Can We Lose A War With North Korea?

Originally posted by OzChris
North Korea HAS nuclear weapons. They unleash them and someone is gonna get hurt.. Personally I would think this nation may be saddistic enough to use them. So they have tech. and they may use it. The most advanced tech in the world cannot stop the millions of radiation related deaths if a nuclear weapon is detonated over the US or some such other country.
Chris

...But they try to launch at the US itself, you can bet your sweet bippy that US missles will already be getting launched even as theirs are reaching their targets...Also, they've already admitted that their missles don't have the capability of reaching the entire area of the North American Continent. Our missles don't have such limitations & we've got a lot more missles than they do. Such a strike by NK would mean literal suicide on their part while most of the US would survive.

In a nuclear exchange, nobody wins...But NK would lose a lot harder than the US.


[Edited on 6-3-2003 by MidnightDStroyer]

If we mean, in the most commonly accepted legal and diplomatic senses of the words" - "Could the government of NK compel the Govt. of the US to surrender (un)conditionally": the answer is manifestly "No".
I doubt any nation could; although I suspect Russia could still make the US disappear, with a little concentration and preparation (of course Russia would disappear too).
The issue that is more open to debate is the extent to which the US could "win" a war ( perhaps not in the legal sense) with NK? The US didn't "win" there in 1953 as it didn't "win" against North Vietnam. Although, of course, the US certainly didn't "lose" on either occasion.
Similarly, it's at least arguable that the US didn't "win" against Saddam a decade or so ago, and has yet to "win" in Afghanistan.
And whatevr the nature and extent of any conflict -could America find itself "losing the peace" - shelling out billions just to have a united Korea that would be a bigger economic threat (this is much the case as far as what happened in Germany and Japan".
I'm not trying to play with words here: but I am suggesting that we need to be extremely careful about what we mean by "war", "peace" "win", and "lose, if the discussion is going to develop.
Otherwise, as I said, it remains a simplistic, almost rhetorical question, to which "no" is the only conceivable response.

Originally posted by Midnight Mutilator
You guys would be surprised as to how much manpower and troops could play in a war. I was reading the other day that a US infantry unit has been equipped with the latest ground assault vehicle technology. Assault tanks and hummers can hit targets 12 miles away and in the poorest weather. If the general feels the operation could be done using ground forces, trust me he'll use it instead for wasting millions on bombing campaigns. With Iraq and possibly N. Korea, extensive bombing campaigns will be needed to cripple the enemy. N. Korea defiantly can cause some hell to their neighbors with their nukes but I feel with a heavy bombing campaign and some small Special Forces operations going on we can control them and their nukes. Iraq would probably be a littler easier with more of the Desert Storm like approach. Either way I have trust in America's Armed Forces.

Yea

America is just like nazi germany in the 30s, with the most advanced army in the world.

if north korea nuked the USA, then i doubt china would be happy with america droping nukes on there doorstep, in the same way that say if mexico went to war with lets just say france, i dont think america would be happy with nukes going off right next door, the chernobal explosion killed loads of animals in western europe with radiation poisoning, if korea nukes america, america will have to be carefull not to upset china by droping nukes, if they did i think china would get involved, as the US can not risk a large land invasion as korea has far to many troops for this to work without first using major air support, they would not retaliate without major air support, unless they were stupid, now what if korea uses some of these nukes on the fleet off korea, and saddam or another country was in league with n korea (dont forget the scuds being moved to the middle east from n korea a few months ago) if the middle eastern scuds were launched at the fleet in the gulf, then america has to re stratagize the remainder of its fleet for air and land invaision,

meanwhile the actions of the asian countrys will astound the un who might support the us or might not, i think russia would stay out of it for the time, but the allys list would probably be looking at the UK and japan and maybe some european countrys ( but they might not get involved as they dont support the war on iraq, and probably not a war with n korea, dont forget japan has a massive navy, now china would not favour japan getting involved and attack there navy, meanwhile the usa would probably withdraw major troops and supplys from the middle east to fight china and nk, there would probably be an uprising in the middle east and isreal will be wiped out but will take half of the middle east with it, pakistan would start trouble with india and war will break out there, the anti war european countrys would now be #ing themselfs as the war is escalating rapidly and would now probably be considered world war 3, the list of allys would probably be , europe, india, austriallia, south korea, japan and the us vs the remainder of the middle east, china and north korea, russia and south america would stay out of it for now, untill judging from pevious encounters the argentinians would invade the falkland islands and try to take them back succeeding in doing so, they would probably also try to instigate a takeover of other south american country they dont like, meanwhile various major terrorist attacks would be going on throughout the allys countrys headed by middle eastern terrorists and their african counterparts, russia would would be getting asked by both sides for help from a stratigic millitay point of view will eventually side with sombody probably the us and allys, and then pretty much the whole world will be at war,

the south china sea would be a site for a major naval battle the south american countrys will all be at war with each other the south european countrys will be fighting with the trying to invade middle eastern and african forces, the russian and korean borders will be fights with the chinnise and south koreans vs the allys,

weapons stolen from isreal will be used by the trigger happy middle eastern terrorists on europe and evaluating the situation the allys will instigate a medium scale nuclear war, this war will break out resulting in the discruction of southern russia, southern europe, the west coast of usa and east cost important citys such as NY and washington, entire south korea, north korea and most of china, japan will be destoryed as will most of the middle east and most of north africa, the allys now won with major losses will be really pissed off and cannot dedicate major forces to the south american war because of ocupying forces in the rest of the world, they will warn the south american forces to stop of they will be decimated with nukes by the allys, the south americans will stop, and there will now be the backlash of such a war which will be mass hunger and thirst, and major deseaise outbreaks, i would expect the final conflict to result in probably around 2 billion people still being alive the majority of thse being south american with the rest spread out throughout the entire world..

that is my personal outlook on what would happen if the usa was to nuke korea.

this was my outlook i didnt copy this off a site our anything i just wrote this out please mind the spelling and punctiation!! thank you

(added : the attacks on the european allys and america will probably consist of school and public place shootings, bombs and gas attacks, bombs on trains and gas attacks, dirty bombs in citys, suitcase nukes, grenade attacks at sports events such as football/soccer/baseball games, kamikazie truck/cars with explosives crashes into buildings, plane crashes, arson attacks, curfues or major armed force patrols in public areas at certain times if not martial law will be put into place... this is about all i can visualize)






[Edited on 7-3-2003 by The Blade Runner]

a frightening and realistic scenario

I have to nitpick one thing

India wouldn't go with the US, that area is confused, India has always gone against the US and Pakistan has always been our ally, but Pakistan is also China's ally

it's hard to tell what would really happen in that situation with India/Pakistan

why would Israel be destroyed? if nothing else her attackers would be, Israel has nukes, the Middle east does not

yeah but pakistan is full of islamic terrorists if the entire middle east was to start fighting an uprising and a coup would probably occour and the muslims hate the hindus, and india would be scared of the entire middle eastern aliance and would want un help

and even if israel has nukes they wont stand a chance against major terror attacks and major invaison, its an unstable country as it is.

[Edited on 7-3-2003 by The Blade Runner]