Idiot Conservative Pundits

I'm irritated at "Great Satan's Girlfriend" for tricking me into clicking on a link that took me to Daniel Goure's post about how the United States isn't ready to fight the second Korean War because Obama weakened the military too far with his constant addition of funds and support to warfighting in the Middle East. We'll probably win the fight, Goure posits, but only at great cost.

North Korea is perhaps the quintessential hybrid threat that defense analysts today speak so much about. Its capabilities range from nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles to thousands of tanks and artillery pieces, millions of infantrymen, hundreds of aircraft (virtually all obsolete but most in working order) and a special operations command of over 100,000. In the last Korean War, northern forces engaged in guerrilla activities throughout the peninsula. This time, Pyongyang might even resort to terrorist attacks in the United States or along the supply lines from the U.S. homeland to the war zone. This kind of war would be a test of the U.S. military’s ability to deal with a so-called hybrid threat.

If Pyongyang chooses to use nuclear weapons, the Obama Administration’s newly-formulated doctrine on nuclear use would receive its first test. It is not clear what kind of punishment the United States could or should inflict on the North if that regime chooses to employ nuclear weapons against us or our allies. We may well wish that the Obama Administration had not truncated deployment of the National Missile Defense system.

Goure is an idiot. Really? A hybrid threat, just because nK has some special forces? I don't think Dr. Goure understands the concept at all. Perhaps he needs to study Israeli operations in Lebanon and Gaza some more. This idea that nK is going to send terrorists into the domestic United States borders on a cheap paperback fiction novel, let alone this idea that it's going to use nukes. Its missiles can barely clear Japan! How in hell's name are they going to range the homeland?

Goure believes that the US Army and Marine Corps need two full years of rest and refit before they're ready to take on combat operations in a second Korean War. I somehow doubt that any field grade military officer with any moderate intelligence will agree with him. And if the ground forces are a little weakened, well I guess it's a good thing that the Navy and Air Force have a strategy for engaging adversarial forces in the Pacific. And why is it that both pundits and news journalists always mention the 28,500 US troops in theater but somehow neglect to mention the half million active duty Republic of Korea ground forces?

Despite all the reports of saber rattling, I don't think nK is coming over the line (and I'm pretty sure I'm not alone here). Their leadership knows that it would mean the end of the regime, that China doesn't have its back and S. Korea isn't unprepared. But don't go to the Lexington Institute for any analysis. They don't have a clue.

Comments

[Sven Ortmann]

It fits into a quite common American pattern; belittling the capabilities of allies, exaggeration of "threat" capabilities.

South Korea could handle North Korea on its own. The U.S. Army structure is actually as ill-suited for Korean peninsula warfare as in 1950, unless the North Koreans fell below their own level of tactical proficiency of 1950.

Korea gives good food for thought and discussion on infantry tactics and force structures, but it doesn't give much food for thought who would win. That's clear: SK.

[Doug]

Jesus Christ, we need to get out of Korea. I spent a year there ('04-'05) and came away from it just stunned at what a waste of our time it was. Right after I got there we sent one of the brigades to Iraq, leaving ONE brigade of maneuver forces, ONE battalion of tube artillery, and TWO battalions of MLRS rocket/missile artillery (which is where I worked).

If a war actually kicked off that one BDE speaking a different language than everybody else is not going to make the difference in between two enormous conscripted armies. Besides, can you tell the difference between a North Korean and a South Korean? I can't.

The only semi-unique capability the US Army brings to the party is MLRS and Q-36/37 radars for counterfire. So let the ROK's do it. A Korean can operate an MLRS launcher, even if they don't reprogram the interface to be in Han Geoul. I've seen it done. One of my platoon's gunners was a KATUSA (Korean Augmentee to US Army). The firefinder radars require more training (they're run by WO's), but there's only like a half-dozen of them in the whole country. If we just gave South Korea 36 M270A1 launchers (2 BN's worth) and a battery worth a radars with all the spare parts as a gift, and trained them to employ and maintain them, we could pull out our land forces from Korea without harming the counterfire fight. A bargain at ten times the price.

The main body of the DPRK army isn't going to get to Seoul. There is ONE high speed avenue of approach going into Seoul, and the ROK's have the entire length rigged with rock-drops that they'll blow to fill the valley with rubble. At narrow points there's huge concrete blocks built over the highway that the ROK's can knock down to seal the roadway.

And what if the North Korean did get to Seoul? Do you know how hard it is to get across Seoul on a GOOD day? Plus, the minute that the common North Korean soldier sees the incredible spectacle of wealth and abundance that is Seoul, he'll have undeniable proof that he's been lied to his entire life. It'll be like the first barbarians to breach Rome's walls, so busy rubbernecking like tourists that they almost forgot to loot.

IIRC, the US is supposed to officially transfer command of the Combined Forces in 2012. This is looong overdue. But oddly, still not completely uncontroversial. Last year there was a ROK Marine officer exchange student in my section of the Career Course, and I said something to the effect of, "Man, it'll be great for you guys to finally have overall command of South Korea's defense, won't it?" And he said, "No, no, no, I think the American's should stay in command. Better that way." I can't say how widespread this attitude is in the ROK military, but it's possible that there's some tit-clutching going on from their side.

My standard for keeping US troops outside of the US is this: If we didn't have troops there, would we feel the need to send them? For example, if we had zero troops in Germany, who the hell would look at Germany today and say, "Oh my God, we need to station tens of thousands of troops there!"

What chance to we have of ever getting our troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan if we can't even get them out of Korea, Germany, and Japan?

[Thomas]

For the last twenty years a number of senior brass and military minded legislators have been trying to convince the country that there's a vast and terrible enemy out there just waiting to emerge and take the place of the USSR.

This isn't the case and it will be at least half a century until it could even become so. Money-drunk defense contractors, glory starved Generals, macho congressmen and their pundit minions have a vested interest in making the tiniest skirmish threat into the next Imperial Japan. They've been doing it for two decades and we really should know better than to listen.

[ry]

Okay, Jay, first off, where does the guy say that the NorKs can hit CONUS? As I read it, he doesn't. He's talking about theatre in the near term, maybe more long range longer term.

He's not too off base from the people I talk to(like Donovan): Army wants time to reset and capitalize. Does that mean it won't be able to do some things? No, it just means it's not as good at them as they'd like. They'd go. They'd lose more people than they'd like(0< is too many, but you know what I mean).

Yeah, it's fear mongery, but there's kernels of truth in there.

The biggest problem in most scenarios where DPRK starts the music is the vast civilian and industrial damage. THe first 20min-hour can see the industrial and historical heart torn out of ROK. THat's a huge problem. They don't have to cross the Han or deal with the clogged streets of Seoul(Beijing is still worse, imo) to effectively kill ROK. They can't capture the country but they can wreck it good and hard.

Beyond that if the Immun Gun pulls south and it'll get cut to pieces in the Joint environment the COmbined command runs(hey, they can't accurately hit anything, it's not like they're going to shut down Kadena, and having done some work on how long an airfield not littered with persistent munitions ala something like Durandel an airfield can be back in action within an hour). the DPRK moving south is wheat before the scythe, and that's without the US involved. The ROKs have everything they need to do the job, they're not the under-fed, undercapitalized, under trained bunch of farm kids they were in 1950. They can hold their own. They'd just like to have out C4I working for them.

An A-10 straffing your armored column, repeatedly, can ruin your whole day. There's I think two wings still stationed in the south of ROK, for exactly that purpose, not to mention what can come in from Japan. Intel is not what it was in 1950-53, as is what air power can do different.

Basically, the only way this is going to happen is if Kartman Jong-Il thinks he's going to lose it all. Blaze of glory. Otherwise we'll pretend to get pissed off over shit they pull and they'll pretend that they actually matter. We'll continue this cycle for god knows how long.

[Sven Ortmann]

There's a reason why I wrote "Korea gives good food for thought and discussion on infantry tactics and force structures...".
Heavy weapons (air power, artillery, tanks) and other expensive military have been much overestimated in 1950 and the present situation is similar in this regard.
I doubt that their artillery would be nearly as relevant as so many voices and pens claim.
Tanks won't be decisive in mountainous terrain.
A-10's may be fine against armour, but the key challenge would be infiltrating infantry.

The ROK has the quantity and the reputation of infantry competence. They would pull the weight and win.

[Doug]

"the key challenge would be infiltrating infantry."

Which, of course, us the mechanized US troops who don't speak Han Geoul will be especially useless at combatting.

"I doubt that their artillery would be nearly as relevant as so many voices and pens claim. "

I suspect you're right. The number they always throw around over there is 10,000. "10,000 tubes, pointed at us, right now!!! Gasp!!!" But a lot of those guns haven't been fired since the last war. Even their "new" guns are pretty old.

In Afghanistan, my job was to train the ANA on their Soviet-era D-30 howitzers. The ones we used rolled off the assembly line in '86 and '85, and were comparatively new. In the entire country, there are around 80 still fit to fire, with God-only-knows how many rusting ones from the '70's or even late '60's in the boneyards along with the rusting hulks of T-62's and BMP's. We used to scavenge them for spare parts and hydraulic fluid. The ammo gets tricky, too. One of the other teams while I was there had a round go off inside of an 82mm mortar tube. The blast killed the ANA loader and the "blooming" of the tube tore his arm off.

I suspect that thousands of scenes like that would play out along the north side of the DMZ if the DPRK tried an artillery barrage, using guns that are 2-3 times older that those D-30's. I doubt that the petroleum-starved North Korean army has been diligently wiping down those 10,000 tubes with gun oil (or at the very least, diesel) to prevent dry rot. No, I would predict a lot of burst tubes, hangfires when their firing pin springs don't have any tension left in them, and breeches sitting in the dirt after the hydraulics in their recoil compensator burst their seals.

It's also hard to anticipate how the crews will react to nearby explosions from counterfire or the Air Force. It's so hard to predict how the force in such an alien culture as North Korea will react. Soldier on fanatically or panic utterly? It's a toss-up.

[Ray]

Apart from anything else, North Korean military preparedness is not being supplied adequately with food and clothing/medical supplies, let alone for a prospective war. The country has serious internal economy troubles, and it's the old dodge of diverting the general population's attention away from these- as Doug above indicates, in his paragraph about some general details on the equipment-readiness. Unless...N.Korea is in self destruct what-the-hell, mode...

[Ray]

Apropos an aside -the Robert Chapman quote- nothing to do with this particular Post (so far) but on the general page, here:
"A quotation, like a pun, should come unsought, and then be welcomed only for some propriety of felicity justifying the intrusion." Robert Chapman.
I don't agree- puns are for fun, too; to sometimes alleviate an all-too serious debate. They help put things in perspective, along with interjections of humour. These are sometimes used in combat situations aren't they?

[Ray]

Never mind; don't want to sidetrack things.