I’m not totally convinced that mutual deference is sensible but this doesn’t make any sense, unless I’m missing something:
Pyongyang’s conventional inferiority requires it to degrade the United States’ ability to sustain the attack against it. This means it essentially has no option but to use nuclear weapons first against targets such as Andersen Air Force Base in Guam…
Pyongyang can’t affect the US’ ability to respond in any meaningful way. Even if Guam sinks into the sea, there’s still South Korea, Japan, ICBs & the US Navy. On top of that, there’s no guarantee that North Korea could even hit Guam without getting intercepted, and trying but failing would certainly means a massive counterattack.
I think the big new issues with a Nuclear North Korea is probably proliferation related. North Korea has a tiny economy with exports of just 4-5bn, less than a small US city. Selling an occasional bomb could triple their exports bring in foreign currency, which they are starving for. Even if they got caught, would the US respond to a nuclear armed country?
> Pyongyang can’t affect the US’ ability to respond in any meaningful way. Even if Guam sinks into the sea, there’s still South Korea, Japan, ICBs & the US Navy. On top of that, there’s no guarantee that North Korea could even hit Guam without getting intercepted, and trying but failing would certainly means a massive counterattack.
1. Those deficiencies in North Korea's capabilities will not remain fixed for much longer if the status quo persists.
2. The scenario outlined I believe assumes that the regime's continuity is already under some active threat, so it may not care much about the massive counter attack.
No, the article lays this out quite sensibly. If NK could reasonably assume that their long-range missiles would continue to pose a threat to the US mainland or military bases after a foreign aggression, then they could and would have to use nuclear weapons against any local aggressors first - their military would not stand much of a chance in a conventional joint attack by SK and the US.
However, they do not (yet) have the ability to safely make this assumption. Their missile launchers and nuclear weapon facilities would be obliterated immediately by the absolute air superiority of any possible aggressor (SK, USA, China, Russia).
I believe that their nuclear weapon program has the simpler goal to prevent limited SK and US aggressions such as aerial bombardments by continually threatening to retaliate against Seoul. This threat is fairly irrational, because it would likely trigger a nuclear response, so they seem to currently follow a "mad dog" strategy.
Not that I would know, though; I'm not a military analyst.
I agree. Also, I think using nuclear weapons would affect the willingness of NKs allies (at least China, but probably also Russia) to assist them in the war. China has already said that much.
I think it's much more likely NK will try to last the first couple of weeks while China and Russia move hardware into the region.
The article explicitly stated how North Korea might feel free to hit or try to hit places like Guam, S.K. and Japan without fear of retaliation because the author guesses the average American would be OK with losing Tokyo and Seoul but not S.F.
In January 1992[1], long after the Cuba Crisis, Robert S. McNamara attended a meeting with Castro. He asked Castro: 1) Did you know the warheads were there? 2) Would you have recommended to Chruschtschow to use the in the face of an US American attack? 3) If he had used them, what would have happened to Cuba?
His response: 1) I knew they were there. 2) I would not have recommended to Cruschtschow, I did recommend to use them. 3) What would have happened to Cuba? We would have been totally destroyed!
I think this story should be kept in mind when trying to predict behavior, esp. when the stakes are this high.
We've been a few moments away from world destruction a few times. This was of course one of the biggest but so was that one malfunction when the Soviets believed we had launched a nuclear strike and ordered the same but the soldier declined to do so. Turned out it was an error. Many don't realize just how precarious a world is with ICBM technology. If they did I don't think they would hesitate for 1 minute to destroy NK years ago before they were first able to create mid range missles
But, presumably Castro was still playing the game even in 1992 ...at least in his mind. What was he going to say? I was bluffing.. I had to do what The Secretary told me to do.
Russia is said to be currently supplying arms to the taliban. Their goal there (to disrupt american efforts) would be the same as in NK. And China is NKs ally today, and has said they would assist if the US restarted the war (except if NK uses nuclear weapons). Both helped them during the Korean war. Both share a border with NK, making it easy for them to do so again. And both have been clear they don't want a pro-american state at their border (in Russia's case, on their western border).
If war breaks out, it's very likely it'll be NK+China+Russia again (unless there's a very clear wrong by NK). In other words, NK will likely have more military options than the article admits once a war breaks out.
But if NK uses nuclear weapons, that may change. Would China and Russia continue to back someone who used them? That's the question, and it's not a given that they would.
> Russia is said to be currently supplying arms to the taliban. Their goal there (to disrupt american efforts) would be the same as in NK.
And of course, the original supplier of arms to the people who formed the Taliban was the United States. The goal for the US was to arm and empower the Islamic extremists who had launched a jihad against the secular Afghan government, and to disrupt Russian efforts to support it.
Click bait title, article is not actually suggesting Kim Jong-Un will instigate nuclear warfare (or would be rational if he chose to do so), even though the title comes across that way.
The article specifically talks about retaliation against military attacks by the US i.e. the article never suggests it would be rational to fire a nuke off as a "first" move, but rather simply fire them before the US does. The title is quite unclear in that regard.
Click bait title, article is not actually suggesting Kim Jong-Un will instigate nuclear warfare
Actually it does:
This scenario to stave off an invasion with a limited nuclear attack on a U.S. military target is not irrational, although it is clearly risky and terrifyingly tragic. One wrinkle is that North Korea’s arsenal is currently small and vulnerable, and U.S. military strategy, reiterated by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, is to try to find and destroy all of Kim’s nuclear systems in the event of a war. That gives Kim an incentive to go first, go early and go massively if he is not confident about surviving a U.S. attempt at disarming him. If Kim thinks we are coming after him or his forces, he cannot afford to be wrong and he cannot afford to launch second.
That last sentence is key, so if you're skimming this comment, go back and read it.
To summarize: The basic thesis is that, if Kim believes an attack is coming (not that it has started, that it is simply coming), his rational choice is to use nuclear arms on bases in the region and thus force the US to the negotiating table.
The missile NK recently fired over Japan recently was launched at 5:58 AM. At 6:02 AM the Japanese government sent a text alert. At 6:12 it landed in the ocean. We know about NK missiles launches very quickly after they are fired. I wouldn't be surprised if we know about them before they're fired. This suggests to me that these missiles can be intercepted.
I don't know what kinds of interception technology is deployed in the area, but I would guess there is some and I would also guess that a (hypothetical) NK ICBM would not have significant countermeasures.
I think the real question here is what NK/Kim's aims are. When Iran was actively developing a nuclear capability, it seemed clear that their goal was to get as close to a weapon as possible without actually finishing a weapon. The closer they were, the more bargaining power they had in terms of getting the US/UN to lift sanctions.
With NK, I'm less clear about strategy. In the past, it seemed like NK actions had the aim of extorting aid money from the US/allies. That may still be the case. Here's a chart showing US humanitarian aid to NK since 2001: https://explorer.usaid.gov/cd/PRK
It takes 30-40 minutes for an NK icbm to reach the US. About 20 minutes to guam.
But the US missile defense has never seen combat.. only tests. They had 10 successful tests (the last 10) out of 18. But those are planned ahead of time (with trajectories already mapped out), and the missiles don't have countermeasures (which they would in a real conflict). So there's a big question about whether the system will work at all. I don't think anyone is eager to find out.
Even the best interception systems have a horrible success rate, it's basically a nice system to have but it's not possible to rely on it for protection. There is no better protection than making sure the missile is not launched in the first place.
After thinking about the situation I always fall back on the realization that China continues to support them. Imagine if they used nukes to attack the US bases in the region. China steps in to stop them and takes the islands that were formerly US held. It's all a major incident that can be blamed on N.Korea, but China gain territory and less US military presence in the region. Plausible?
Not plausible at all. If China took Guam, the United States Military would kick the crap out of China from one end of the Pacific to the other. Within 60 days, China would completely defeated on the oceans and in the air.
Any resulting peace treaty would be of China accepting Taiwan independence, dropping all support for North Korea and giving all ambitions to the South China sea. China has a lot to lose if it went to war against the United States.
Unlikely. China has no experience and insufficient infrastructure to project power over an ocean to take and hold land against the US Navy; logistics would get difficult once the US Air Force and Marines enter the picture, as well. Also, they currently enjoy a highly-advantageous position by keeping their relationship with the US somewhat ambiguous, by turns friendly and icy. This strongly advances their mercantilist posture, while giving them cover to engage in low-intensity conflict (like the South China Sea islands activity) with impunity.
If they openly turned hostile against the US like that, then their economy would have to do without much export trade in a short amount of time, months instead of decades. Doable, but a mess, and it's not clear that the initial domestic support the current regime would enjoy from a war would outweigh and outlast the longer term economic adjustments to be made. They're trying to pivot away from exports at the moment, but it's pretty addictive.
I tend to buy more into arguments that the PRC enjoys the cognitive/attention bandwidth NK occupies within US leadership, and if NK happens to first strike US, successfully or not, the resulting chaos would net benefit the PRC's global power position. They keep the benefit of a buffer state by insisting the US not take pre-emptive action, while simultaneously refusing to take stronger action (using the avoidance of absorbing a NK humanitarian crisis as shield) against NK, yet not actively help NK beyond the current nominal assistance levels, so I don't see significant downsides for the PRC and RUS to let the status quo reign.
I suspect the PRC's unofficial statement that if NK struck first, then the PRC would not oppose a US reaction, is a thinly-veiled threat to the US: even if you or an ally absorb a nuclear first strike, you're not going to replace our buffer state. We'll intervene to topple the Kim regime, perhaps even help you do that, and then we'll ensure we control the agenda going forward of what emerges to replace that regime in NK.
Before we get all doom and gloom over ICBMs, the chances are greater NK will ship a nuclear bomb to the US inside an ISO shipping container crossing in by ship, train or truck than lobbing it with a missile. The difficulties from this point in their ICBM development program are still substantial:
I agree with other comments here that the bigger, long-term threat is nuclear proliferation. We might successfully enter a MAD scenario with NK, only to get clocked by a Hezbollah-assembled device painstakingly purchased and gleaned from multiple sources including NK among the list. It's not even the materiel or finished devices that has me wondering as much as the practical knowledge that sits in scientists', engineers' and technicians' heads. We could magic away all of NK's nuclear infrastructure, and that still won't solve the problem of they have all these people that know the how-to's of building the devices. That's going to be a tough problem to solve.
Tangent, but I've always wondered what the cost of dropping rice (or similar) into country to disrupt it is.
I'd guess that you can drop enough rice to feed the population of NK for around $1-2bil/mo. The cost of the Iraq war was around $8-10bil/mo. So you're talking about 10-25% of the cost of a war effort. (I'd guess towards the higher side.)
But! There's a lot of goodwill to be earned by dropping a steady supply of food across the country during the conflict. At the end of the day, starving people usually care more about food than kings. (Also, for marginally more you can include other kinds of supplies.)
This is complete and utter media hype. The most that will happen is we will continue sanctions, and NK will develop a nuclear deterrent. They will not actually use it to bomb anyone, but just so they can be safe in the knowledge they will not get invaded because of said deterrent. Like any other country with nukes (there is a lot of us).
I do not support their regime, but I also do not support everyone ganging up on them and deciding that military invasion and mass slaughter is somehow the solution. Like with any country, change is slow and has to come from within.
>Like with any country, change is slow and has to come from within.
That wasn't the case with Japan and Germany during WWII. They both went from militaristic, imperialistic societies to pacifist ones in a relatively short amount of time. And that change was the result of their being utterly and completely defeated in a bloody war, and the occupations that followed.
In the 1980s I took some classes at MIT on strategic nuclear doctrine and related subjects. Even then it seemed a bit irrelevant, and the more I learned, the more so. It is disturbing to be paging back all that game theory bullshit 35 years later.
(At that point MIT was still heavily into public policy rather than entrepreneurship. Though I am far, far from libertarian, that orientation also seemed outdated at the time).
I'm perplexed by the logic here. If NK initiated a preemptive strike on local bases, there wouldn't be an opportunity for a second wave of attacks against the US mainland. The United States would retaliate so savagely that there wouldn't be any infrastructure for people to initiate a second strike with.
I'm perplexed that you're perplexed. The article does a good job of laying out their argument. In short: The claim is that Kim believes the US wouldn't "retaliate so savagely" because the US wouldn't be willing to risk losing a major populated area to a successful ICBM strike.
So preemptive nuclear strikes on local bases make sense to degrade the US's ability to stage a conventional invasion, while acting as a deterrent by threatening a strike on the domestic US.
You can choose to believe or not believe that argument (it depends on your measure of risk in that scenario), but the logic is clear and reasonable.
I found the writing style of this article a little opaque (and poorly edited in some places), so let me try to lay out the logic as I understand it.
There are two styles of attack: "conventional" (bombers, soldiers, etc. but no nukes) and "nuclear".
A successful conventional attack on NK could quickly remove its ability to initiate a nuclear attack. Without too much trouble, the US or some other major power could send a bunch of bombers over and completely eradicate NK's nuclear arsenal.
NK may be able to prevent a conventional attack by making a pre-emptive nuclear attack on foreign military targets. I say "may" because I think this is the least-justified claim of the article.
Doing that would not provoke the same kind of international response that a nuclear attack on NK would. If we blew up a base or two in NK, we could say, "We're just try to keep the world safe." and most other countries probably wouldn't do much about it except maybe some stern looks of disapproval.
This means that a conventional attack on NK is more likely, since there is less disincentive for it.
NK has no real ability to respond conventionally. We could take out their entire military without breaking a sweat. Their only noteworthy weapon is nukes. That means they must be preserved at all costs.
So Kim Jong-Un knows:
1. A conventional attack can remove NK's nuclear capability.
2. A nuclear strike on military bases may prevent that conventional attack.
3. NK's nuclear capability is their only weapon against other countries so must be preserved at all costs.
Those logically imply that if NK is to engage in any military conflict, it must strike first with nuclear weapons. Anything else results in defeat.
Add to that:
4. A conventional attack is more likely because there would be fewer repercussions on other countries for doing so.
Combine those together and it implies an NK nuclear first strike on military targets is more likely.
This presumes you believe 2 and 4 to be true. I think 4 probably is true -- the world generally seems to roll over when the US marches troops into random countries, even under dubious justification (Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.).
I don't believe 2 is true. Even if NK used every nuke they got on every base they can reach, I think the US and its allies would still have so much remaining military capability that we could turn the entire country into a glowing slag heap and still be home in time for the weekend.
Reading this makes me relieved that Nazi Germany did not obtain nuclear weapons - else a regime change ousting Hitler might not have happened at all, and it would've been free to carry on its agenda with less fear of Allied intervention.
I'm not so sure about that. Nazi Germany invaded many neighbouring countries. You can bet that if North Korea invades South Korea the presence of nuclear arsenal won't cause the UN to simply ignore their actions.
Of course it would. But their argument is that he might end up in a position where it may seem to him that there is no alternative if he wants to secure his own survival.
Consider Iraq. Hussein apparently believed the West would eventually believe him when he said he had no weapons of mass destruction. Instead he was killed.
Why would any future dictator facing escalation from the west play along? Playing along now has a proven risk of getting you killed.
The argument then is that to someone like Kim Jong-Un it may feel like the only alternative is to be so unhinged and so willing to escalate that the price of taking him out is too great for anyone to want to take it.
Of course it's a tricky line - overplay your hand and you seem so unhinged that nobody can afford to let you live.
The regime is going down one way or another. They’ve backed themselves into a corner. While firing off a nuke would be insane, I would struggle to call it irrational.
The problem with this assumptions is that you have only one shot.
Edit: when I said one shot I was referring to being right or wrong about if you would be attacked or not. I was not referring to nuclear missile shots.
No, actually the article clearly assumes that North Korea would have multiple shots, but not enough to eliminate the US. The strategy for them would be to hit Guam first to degrade American conventional war capability and then explicity force a choice of "we can stop now, or you can lose San Francisco."
IMHO: On North Korea (NK), Trump is building rings and layers of responses and forces, at first to defend the US, South Korea (SK), and Japan and then to get rid of Kim and his military equipment, missile program, and nuke program. So, Trump's rings and layers are first defensive and then offensive.
The urgent purpose of the defensive parts are to deter Kim from shooting at the US, SK, Japan, Guam, Australia, England, .... Here the message is clear: If Kim explodes a nuke, the US will respond so that Kim's first nuke will he his last one.
For the defensive parts, he has been pursuing UN sanctions and lining up other countries against NK. He has positioned off the coasts of NK a Nimitz class aircraft carrier, several smaller ships, an attack submarine (in case Kim does something hostile with a submarine), and an Ohio-class missile firing submarine (SSBN) (in case Kim explodes a nuke). Apparently the British are sending a ship with some Mach 3 missiles maybe able to destroy an ICBM during launch or boost phase. Trump has positioned USAF planes at least in Guam and maybe in other west Pacific bases and held joint exercises with SK. He has authorized SK and Japan to buy some more advanced US weapons and has authorized SK to have more throw weight on their missiles (somehow the US retains some legal rights, soon to end, over SK from the Korean War). SK has been deploying US THAAD anti-missile systems. The US has been testing its anti-ballistic (ABM) systems, the ones designed to intercept a warhead during reentry.
Trump had a White House meeting on NK with Mattis and Dunford and likely also Kelly, McMaster, and others and then had Mattis, with Dunford, make a strong statement that, to translate, if NK exploded a nuke then the US would make that first nuke the last one, and for this the US has several options, some nuclear, some non-nuclear.
So, maybe for such largely defensive steps Trump's goal is to keep Kim from exploding a nuke right away.
So, there are geographical rings from SK to Japan, Guam, and the US, e.g., short range defenses and long range defenses. And there are diplomatic layers from SK, China, Russia, the UN, the US, other countries, etc.
For offense, Trump claims he talked with Xi and got him to say that he agreed that NK should not have nukes.
It looks like Trump has decided that NK will not have missiles or nukes. If Kim wants to give up missiles and nukes peacefully, then maybe that will be enough. Otherwise Trump will work to have the missiles and nukes destroyed, to have Kim removed from office, say, moved out of the country and/or killed, and to have the NK military equipment, e.g., rockets, artillery, guns, trucks, submarines, other ships, etc. destroyed.
The US Navy Seals have been training with some SK soldiers on how to take out someone, likely Kim, like the Seals took out UBL. Broadly it begins to look like the US and SK have decided that SK will do most of the fighting.
So, maybe a fight would go: (A) The Seal trained SK soldiers cross into NK and kill and/or capture Kim. (B) Enough of the NK leadership and military command and control will be captured or destroyed to stop NK from shooting missiles, artillery. (C) SK will launch some hyper accurate missiles at the NK missiles ready to be launched. (D) The SK army, backed from the air by the USAF and Navy, will invade NK, take over the government and missile and nuke infrastructure and destroy that infrastructure. (E) China has troops on the NK border to keep NK civilians from entering China. Russia may do something similar. (F) The SK army will destroy essentially all the NK military equipment, e.g., artillery. (G) SK will turn NK over to the UN and leave.
All the important steps will be over in just a few minutes or hours. Step (G) will take no more than some weeks.
Then Kim and his military, missiles, and nukes will be gone. The NK leadership in missiles and nukes will be gone. The US will never set foot in NK. There will be very few civilian deaths. Little or no radiation will be released.
[+] [-] dalbasal|8 years ago|reply
Pyongyang’s conventional inferiority requires it to degrade the United States’ ability to sustain the attack against it. This means it essentially has no option but to use nuclear weapons first against targets such as Andersen Air Force Base in Guam…
Pyongyang can’t affect the US’ ability to respond in any meaningful way. Even if Guam sinks into the sea, there’s still South Korea, Japan, ICBs & the US Navy. On top of that, there’s no guarantee that North Korea could even hit Guam without getting intercepted, and trying but failing would certainly means a massive counterattack.
I think the big new issues with a Nuclear North Korea is probably proliferation related. North Korea has a tiny economy with exports of just 4-5bn, less than a small US city. Selling an occasional bomb could triple their exports bring in foreign currency, which they are starving for. Even if they got caught, would the US respond to a nuclear armed country?
[+] [-] thehardsphere|8 years ago|reply
1. Those deficiencies in North Korea's capabilities will not remain fixed for much longer if the status quo persists.
2. The scenario outlined I believe assumes that the regime's continuity is already under some active threat, so it may not care much about the massive counter attack.
[+] [-] JohnStrange|8 years ago|reply
However, they do not (yet) have the ability to safely make this assumption. Their missile launchers and nuclear weapon facilities would be obliterated immediately by the absolute air superiority of any possible aggressor (SK, USA, China, Russia).
I believe that their nuclear weapon program has the simpler goal to prevent limited SK and US aggressions such as aerial bombardments by continually threatening to retaliate against Seoul. This threat is fairly irrational, because it would likely trigger a nuclear response, so they seem to currently follow a "mad dog" strategy.
Not that I would know, though; I'm not a military analyst.
[+] [-] rgbrenner|8 years ago|reply
I think it's much more likely NK will try to last the first couple of weeks while China and Russia move hardware into the region.
[+] [-] vtange|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jlg23|8 years ago|reply
His response: 1) I knew they were there. 2) I would not have recommended to Cruschtschow, I did recommend to use them. 3) What would have happened to Cuba? We would have been totally destroyed!
I think this story should be kept in mind when trying to predict behavior, esp. when the stakes are this high.
[1] Retold by Robert S. McNamara in "The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara": http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0317910/
[+] [-] edison85|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dalbasal|8 years ago|reply
But, presumably Castro was still playing the game even in 1992 ...at least in his mind. What was he going to say? I was bluffing.. I had to do what The Secretary told me to do.
[+] [-] 8ytecoder|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rgbrenner|8 years ago|reply
Russia is said to be currently supplying arms to the taliban. Their goal there (to disrupt american efforts) would be the same as in NK. And China is NKs ally today, and has said they would assist if the US restarted the war (except if NK uses nuclear weapons). Both helped them during the Korean war. Both share a border with NK, making it easy for them to do so again. And both have been clear they don't want a pro-american state at their border (in Russia's case, on their western border).
If war breaks out, it's very likely it'll be NK+China+Russia again (unless there's a very clear wrong by NK). In other words, NK will likely have more military options than the article admits once a war breaks out.
But if NK uses nuclear weapons, that may change. Would China and Russia continue to back someone who used them? That's the question, and it's not a given that they would.
[+] [-] balance_factor|8 years ago|reply
And of course, the original supplier of arms to the people who formed the Taliban was the United States. The goal for the US was to arm and empower the Islamic extremists who had launched a jihad against the secular Afghan government, and to disrupt Russian efforts to support it.
[+] [-] Benjamin_Dobell|8 years ago|reply
The article specifically talks about retaliation against military attacks by the US i.e. the article never suggests it would be rational to fire a nuke off as a "first" move, but rather simply fire them before the US does. The title is quite unclear in that regard.
[+] [-] zzalpha|8 years ago|reply
Actually it does:
This scenario to stave off an invasion with a limited nuclear attack on a U.S. military target is not irrational, although it is clearly risky and terrifyingly tragic. One wrinkle is that North Korea’s arsenal is currently small and vulnerable, and U.S. military strategy, reiterated by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, is to try to find and destroy all of Kim’s nuclear systems in the event of a war. That gives Kim an incentive to go first, go early and go massively if he is not confident about surviving a U.S. attempt at disarming him. If Kim thinks we are coming after him or his forces, he cannot afford to be wrong and he cannot afford to launch second.
That last sentence is key, so if you're skimming this comment, go back and read it.
To summarize: The basic thesis is that, if Kim believes an attack is coming (not that it has started, that it is simply coming), his rational choice is to use nuclear arms on bases in the region and thus force the US to the negotiating table.
[+] [-] trgv|8 years ago|reply
I don't know what kinds of interception technology is deployed in the area, but I would guess there is some and I would also guess that a (hypothetical) NK ICBM would not have significant countermeasures.
I think the real question here is what NK/Kim's aims are. When Iran was actively developing a nuclear capability, it seemed clear that their goal was to get as close to a weapon as possible without actually finishing a weapon. The closer they were, the more bargaining power they had in terms of getting the US/UN to lift sanctions.
With NK, I'm less clear about strategy. In the past, it seemed like NK actions had the aim of extorting aid money from the US/allies. That may still be the case. Here's a chart showing US humanitarian aid to NK since 2001: https://explorer.usaid.gov/cd/PRK
[+] [-] rgbrenner|8 years ago|reply
But the US missile defense has never seen combat.. only tests. They had 10 successful tests (the last 10) out of 18. But those are planned ahead of time (with trajectories already mapped out), and the missiles don't have countermeasures (which they would in a real conflict). So there's a big question about whether the system will work at all. I don't think anyone is eager to find out.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-missiles-usa-d...
[+] [-] gambiting|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hacker_9|8 years ago|reply
To put it in context, it was fired into space, over the part of the world where Japan resides. Changes the narrative quite a bit.
[+] [-] phkahler|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mullen|8 years ago|reply
Any resulting peace treaty would be of China accepting Taiwan independence, dropping all support for North Korea and giving all ambitions to the South China sea. China has a lot to lose if it went to war against the United States.
[+] [-] yourapostasy|8 years ago|reply
If they openly turned hostile against the US like that, then their economy would have to do without much export trade in a short amount of time, months instead of decades. Doable, but a mess, and it's not clear that the initial domestic support the current regime would enjoy from a war would outweigh and outlast the longer term economic adjustments to be made. They're trying to pivot away from exports at the moment, but it's pretty addictive.
I tend to buy more into arguments that the PRC enjoys the cognitive/attention bandwidth NK occupies within US leadership, and if NK happens to first strike US, successfully or not, the resulting chaos would net benefit the PRC's global power position. They keep the benefit of a buffer state by insisting the US not take pre-emptive action, while simultaneously refusing to take stronger action (using the avoidance of absorbing a NK humanitarian crisis as shield) against NK, yet not actively help NK beyond the current nominal assistance levels, so I don't see significant downsides for the PRC and RUS to let the status quo reign.
I suspect the PRC's unofficial statement that if NK struck first, then the PRC would not oppose a US reaction, is a thinly-veiled threat to the US: even if you or an ally absorb a nuclear first strike, you're not going to replace our buffer state. We'll intervene to topple the Kim regime, perhaps even help you do that, and then we'll ensure we control the agenda going forward of what emerges to replace that regime in NK.
Before we get all doom and gloom over ICBMs, the chances are greater NK will ship a nuclear bomb to the US inside an ISO shipping container crossing in by ship, train or truck than lobbing it with a missile. The difficulties from this point in their ICBM development program are still substantial:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A00QWVHem3A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=elEh4EBrqTQ
I agree with other comments here that the bigger, long-term threat is nuclear proliferation. We might successfully enter a MAD scenario with NK, only to get clocked by a Hezbollah-assembled device painstakingly purchased and gleaned from multiple sources including NK among the list. It's not even the materiel or finished devices that has me wondering as much as the practical knowledge that sits in scientists', engineers' and technicians' heads. We could magic away all of NK's nuclear infrastructure, and that still won't solve the problem of they have all these people that know the how-to's of building the devices. That's going to be a tough problem to solve.
[+] [-] SomeStupidPoint|8 years ago|reply
I'd guess that you can drop enough rice to feed the population of NK for around $1-2bil/mo. The cost of the Iraq war was around $8-10bil/mo. So you're talking about 10-25% of the cost of a war effort. (I'd guess towards the higher side.)
But! There's a lot of goodwill to be earned by dropping a steady supply of food across the country during the conflict. At the end of the day, starving people usually care more about food than kings. (Also, for marginally more you can include other kinds of supplies.)
[+] [-] planteen|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hacker_9|8 years ago|reply
I do not support their regime, but I also do not support everyone ganging up on them and deciding that military invasion and mass slaughter is somehow the solution. Like with any country, change is slow and has to come from within.
[+] [-] rhapsodic|8 years ago|reply
That wasn't the case with Japan and Germany during WWII. They both went from militaristic, imperialistic societies to pacifist ones in a relatively short amount of time. And that change was the result of their being utterly and completely defeated in a bloody war, and the occupations that followed.
[+] [-] s17n|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gumby|8 years ago|reply
(At that point MIT was still heavily into public policy rather than entrepreneurship. Though I am far, far from libertarian, that orientation also seemed outdated at the time).
[+] [-] Thriptic|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zzalpha|8 years ago|reply
I'm perplexed that you're perplexed. The article does a good job of laying out their argument. In short: The claim is that Kim believes the US wouldn't "retaliate so savagely" because the US wouldn't be willing to risk losing a major populated area to a successful ICBM strike.
So preemptive nuclear strikes on local bases make sense to degrade the US's ability to stage a conventional invasion, while acting as a deterrent by threatening a strike on the domestic US.
You can choose to believe or not believe that argument (it depends on your measure of risk in that scenario), but the logic is clear and reasonable.
[+] [-] rgbrenner|8 years ago|reply
They can be hidden pretty easily.
[+] [-] munificent|8 years ago|reply
There are two styles of attack: "conventional" (bombers, soldiers, etc. but no nukes) and "nuclear".
A successful conventional attack on NK could quickly remove its ability to initiate a nuclear attack. Without too much trouble, the US or some other major power could send a bunch of bombers over and completely eradicate NK's nuclear arsenal.
NK may be able to prevent a conventional attack by making a pre-emptive nuclear attack on foreign military targets. I say "may" because I think this is the least-justified claim of the article.
Doing that would not provoke the same kind of international response that a nuclear attack on NK would. If we blew up a base or two in NK, we could say, "We're just try to keep the world safe." and most other countries probably wouldn't do much about it except maybe some stern looks of disapproval.
This means that a conventional attack on NK is more likely, since there is less disincentive for it.
NK has no real ability to respond conventionally. We could take out their entire military without breaking a sweat. Their only noteworthy weapon is nukes. That means they must be preserved at all costs.
So Kim Jong-Un knows:
1. A conventional attack can remove NK's nuclear capability.
2. A nuclear strike on military bases may prevent that conventional attack.
3. NK's nuclear capability is their only weapon against other countries so must be preserved at all costs.
Those logically imply that if NK is to engage in any military conflict, it must strike first with nuclear weapons. Anything else results in defeat.
Add to that:
4. A conventional attack is more likely because there would be fewer repercussions on other countries for doing so.
Combine those together and it implies an NK nuclear first strike on military targets is more likely.
This presumes you believe 2 and 4 to be true. I think 4 probably is true -- the world generally seems to roll over when the US marches troops into random countries, even under dubious justification (Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.).
I don't believe 2 is true. Even if NK used every nuke they got on every base they can reach, I think the US and its allies would still have so much remaining military capability that we could turn the entire country into a glowing slag heap and still be home in time for the weekend.
[+] [-] vtange|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Benjamin_Dobell|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] clavalle|8 years ago|reply
There would not be time for public debate. The US would respond within minutes of a move like that.
[+] [-] bauer|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sharemywin|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vidarh|8 years ago|reply
Consider Iraq. Hussein apparently believed the West would eventually believe him when he said he had no weapons of mass destruction. Instead he was killed.
Why would any future dictator facing escalation from the west play along? Playing along now has a proven risk of getting you killed.
The argument then is that to someone like Kim Jong-Un it may feel like the only alternative is to be so unhinged and so willing to escalate that the price of taking him out is too great for anyone to want to take it.
Of course it's a tricky line - overplay your hand and you seem so unhinged that nobody can afford to let you live.
[+] [-] selectodude|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lwhalen|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wslh|8 years ago|reply
Edit: when I said one shot I was referring to being right or wrong about if you would be attacked or not. I was not referring to nuclear missile shots.
[+] [-] thehardsphere|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eksu|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] voxadam|8 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|8 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] graycat|8 years ago|reply
The urgent purpose of the defensive parts are to deter Kim from shooting at the US, SK, Japan, Guam, Australia, England, .... Here the message is clear: If Kim explodes a nuke, the US will respond so that Kim's first nuke will he his last one.
For the defensive parts, he has been pursuing UN sanctions and lining up other countries against NK. He has positioned off the coasts of NK a Nimitz class aircraft carrier, several smaller ships, an attack submarine (in case Kim does something hostile with a submarine), and an Ohio-class missile firing submarine (SSBN) (in case Kim explodes a nuke). Apparently the British are sending a ship with some Mach 3 missiles maybe able to destroy an ICBM during launch or boost phase. Trump has positioned USAF planes at least in Guam and maybe in other west Pacific bases and held joint exercises with SK. He has authorized SK and Japan to buy some more advanced US weapons and has authorized SK to have more throw weight on their missiles (somehow the US retains some legal rights, soon to end, over SK from the Korean War). SK has been deploying US THAAD anti-missile systems. The US has been testing its anti-ballistic (ABM) systems, the ones designed to intercept a warhead during reentry.
Trump had a White House meeting on NK with Mattis and Dunford and likely also Kelly, McMaster, and others and then had Mattis, with Dunford, make a strong statement that, to translate, if NK exploded a nuke then the US would make that first nuke the last one, and for this the US has several options, some nuclear, some non-nuclear.
So, maybe for such largely defensive steps Trump's goal is to keep Kim from exploding a nuke right away.
So, there are geographical rings from SK to Japan, Guam, and the US, e.g., short range defenses and long range defenses. And there are diplomatic layers from SK, China, Russia, the UN, the US, other countries, etc.
For offense, Trump claims he talked with Xi and got him to say that he agreed that NK should not have nukes.
It looks like Trump has decided that NK will not have missiles or nukes. If Kim wants to give up missiles and nukes peacefully, then maybe that will be enough. Otherwise Trump will work to have the missiles and nukes destroyed, to have Kim removed from office, say, moved out of the country and/or killed, and to have the NK military equipment, e.g., rockets, artillery, guns, trucks, submarines, other ships, etc. destroyed.
The US Navy Seals have been training with some SK soldiers on how to take out someone, likely Kim, like the Seals took out UBL. Broadly it begins to look like the US and SK have decided that SK will do most of the fighting.
So, maybe a fight would go: (A) The Seal trained SK soldiers cross into NK and kill and/or capture Kim. (B) Enough of the NK leadership and military command and control will be captured or destroyed to stop NK from shooting missiles, artillery. (C) SK will launch some hyper accurate missiles at the NK missiles ready to be launched. (D) The SK army, backed from the air by the USAF and Navy, will invade NK, take over the government and missile and nuke infrastructure and destroy that infrastructure. (E) China has troops on the NK border to keep NK civilians from entering China. Russia may do something similar. (F) The SK army will destroy essentially all the NK military equipment, e.g., artillery. (G) SK will turn NK over to the UN and leave.
All the important steps will be over in just a few minutes or hours. Step (G) will take no more than some weeks.
Then Kim and his military, missiles, and nukes will be gone. The NK leadership in missiles and nukes will be gone. The US will never set foot in NK. There will be very few civilian deaths. Little or no radiation will be released.
All that is just a guess.
[+] [-] fortythirteen|8 years ago|reply
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