in the region and give that in aid to the locals then it would probably stretch a lot farther anyhow.

We have the equipment. The locals don't. The equipment is *VERY* expensive. We have guys trained to use and fix the equipment. They don't. Israel would rightly be *VERY* afraid if we supplied Saudia Arabia with the sort of force needed to stop Iraq.

As for other countries that could help--that's basically only western Europe. Infantry isn't of a lot of use there.

Loren Pechtel

Precisely. Seoul is only 50 km and 5 minutes from a devastating artillery bombardment that would kill many thousands of civilians.

And that's assuming it stays conventional.

Therefore the answer is airstrikes against nuclear power plants (want to think about the fall-out, and the fall-out, from that one alone ?),

Actually, the powerplants wouldn't be that big a problem. They are buried. Use a small penetrating nuke instead of conventional bombs. Get the yield vs depth right and it will basically seal the chamber, there will be very little fallout or even leakage.

nuclear storage plants, and all artillery and armour concentrations within a 100 km radius from the DMZ, as well as all airfields, rocket sites, oh, and large infantry concentrations, oh, and then keep a very watchful military eye on North Korea for a long while (if not invade).

The armor isn't an immediate concern--armor can't fire that far. The big target would be the artillery--but we can't do it. That would take a basically time on target hit on all of them (can we even identify all of them?) and we don't have that many planes. Get the timing wrong and of course the chief loon over there would order it used. Not to mention that bringing in just about the whole US airpower would be *VERY* notable.

Would China intervene ? Possibly in case of an invasion - China never did take kindly to the thought of outsiders pushing into its spheres of influence.

If we made a serious invasion they might react. I don't think they would do anything but scream if we simply bombed various things and perhaps crossed the border in a minor way.

Are the North Korean leaders mad ? No. Let's leave the empty, childish rhetoric to one side.

I don't think a sane leader buys guns against a non-existant threat while his people are dying of starvation. A total disregard for others like that is generally considered a sign of sociopathy.

So what's going to happen ?
Short-term,
North Korea has just markedly imporived its odds at the bargaining table, or perhaps the blackmailing table.

Yeah, that's what I figure they are planning.

Long-term ?
Anyone's guess, but it's a bad time to buy real estate in Japan or South Korea.

Any good answers ? No [

One possible one: Find some important function that's going to be held outdoors so we can see whose there. Take a small nuke and put a camera, parachute and stealth coating on it. When the top guy shows up, a B-2 drops the bomb. It does not have the normal altitude trigger, though--it falls all the way down. The last bit is done by parachute so nothing gets smashed up.
Once the bomb lands the camera is immediately aimed at the top guy and he's told the situation: Do not oppose peacekeepers who will come in and haul off all the big weapons. Do not disappear from the camera's sight for even a second. The slightest noncompliance results in detonation.
When it's most clearly his own head on the line he'll probably act reasonably.

elwoodblues

How is 35,000 troops considered 'massive' in comparison to the military of China, Russia, or even North Korea? And, hell, India is basically an ally, and well away from the area anyways. The 35,000 isn't there as a military presence per se . In the face of North Korea's possible invasion force, they couldn't do much to slow it down, much less stop it. It's more of a statement of alliance, putting our eggs on the line along with South Korea's. If North Korea invades, they won't 'just' be marching over South Korea's troops. They'll also be marching over the corpses of US soldiers. And that, hopefully, stops the invasion from ever happening in the first place.

Zar

Are there 35,000 troops of any foreign nation massed near our borders (the U.S., that is)? I would bet that would chafe the U.S. leadership and citizenry somewhat.

I'll believe you that this troop concentration couldn't win a war with China or anything, but that doesn't mean it isn't a political factor. I'll also agree that the North Korea thing at this point doesn't seem strateigically important except for the fact comparisons will be drawn at this point between their dealings with the U.S. and other nation's dealings, esp. vis-a-vis their nuclear status. And so the U.S. cannot ignore them. There is already "nuclear blackmail" going on. No reason to fear it in the future, for it is already upon us in combination with the more significant challenge it would be to go to war with them conventionally than, say, Iraq. Still, this is no different a "threat" than what the U.S. or any nuclear power poses. It is not a question of morality, because that was thrown out the window long ago. If the U.S. says their fight is a purely a moral one, that is windowdressing for dummies and ignroes provcative statements and movements made by the U.S. which have helped accelerate this crisis, not to mention the totally one-sided way policy has often been conducted over the last several decades on many subjects. N. Korea is simply returning like treatment for like, and this is a very bad thing when all the world starts playing the same games Washington has grown accustomed to stacking in its favor.

Seeker196

I'm an expat Canadian living in a suburb of Seoul, teaching English.

I get the Korean papers here, and see the protests.

Understand that the US army is EXTREMELY unpopular in Korea right now, they've been firebombed a few times, and it's really their own fault, I mean why oh why is their base right in the middle of downtown Seoul, constantly disgorging hordes of drunk, disrespectful Americans. A couple of them got knifed recently, I keep my Canadian patch on at all times.

The North: there have been 2 naval skirmishes, 1 in the summer in which the NK navy sank a UN ship, 1 more recently.

The North feels VERY threatened by the US, and Bush seems to have forgotten that the DMZ is still in a kind of low level warfare with NK spy tunnels under the DMZ being found again.

The NKs understand, correctly I believe, that the only guarantee of becoming the next US military adventure after Iraq is to have nukes. They already probably have plutonium enough to make 3 in a few months, and they just turned off the monitoring equipment in their plutonium plant.

Second: The military situation in Korea is not easy for the US/SK side. The North has done nothing but built defences for 50 years.

You can go see the border on a special tour now with an NK 'guide'. The beaches are something else. The whole coastline is D-Day, endless miles of bunkers, electrified fences, barbed wire, and mines. The countries is mountainous, and has poor weather. There is one large 'show' city.

If the north wanted to, they could just pour over the border in a massive WWII style invasion. The 35 000 drunks here are symbolic, the big thing the US offers is its super airpower and its good firefinding anti-artillery radar.

The US MLRS and firefinder can automatically calculate where an NK gun is, after it has fired. The NKs would have to use less high tech methods, but they just have so much shit that if they sacrifice a few hundred guns they can quickly locate the small number of expense US superweapons and drop the equivalent of a foundry on them.

The US, no matter what rhetoric they may employ, is NOT ready for war with NK, and a strike on North Korea as Clinton envisioned would probably mean an invasion of the SOuth by the North, lasting a year or 2, destroying South Korea, and causing human suffering on a large scale.

I say: Stalin had Nukes. Khruschev had nukes. Breznev had nukes. They were negotiated with, war was avoiding, and within 2 or 3 generations the siren of Westernism changed their populations.

I say: let them have them. Confiscate them if they try to sell them. Don't cut them off economically, Kim Il-Sung's worst enemy is the prosperity of his people.

That's my opinion, a few miles from the DMZ