The fear of North Korea

[Coito ergo sum]

I wonder where the coax attaches. The white wire looks like an end is tucked under the device.

I bet the thing is just a prop in a photo op -- "here, see Kim Jong Un working with his generals on the latest technology..."

[Jason]

He's a fat little fucker too isn't he? Is he ever in a photo without wearing a long, loose, jacket in an apparent attempt to conceal his corpulence?

[cronus]

Lot's of people fat. Not sure that is relevant?

[Coito ergo sum]

DPRK says get out by April 10 -- http://abcnews.go.com/International/nor ... V8cIpPCaSo


Brits have no plans to move out -- http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22037008


Russians practicing bombing our anti-missile equipment... http://freebeacon.com/russian-bomber-roulette/

[Jason]

Lot's of people fat. Not sure that is relevant?

Feeling self-conscious?

It has to do with his people starving and him attempting (clumsily) to manage his image. I imagine he doesn't want to appear to be the fat dictator to his people.

[Coito ergo sum]

Lot's of people fat. Not sure that is relevant?

Very few North Koreans are fat, almost none is, as a matter of fact. Might be considered poor taste to be a chubby fat fucker when your people are starving.

WHO thinks their health system is the envy of the world, though.... lol http://reason.com/blog/2010/05/07/who-c ... the-good-n

[FBM]

Him being well-fed is a symbol of NK's prosperity.

[cronus]

Him being well-fed is a symbol of NK's prosperity.

Something to aspire towards and hopefully never attain.

[Calilasseia]

Right, first of all, artillery.

My understanding is that 50 Km represents the upper limit of capability for state of the art Western self propelled guns, such as the M109 Paladin and variations thereupon, the AS90, the Denel Land Systems GS6 and the Rheinmetall PzH 2000. But that range is only achievable with assisted munitions that are rocket-propelled for part of their flight trajectory. Unassisted munitions maximum range is nearer 30 Km.

Even if NK has the ability to construct assisted munitions, it's questionable whether or not they have the ability to construct the ballistic fire control computers required to make best use of those munitions. The likes of Denel and BAE Land systems didn't spend tens of millions developing these computers just for them to look pretty on the dashboard, they built them to work. It's pretty debatable whether NK even has the ability to produce the chips upon which to base such a computer, let alone the complete computer. Do they have in-house technology to build radiation-hardened CPUs, for example? Do they even have in-house technology for fabricating basic integrated circuits full stop? If not, where are they going to get their chips from? I suspect even the Chinese will be less than happy to supply NK with chips that can enable the NK military to build accurate long range fire control computers for artillery, and there's no way Intel or AMD are going to supply NK with chips.

Isn't the current limit for field cannons just about 50 km? On the other hand DPRK has a lot of stationary pieces along the border, which could have a longer range, and probably rocket launchers too, unless these are all phoney (which they definitely might be).

Those vehicles are basically "Stalin's Organ Pipe" launchers on a more modern truck chassis. They're about as accurate as Republican party press releases. Great if you simply want to saturate an area with munitions, without worrying whether or not you actually score direct hits on anything, but if you want accuracy, you need something a bit better than the above. Say, for example, recent upgrades to the M270 MRLS. Or better still, Pershing II, which can hit targets 1,400 Km away with a CEP of about 30 metres, and deliver an earth-penetrator warhead, either conventional or nuclear, though using Pershing IIs against NK would be overkill in a conventional war.

How long for the S. Korean airforce and USAF to take out the static NK artillery positions?

Two minutes after the war actually starts.
Seriously.

The US probably has round the clock satellite surveillance of NK positions, and has them mapped to about 10 centimetre accuracy. If the US joins the fray, and uses lofted JDAMs delivered via a "bunt" manouevre close to the NK border, they could probably take out much of the NK's artillery without having to leave SK airspace. Alternatively, all those F-16s the SK Air Force has, could very easily deliver missiles such as Mavericks. These are imaging infra-red homers, that use an infra-red TV to pick out and home in on the target. With a Maverick, you could not only decide to hit Kim the Third, you could decide which of his testicles the missile will hit first.

How long for the S. Korean airforce and USAF to take out the static NK artillery positions?

Two minutes after the war actually starts.
Seriously.

Looks like they've dug caves to hide the big guns in over the years. It would take some pretty accurate smart bombs to hit the entrances precisely enough to disable the most important artillery.

That artillery can't fire from inside its caves. The NK army has to take them out of the caves to use them. If the satellite intel has those caves mapped, it's a no-brainer. You simply arrange for your munitions to arrive at the entrance just as they're towing the artillery out.

This issue crops up in the local news from time to time. I don't think the NK air force is much, but them and their ground-based AA tech would make it a job. It won't be over in a few minutes, I think. And I think it would be dangerous for SK and the USFK to assume it would be.

I suspect the NK is still relying on old generation SAMs that can be jammed with ease. I don't think they've got their hands on anything as modern as, say, an SA-13, let alone the 2S6M Tunguska, and I don't think even the most venal of Russian businessmen would sell them these systems. Putin would probably arrange for them to enjoy a crash course in salt mining if they did. The only reason they have access to SA-14 standard MANPADS is because they stole the technology from the Russians. As for triple-A, they're still relying on locally produced variants of the ZSU-23, which, whilst being a capable mobile triple-A system, is limited to hitting targets within 2 km, and an F-16 isn't going to let itself fly within the kill radius of a ZSU.

Now if the NK Army had access to Tunguskas, Pantsyr S1s or SA-21s, it would be a different story. Those systems are treated with a lot of respect even by the best US Air Force pilots, because they know what those systems are capable of. The S-400 (SA-21), for example, is a multiple SAM system using three different missiles, the 40N6 (400 km range), the 48N6 (250 km range) and 9M96E2 (120 km range), with a range of multiple seekers allowing the missiles to evade countermeasures. But you'd see Putin dancing naked in Red Square with an Ethiopian transvestite before the Russians sold S-400s to NK.

As for dealing with caves, once again, there are ways and means of dealing with those. Earth penetrator warheads and thermobaric weapons being merely two of the options.

I was wondering what the response to an NK nuke would be. Massive nuclear response? Counter-productive. Tactical nuke strike against NKs remaining nuke facilities to stop them launching another one? Massive conventional response and invasion?

Local news has only been reporting about potential SK/USFK responses to conventional attacks. Nothing about responses to a hypothetical nuke. Wrt the response to a conventional attack, the word is 'surgical.' If it were a nuclear attack, I think the response would be to turn Pyongyang into a glass parking lot and get it over with. At this point, I don't even think China would object too much.

I've heard suggestions that the Chinese would rather invade NK themselves, than let the situation get to the point where nuclear ordnance is detonating over Pyongyang. I'm minded to agree with those suggestions. One, if the NK regime is mad enough to detonate a nuclear warhead over, say, Alaska (which is just within their reach if they really push their missiles hard), the Chinese will invade NK rather than see US nuclear weapons deployed, if they have sufficient time to play with.

With North Korea they are unpredictable and could easily do a cheap'n'easy dirty nuke vanbomb a few blocks from the NYSE which would inflict as much damage or more than a difficult exercise in full yield missiles.

If NK pulled that off, the ICBMs would be flying within about 5 minutes of detonation. Pyongyang would be lava 30 minutes later. The Chinese would simply resign themselves to sitting on the sidelines the moment a North Korean nuke went off in New York. The aforementioned "sufficient time" above would cease to be.

I don't know what China's response to a NK invasion of SK would be but I don't think they would be too pleased with so much disruption next door, nor with a potentially radioactive neighbour. Can't see them coming in on NKs side, as that would mean war with the US, which isn't scheduled for another 15 years until the USA clears its debts...

Agreed though that the Chinese do not want any disturbance on their doorstep. In the long run, China would be much better off with a united and stable Korea. I thought the Chinese were supposed to think in the long term?

What the Chinese government likes, when it can have them, is elegant solutions involving a minimum of fuss. The US nuking Pyongyang is the very antithesis of "elegant" as far as the Chinese are concerned, though if NK smuggles a van bomb into New York and kills 2 million Americans in the process, the Chinese will probably sit on the sidelines, because they know the ICBMs will fly if that happens.

I just find it hard to imagine China jumping in uninvited and trying to take over NK. They'd lose both the US and SK as trading partners, not to mention those on the UNSC who would probably follow suit. Doesn't make economic sense, and everything bows down before the idol of economics.

If the NK regime goes batshit insane enough for the Chinese to think invasion is preferable to the US turning Pyongyang into lava, they'll bite that bitter pill and swallow it. It's even possible that the Chinese might stage an "incident" involving an alleged "NK nuke" going off course and hitting some part of China, in order to provide a "justification" for invasion. Which will allow them in turn to claim the usual right of "self-defence".

I just find it hard to imagine China jumping in uninvited and trying to take over NK. They'd lose both the US and SK as trading partners, not to mention those on the UNSC who would probably follow suit. Doesn't make economic sense, and everything bows down before the idol of economics.

Exactly. And since a unified Korea* would be a healthier trading partner for China than just SK alone, why prop up NK? A side-benefit for China might be that US military presence on the Korean peninsula would be reduced over time.

*Unified along the lines of South Korea of course, not the "Workers Paradise".

NK have shown their economic aptitude already. And it's been costing China for decades now. And yes, SK would have no more need of the expensive US military presence once reunification was achieved. It has no other significant military threats to it. Win, win, win...except for poor ol' Uncle Sam, I guess. He'd have to retreat to Japan. Which is like, just right across the street in terms of military presence in Northeast Asia. But still, it's not like they would become SK's enemies or anything.

I gather Dale Brown had a scenario of this sort in mind when he wrote Battle Born.

[Jason]

TD;DR

[cronus]

DPRK says get out by April 10 -- http://abcnews.go.com/International/nor ... V8cIpPCaSo


Brits have no plans to move out -- http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22037008


Russians practicing bombing our anti-missile equipment... http://freebeacon.com/russian-bomber-roulette/

“We should understand that they look at ‘reset’ differently than we do,” said the retired three-star general, who once commanded forces in Alaska. “They look at it as regaining their previous USSR position as a superpower while this administration is moving towards unilateral disarmament.”

Quite a divergent take on things there.

[Jason]

Dafuq?

Why do you think I'm in British Columbia?

Trust me, given the choice I'd much rather be in Ontario.

[FBM]

What I recall was that caves were dug and then the entrances minimized, camouflaged and fortified to make hitting them a very difficult task with anything but the most precise guided missile. Also, they place their long-range artillery units on the northern side of mountains so that detecting them in operation is all but impossible without air superiority. I'm thinking they would be able to get off quite a few over the DMZ before they could be neutralized.

http://edition.cnn.com/video/?hpt=hp_t1 ... -korea.cnn

As for the Chinese, they're massing troops on the NK border, but it's not clear yet why. Not to me, anyway.

[Jason]

God damned inscrutable Chinese.. They're they're the wildcard.. which I'm actually grateful for.

Let's not go to war hey? It'll fuck up my retirement plans.

[cronus]

What I recall was that caves were dug and then the entrances minimized, camouflaged and fortified to make hitting them a very difficult task with anything but the most precise guided missile. Also, they place their long-range artillery units on the northern side of mountains so that detecting them in operation is all but impossible without air superiority. I'm thinking they would be able to get off quite a few over the DMZ before they could be neutralized.

http://edition.cnn.com/video/?hpt=hp_t1 ... -korea.cnn

As for the Chinese, they're massing troops on the NK border, but it's not clear yet why. Not to me, anyway.

Chinese don't want refugees fleeing out their way. Then the NK famine will be even more intense and with Western media present, America will lose the moral high ground without spending a fortune on food aid, and this whole thing might be to push up prices of food measured in dollars...pushing the dollar to the edge of the cliff.