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Hello Infographics fans, it's another year
and another update to what has quickly become
one of the most heated relationships in the
international community.
In the last few years North Korea has proven
that it has the technological sophistication
to develop a nuclear weapon, and while its
missile technology barely gives it the ability
to target the American west coast, it is more
than capable of raining nuclear fire down
on its regional enemies: Japan and South Korea.
In the last year there has been reason to
hope that a military conflict between the
US and North Korea would be avoidable, yet
after two summits between President Trump
and Kim Jong Un, we are no closer to a resolution
to the nuclear crisis on the peninsula.
Promises by North Korea that it would ramp
down or stop its nuclear program after the
first face-to-face meeting with President
Trump were quickly proven false as the American
intelligence community confirmed that major
activity was still taking place in North Korea's
hidden nuclear labs.
North Korea, wary of how easily the US removed
several Middle Eastern dictators from power,
sees having nuclear weapons as a necessity,
and after years of promises by his father
and his grandfather before him, acquiring
nuclear weapons is also a matter of life and
death for Kim Jong Un.
Failure to achieve a nuclear capability by
North Korea will certainly spell the end of
the young dictator's life, as political rivals
use the opportunity of failed promises to
oust and likely kill him.
So with the threat of all-out conflict ever-present
on the peninsula, just how do the two nation's
militaries compare?
In case of war, strategy often matters more
than weapons, and both sides have markedly
different strategies for winning.
North Korea has learned well the lessons from
Iraq and Afghanistan, and rather than achieve
an all-out victory over the United States
it knows is impossible, instead the north
has focused on making the conflict so costly
in terms of collateral damage and civilian
casualties that the US will sue for an early
peace.
Much like the Soviet Union during the Cold
War, the north will try to force the US to
the negotiation table by making the US's protectorate
lose its will to fight.
In the Cold War, the Soviets planned on overrunning
NATO and seizing the whole of Germany and
Belgium, then using the governments of those
two nations to sue NATO for peace.
In a new Korean war, the North will attempt
to make the conflict so costly that South
Korea will lose all will to continue fighting
and force the US to negotiate with the North.
One of the linchpins of this strategy is South
Korea's capital: Seoul.
A city of almost ten million people, the South's
capital lies only thirty five miles (50 km)
from the DMZ that separates the two nations.
This places Seoul square in the sights of
long range North Korean artillery pieces-
so much firepower that a conventional artillery
strike against the city will cause untold
devastation.
While not all of the North's artillery could
reach Seoul, enough to do serious damage to
the city and kill tens of thousands of people
are within range.
North Korea's 122mm, 240mm, and 300mm multiple
rocket launchers as well as more traditional
170mm self-propelled guns could all fire thousands
of rounds into Seoul itself, and a single
volley of the North's 300mm rocket launchers
could deliver over 350 metric tons of explosives
across the entire city.
With over 11,000 artillery platforms ranging
from rocket launchers to towed and self-propelled
artillery, North Korea still retains a major
advantage over the United States in artillery
pieces, whom only fields about 2700 total
artillery, nearly evenly split between rocket
launchers, towed artillery, and self-propelled
artillery.
Then of course there's the fact that most
of the US's inventory isn't actually present
on the peninsula.
Upon the start of hostilities though the South's
military would fall under American command
per current operating procedures, giving the
US access to over 6,000 pieces of South Korean
artillery, most of which is towed and self-propelled
artillery.
The south, very cognizant of how vulnerable
Seoul is to an overwhelming artillery barrage,
has deployed its artillery in order to very
quickly destroy North Korean artillery in
counter-barrages, leaving the North with the
choice of exposing its most capable artillery
pieces in an all-out attack on Seoul and risk
having them destroyed, or using them instead
to strike at military targets.
Seoul however is a key objective for the North,
and North Korean strategy does not extend
much deeper into the South than the capital
city.
There is also the matter of logistics, with
pre-war caches of supplies, ammunition, and
fuel only capable of sustaining about a month
of intense conflict and only a few dozen miles
into the South.
Relying on an overwhelming, all-out attack
against the South in a bid to bring it to
the negotiating table before the US can muster
its overseas forces to respond, the North
would utilize its entire air force in waves
of suicide attacks against the South.
In total the North only fields just under
a thousand aircraft versus the US's 13,398.
Of these, 458 are fighters vs the US's 2,362,
and 498 are attack aircraft versus the US's
2,831.
North Korea's air forces are overwhelmingly
antiquated, and feature cold war era relics
such as the Sukhoi Su-7 and even the post-WWII
era Ilyushin II-28 medium bomber.
It does feature a fleet of 35 Mig-29s, which
while older are still capable aircraft, but
they would be unable to face the onslaught
of American and South Korean F-16s and F-15s
nor the South's modern anti-air defense network.
Instead, North Korea would utilize these planes
as kamikaze units against ROK and American
military targets as well as civilian targets.
On the ground North Korea fields a force of
just over 6,000 main battle tanks, versus
the US's 6,287, or the South's 2,654.
North Korean tanks are overwhelmingly antiquated
models, with its main force of 1600 T-55s
dating back to the post-World War II years.
It does sport an unknown number of Soviet
made T-72s and T-80s, but these are thought
to be very few in number and would not have
a significant effect on a ground campaign.
While US tank forces would completely obliterate
the North's antiquated tanks, again, most
of the US's own tanks are stationed elsewhere
around the world and would take time to get
to the peninsula.
The North would thus group its armor into
large armored advances that would easily break
through the American and South Korean defenses
along the DMZ and roll towards Seoul at top
speed, with the aim of cutting the city off
on the ground.
While South Korea would respond with overwhelmingly
modern Abrams-derivatives, the K1 and K1A1,
these are greatly outnumbered by the North's
tank forces.
Neither the North nor the South field a navy
of any considerable size, though the South
does have the firepower advantage with its
small fleet of 13 frigates, and 12 destroyers.
The North has long focused on trying to deny
the US the use of its aircraft carriers by
building fleets of midget submarines that
are believed to be suicide attack vessels,
meant to reach American carriers and sink
them or at least drive them off the Korean
coasts.
With the hands-down best anti-submarine warfare
capability in the world though, the United
States would very easily be able to protect
its carrier battle groups from even the North's
Sang-O-class of subs.
A boat only 34 meters long, the Sang-O subs
are meant to ferry special operations forces
for missions into the south, and used as a
last-ditch defense against American carrier
battegroups.
In the past, the US and South Korea would
have responded to a North Korean attack via
a fighting retreat action, falling back from
prepared position to prepared position and
drawing the North deeper into the South while
buying time for the US's air power to arrive
from Guam and Japan.
Then the two allies would push deep into the
North under the cover of the largest aerial
bombing campaign since the original Korean
war.
While most of its equipment is antiquated,
and its troop's training and morale are both
very poor, the North's sheer numbers would
give it the initial advantage- at least until
US air assets responding from Guam began to
decimate the North's advances over the DMZ.
Today, the initial strategy of a fighting
retreat is still in place, but instead of
pushing deep into the North to achieve a conventional
military victory, new plans known as OPLAN
5015 focuses on the use of targeted strikes
and special forces to destroy the North's
command and control networks and kill its
leaders, including Kim Jong Un.
A decapitating blow is thought to be enough
to finish off the North's will to fight, specially
when backed up by a significant portion of
the US's strategic bomber force.
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How do you think a war between the North and
the South would play out?
Let us know in the comments, and as always
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