War Drums: North Korea edition

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

9 minutes ago, A True Kaniggit said:

You mean that sociopath who used to kill small rodents for fun? 

Let's not forget this pervert kissed his sister too. Pretty sure there was some tongue involved.

[A True Kaniggit]

33 minutes ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

Let's not forget this pervert kissed his sister too. Pretty sure there was some tongue involved.

Cult leaders. Amirite?

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

2 minutes ago, A True Kaniggit said:

Cult leaders. Amirite?

Let's just say hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid.

[Horza]

18 hours ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

It's quite simple. However unpleasant a war today with North Korea might appear to someone, the question is whether that is a worse option than facing a North Korea with nuclear warheads on a couple dozen ICBM's in a decade or so. To me, the former option is preferable to the latter. To some, the latter appears to be an acceptable trade off for a few more years of peace.

And that, really, is what this entire difference of opinion is about. It's not about just wanting to bomb North Korea for the sake of some entertainment in an otherwise boringly normal life.

Why people think war with state with dozens of nuclear-armed short and medium range ballistic missiles pointed at South Korea and Japan is some kind of bitter pill it is necessary to swallow to prevent them acquiring roughly the same capability to hold US cities at risk as China escapes me.

[James Arryn]

6 hours ago, Horza said:

Why people think war with state with dozens of nuclear-armed short and medium range ballistic missiles pointed at South Korea and Japan is some kind of bitter pill it is necessary to swallow to prevent them acquiring roughly the same capability to hold US cities at risk as China escapes me.

Americans have long held an extremely high 'peace of mind' expectation, and been willing to kill lots of other folk to meet it. I'll repeat the Cuban Missile Crisis illustration which, even in hindsight, is described as a near miss on WWIII, only avoided because Russia backed down.

Them not backing down would therefore have necessitated the US going nuclear because...otherwise enemy missiles would be too close? Like was/is true for almost everyone else in the world, including the Soviets, and none of them even raised the idea of Armageddon to ease their peace of mind. And it's worth adding that unlike the US confronting Soviet missiles nearby in Cuba, the Russians were very accustomed to nearby missiles pointed at them by the only nation to ever use them. Not to mention the one chalk full of all kinds of people pushing for the nuclear option on a fairly regular basis. LeMay damn near had a Catonic Carthago delende est thing going on, Nixon was giving it serious consideration for Nam, etc.

And yet it's THAT nation so convinced that other states just having nukes is such an existential threat that it's worth, well, like what LeMay, Nixon et al wanted. What's nuclear irony called?

[GAROVORKIN]

 Crazy Kim's biggest hope and delusion is  the reunification Korea under his rule. 

 

[norwaywolf123]

On 8.8.2017 at 11:43 PM, Mexal said:

There are 28,500 US troops in South Korea and another 50,000 in Japan (not including the 40k support personnel). Any war with NK will kill Americans and a very large amount of them.

Compared with the losses North Korea will take the american losses will look like nothing.

[norwaywolf123]

On 10.8.2017 at 0:03 AM, Free Northman Reborn said:

This is a complex issue on which my view has swayed from one end of the spectrum to the other over time. At the moment I actually do believe that a preemtive strike might well be the best option. Lance the boil, so to speak.

Because NK's capability to inflict damage is increasing exponentially as their nuclear capabilties grow. Once they have 10 or 20 nukes and the missiles to deliver them to high value targets, they basically become impossible to attack. At the moment one senses that much of their bluster is just that, bravado based on exaggerated claims of their current capabilities. But clearly not for much longer. Hit them hard now, before they cross that threshold of power.

 

North Korea has tested some nukes. They probably have some delivery system. THe delivery system might not be very accurate or trustworthy. BEsides NK agent could smuggle and detonate dirty bombs to their enemies, and maybe even nukes. Dirty bombs, i believe is the most likely threat!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirty_bomb

http://www.nytimes.com/1995/11/24/world/chechen-insurgents-take-their-struggle-to-a-moscow-park.html

[norwaywolf123]

On 10.8.2017 at 3:40 AM, Fez said:

I think North Korea and its leaders are rational; but I am concerned that someday after they have ICBMs they will decide the rational move is to invade South Korea to finally reunify and threaten to nuke LA if the US intervenes and doesn't withdraw its garrisons immediately.

The most likely scenario in my mind is that north korea will have a pro south korea coup one day. It depends on the administration of south korea. I think korean nationalists would be the most likely to unify Korea.

[GAROVORKIN]

10 hours ago, norwaywolf123 said:

Compared with the losses North Korea will take the american losses will look like nothing.

Assuming Kim makes the first move and assuming China doesn't get directly involved , The US air force would make very quick work of his missile , nuclear facilities and Air force.  Their navy  wouldn't be much of a factor.  Even without air cover the  North Korea army would fight fiercely and yes there would alot of casualties civilian and military  but ultimately the North would face defeat. One or more of his generals sensing the endgame could move against Kim, taking him out of the picture. Whoever  takes over in the the north would then sue  for peace and that would be the end of Nukes and might even  mean conclusion to the Korean War . I think to  satisfy China, Korea stays divided for the time being.   This is just a projection on my part . The reality of such a conflict would likely be a  whole lot worse.

[Werthead]

On 13/08/2017 at 4:17 PM, GAROVORKIN said:

Assuming Kim makes the first move and assuming China doesn't get directly involved , The US air force would make very quick work of his missile , nuclear facilities and Air force.  Their navy  wouldn't be much of a factor.  Even without air cover the  North Korea army would fight fiercely and yes there would alot of casualties civilian and military  but ultimately the North would face defeat. One or more of his generals sensing the endgame could move against Kim, taking him out of the picture. Whoever  takes over in the the north would then sue  for peace and that would be the end of Nukes and might even  mean conclusion to the Korean War . I think to  satisfy China, Korea stays divided for the time being.   This is just a projection on my part . The reality of such a conflict would likely be a  whole lot worse.

This. North Korea loses the second it hits the launch button, because they've spent decades and billions of dollars to build up their military infrastructure and the second they start losing it, they cannot rebuild it quickly (the same argument applies to Russia, actually, but they have nukes and a much larger population and stronger economy). That's why North Korea would have to be very stupid indeed to initiate a confrontation.

The main danger remains as it has been: North Korea decides to test another missile, or detonate another nuke, and this crosses an invisible red line and Trump orders a retaliation. Then North Korea retaliates against South Korea (and maybe Japan) and the conflict gets very big very quickly. That's why if the US decides to strike North Korea it has to be all or nothing: a thousand sorties on the first day hitting absolutely everything from the artillery pieces ranged on Seoul to the nuke facilities to the North Korea troops stationed on the border, and C&C facilities and lines of communication. It's the only chance to avoid massive civilian loss of life in South Korea, and the price will be an astounding death toll in North Korea. Make one misjudgement about NK's WMDs in all of that and the price is even more catastrophic.

[The Anti-Targ]

I guess at best Un can be said to have been the older child in this spat. As the older child he was making threats to try to frighten the little child, without ever actually intended to act on those threats. But at some point the older child realised the younger child lacked the emotional and intellectual maturity to realise this was all bark and no bite. So the older child had to say it in words of one syllable that actually the threats were all talk.

Now hopefully if there are any adults in the younger child's room they will tell that child that the bogey man is not coming and everything is OK. 

[ljkeane]

I was watching a documentary on the assassination of Kim Jong-nam last night and something which I'd missed in the original news reports was that he was apparently killed with VX nerve agent. That's another fun option for the North Koreans to put on their missiles beyond nuclear weapons.

[Horza]

Things that don't often get addressed when people talk about attacking North Korea:

• North Korea likely has dozens of compact nuclear devices ready to be mated to missiles.
• In addition to their almost-operational ICBMs and IRBMs North Korea has loads of operational ballistic missiles of the short and medium range variety.
• These missiles are all road mobile, and some are solid fuelled, which means they can be stored with fuel and fired in minutes.
• Their rocket forces are really big on hiding their missiles in caves and tunnels, and North Korea abounds in deep, forested valleys.
• Their stated nuclear strategy is to pre-emptively attack US bases and ports in South Korea and Japan to prevent an overwhelming conventional force assembling.

Taken together, I don't see why anyone would be confident in a preventative war.

 

[Ghjhero]

Looks like North Korea has possibly tested another nuke, maybe even a hydrogen bomb. If so, esclatory Trump tweets are bound to be incoming!

[Werthead]

The two questions here are is the testing of a nuke still a red line (Trump said as much a couple of months ago, and NK apparently listened and delayed the next test), and when does the near-certainty of massive casualties on the Korean peninsula become outweighed by the threat of nuclear weapons hitting the US mainland?

At the current pace of events, Trump is going to be put in the position during his presidency of having to either launch a war against North Korea or completely back down and enter negotiations and accept a de facto nuclear-armed North Korea which could, at any moment, demand South Korea's surrender in the face of a nuclear attack. I don't see that being a viable scenario.

[Free Northman Reborn]

This appears to have been at least a 100 kiloton yield, compared to the 10 kiloton of the previous biggest test. This takes the threat to a while new level.

I don't think they can wait any longer to act. Take them out before they have perfected the delivery mechanism for these warheads. A dozen 100 kiloton ICBM's makes Kim pretty much untouchable.

[Werthead]

If they already have deliverable warheads, the US can't risk a military attack. If they don't, they might choose to risk it. The final decision will come down to the intelligence on that, and the intelligence on North Korea's capabilities so far has been way off.

[Horza]

31 minutes ago, Free Northman Reborn said:

This appears to have been at least a 100 kiloton yield, compared to the 10 kiloton of the previous biggest test. This takes the threat to a while new level.

I don't think they can wait any longer to act. Take them out before they have perfected the delivery mechanism for these warheads. A dozen 100 kiloton ICBM's makes Kim pretty much untouchable.

 

55 minutes ago, Werthead said:

The two questions here are is the testing of a nuke still a red line (Trump said as much a couple of months ago, and NK apparently listened and delayed the next test), and when does the near-certainty of massive casualties on the Korean peninsula become outweighed by the threat of nuclear weapons hitting the US mainland?

Like I said, people don't want to deal with the fact that North Korea can already hit South Korea and Japan with nuclear-armed short and medium range ballistic missiles. Once that's in the conversation it's harder to argue that it's somehow worth risking millions of lives to prevent NK holding US cities at risk.

 

Quote

At the current pace of events, Trump is going to be put in the position during his presidency of having to either launch a war against North Korea or completely back down and enter negotiations and accept a de facto nuclear-armed North Korea which could, at any moment, demand South Korea's surrender in the face of a nuclear attack. I don't see that being a viable scenario.

Hey, there's always more sanctions and threatening tweets.

But seriously, I think the chances of this administration successfully entering into sustained talks with North Korea are vanishingly small. Even if you could stop Trump tweeting, even if the State Department was taken off life support, there's just no politically satisfying deal to be struck any more. Denuclearisation is off the table and there's zero chance of the North Koreans allowing inspections, so the best on offer is going to be a halt to nuclear testing and a freeze on missile (but not satellite launch vehicle) testing, in exchange for an end to joint exercises with South Korea. Could you sell that to Trump? Could he sell that to this Congress, let alone the base? It's the same problem that's faced every US administration since Bush and crew let the Agreed Framework implode, and I don't see this administration solving it. 

So, given that diplomacy is odious and war would be utterly horrific, I think we're stuck with more tensions, testing and tweetstorms.

[Werthead]

Quote

 

Like I said, people don't want to deal with the fact that North Korea can already hit South Korea and Japan with nuclear-armed short and medium range ballistic missiles. Once that's in the conversation it's harder to argue that it's somehow worth risking millions of lives to prevent NK holding US cities at risk.

 

It is not a given that North Korea has nuclear-armed short and medium range ballistic missiles (but it is also not a given they do not), but they certainly have conventional and possibly chemical missiles and artillery. That in itself is dangerous and may make Trump feel that he has to act now or lose the freedom of action.

For at least the third time in the last year, I think the next week or so will be very dangerous and the chances of this escalating into a military confrontation will once again start mounting.