What Could We Do If North Korea Invaded South Korea?
The posts below report the relative numbers of troops respectively of the U.S. and North Korea and the block on nuclear retaliation to a North Korean attack.
To speculate a bit, our U.S. military has been exhausting itself with unwinnable wars in the Middle East. Consequently, should North Korea decide to invade South Korea, there is not much that we could do about it. We could not attack it with nuclear weapons which would spread dangerous radioactivity throughout the area — particularly threatening China. Let us not forget the disastrous effects of Chernobyl!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster
The aggressive acts of North Korea, killing people on a ship it sank, firing back and forth, cannot but make one wonder what more its enigmatic leadership has in mind. With a sudden attack, could it not finish off the Korean war by capturing South Korea with all its valuable resources? This seems to be an act of madness, but the North has been warning us that it has also nuclear capacity as well as its massive military.
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737 U.S. Military Bases = Global Empire
With more than 2,500,000 U.S. personnel serving across the planet and military bases spread across each continent, it’s time to face up to the fact that our American democracy has spawned a global empire.
http://www.alternet.org/story/47998
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North Korea is the most militarized country in the world today,[4] having the fourth largest army in the world, at about 1,106,000 armed personnel, with about 20% of men ages 17–54 in the regular armed forces.[5] It also has a reserve force comprising 8,200,000 personnel. It operates an enormous network of military facilities scattered around the country, a large weapons production basis, a dense air defense system, the third largest chemical weapons stockpile in the world,[6] and includes the largest Special Forces contingent (numbering 180,000 men).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_People%27s_Army
I wonder whether our security people are beginning to speculate along similar lines?
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“A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope.” (Livy cited by Machiavelli)
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Ed Kent [blind copies]
4 users commented in " What Could We Do If North Korea Invaded South Korea? "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackCounting the troops and weapons that N. Korea possesses is not a good forecast of the outcome of a war. Darius bragged of the size of his armies and the quality of his chariots in a series of letters warning Alexander the Great. Yet Alexander, with a tiny army in comparison, went in and took Darius’s throne.
Germany in 1939 and ’40 was outnumbered by the Brit and French armies. Yet Hitler owned France in a few weeks.
Instead, I think the factor could be the South Korean forces. Having trained the the ROK’s, I would not put my money on the Northern Armies when they cannot even feed themselves.
Korea is not so dependent upon our military as they once were.
D. Alan Johnson
Author of “Asgaard”
we can not let North korea Dicktate INVADE South Korea.
We all must make it clear to NORTH KOREA
THAT ALL THE REST OF THE WORLD WILL NOT STAND BY
AND LET THEM INVADE S KOREA .
IF THEY DO WELL BOMB THE HELL OUT OF AS THEY WILL BE WIPE OF THE FACE OF THE EARTH.
The trick will be neutralizing NK nuclear missiles if they have them – not sure if radioactivity would be released if missile sites/reactor are blown up. Second is to stop the NKs from getting into Seoul. A few strategically placed MOABs would have major effect (psychologically as well), but main hope is the NKs are not in good enough shape or willing to follow through with an invasion. In the end NK would probably lose quickly, but they can inflict a lot of damage in a short period. Good thing China is nearby – they have much more at stake and can help the situation.
It is not a matter of ‘can the south beat the north?’. South Korea can take out North Korea at any time. The problem is what do they do afterwards. Then, the question is a moral one… does the south go bankrupt repairing the north? South Koreans would rather hold on to what they got then invade the north and have to rebuild 70 years of total devastation….
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