Quote:
Originally Posted by flere-imsaho
You guys are forgetting how close Seoul is to the border. Maybe 10-15 miles?
I'm actually pretty sure NK could shell Seoul from the border just with regular artillery. Further, IIRC, most military analysis believe there's little the U.S. & SK could do to stop an initial, full-on invasion with the amount of manpower on the ground right now and the size of NK's standing army.
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Ok, I was an -E3-Sentry US Air Force intel officer (O3)though over a decade back in Korea I see nothing has changed from my sources in the military and in Korea. We must remember that NK constantly screws with the US and SK governments in all sorts of manners knowing one key fact. The US has 85000-100000+ US military and their families along with US expat civilians working living with 20 miles of NK artillery. Also, if NK was to go on the offensive first we would have some real difficulties. First off, it has been long known through intelligence gathered through human intel. sources including defectors that the NK military has 120000 commandos that have been training for the last 20-30 years to infiltrate behind our lines via a fleet of special made radar evading 20,000 wooden biplanes/gliders (I shit you not). there mission would be to kill the Air Force Pilots at Osan AB and Kunsan AB as well as try to damage/destroy our runways and planes along with killing anyone near the airfields mechanics, fuelers, ammo troops etc. hitting our soft underbelly something they picked up from the North Viet Cong no doubt.
The NKs know they could not win an Air/Navy war and so want to force us to fight on our on terms. Anyone who even mentions the nuclear option has no knowledge of this theater since that would only be an option of last resort since the fallout would have extremely adverse affects on South Korea with the prevailing winds in Korea normally blowing southeasterly. Once the NKs took out the Air Force we would have a toe to toe fight in urban areas where our tanks in Korea at least are still not as effective in urban settings due to their size as opposed to some of the newer vehicles like the Stryker units and more maneuverable tanks coming out recently. The South Korean populace would be of little to no help to us and with there being many sympathizers and actually estimates are that there are 10000-20000 sleeper agents among the student populations these days . Also the expectations are that as much as 20-35% of the South Korean
military would defect with another 25-35% defecting shortly after the NKs ground forces enter the Seoul corridor. Those numbers I think may be far lower since Koreans have long throught of the US military in Korea as the ones that should and would do the fighting even among the young military conscription age population.
By the time our heavy bombers B52S an d B1Bs arrived from Guam and the US the North Koreans would certainly occupy Seoul and most of the western coast including Inchon down to Kwangju.
So what would be the best course of action:
1-Do not over react. A guy punches you in the face don't cut his head off with a sword.
2-Longterm solution is in the next five years or sooner pull our military (90%) out of SK and give them what they need through selling them equipment not technology since they can not be trusted with not giving to the NKs to us eagainst us.
3-Once we have our folks out of harms way we force the SKs to be more harsh diplomatically, socially, culturally with their "brothers" in the North our we can just turn the place into a parking lot or
4-Further weaponize the Japanese (China would not like this and would roll right over on the North.
Just my two cents.