Say What!!?? Oh, I get it!! "It's always America's fault!!". The Japanese are busy raping China with our raw materials, and we decide we don't want to sell it to them cause we don't like how it's being used so Japan attacks us. Was it wrong for us to stop selling to them; were they in the right to attack us?? If NK has cheated on a treaty why should we continue to supply oil?? If they attack us, why is it our fault?? Screw'em NO DANEGELD FOR THEM. Freeze in the dark sucker. If they want it, let'em bring it on.
Here's one guy's take: denbeste.nu
One analyst in South Korea that I read about speculates that the real reason that North Korea is creating a crisis now is because it hopes to take advantage of America's preoccupation with Iraq. By banging on its cage bars now, it hopes that the US can be panicked into making a quick agreement with North Korea, or that US allies can be panicked into bringing pressure to bear on the US for such a quick agreement.
It is a truism of negotiations that if one party is up against a deadline and the other is not, the one in a hurry is at a disadvantage. So it is frustrating the North Koreans mightily that the US government refuses to even talk to them, and shows no sign that it considers the situation urgent.
Most of the announcements made by various US government officials recently have been intending primarily to indicate to the North Korean government that we're not impressed by what they've been doing the last few days, and that we're not going to be rushed into making a foolish deal with them. That is exactly the right message to be sending to North Korea right now, and I'm glad that's what our government is actually doing.
One of those messages has been from Rumsfeld, who announced that the US would have no trouble fighting two wars at once (with the specific implication that they would be Iraq and North Korea). That is also correct; it's not just rhetoric.
We might not be able to fight two arbitrarily chosen wars, especially if they were similar, but we absolutely do have the ability to fight these two, and can do so even without using nuclear weapons in either theater. That's because each one would require different things from us.
In the Iraqi theater, we will probably end up using 4 carrier battle groups to supply air power, and in addition we will fly heavy bombers from Diego Garcia. Air tankers will fly from several bases in the area (I'm not exactly sure where but I suspect Oman will be a prime base for this kind of thing). JSTARS and AWACS will also fly from bases further from Iraq. We'll have fighters and fighter-bombers based in Qatar, and if the Saudis cave at the last minute (which is looking increasingly likely, because though they despise the idea of war, they hate being on the losing side and angering the US even more) then we'd also use airfields there. There are also fighters and fighter-bombers at Incirlik, and based in Kuwait. And there will also be some flights from Germany, though at this point I think our planners would be idiots to rely on those given that Germany has become a distinctly unreliable ally given to stab us in the back any time their leaders see minor advantage in doing so. Like Saudi Arabia, we'll take advantage of that resource if it actually is available when the cards are laid down on the table, but I have no doubt that our planning doesn't require either place.
The primary commitment to the Iraq theater is ground forces, which will be deployed there at the last possible instant so as to reduce the window of vulnerability to chemical attack to the bare minimum. Part of that will be deployment of a huge force of ground logistics, including trucks. In the Gulf War in 1991, it was necessary for the US to mobilize nearly every reserve and National Guard trucking unit we had in order to support ground operations by less than half of our divisions. Though the US is better prepared to handle logistical problems than anyone else in the world, it remains the case that this is something we do not have enough of, and we will use a larger percentage, probably the majority, of our logistical units in Iraq than any other military asset we have. (We won't need as many as we did in 1991 because we're not going to be using as large a ground force this time.)
We'll deploy one third of our carriers, probably one quarter of the Air Force, and right now it looks as if we will use no more than three divisional-equivalents of ground forces of various kinds, though they will be drawn out of more than three divisions all told. (Part of the reason why is that further units from those divisions could be deployed as reinforcements or replacements later if necessary.) And I suspect we'll end up keeping a substantial part of the Army and Marines on standby as a reserve in case things don't actually go as well as we'd like.
So suppose that while this is going on, North Korea launches its doomsday attack southward. US Second Infantry Division is there, and it would fight, but it's a mistake to try to claim that "we're protecting South Korea with our army". In actuality, the main reason that Second Infantry is there is so that it isn't possible for North Korea to attack the South without getting the US involved.
But the vast majority of the ground fighting would be done by the South Korean regular army and its huge mass of reserves. It would not be necessary for the US to move substantial ground forces into the theater. Our primary contribution to combat would be sea and airpower.
First, we would certainly deploy one carrier and probably two into the theater. Heavy bombers based on Guam would participate. We also have substantial air assets in Okinawa and in South Korea itself, and there will be large numbers of uncommitted air units remaining in CONUS would could be deployed to the theater if need be. (If necessary, we could activate ANG squadrons, but there will be regular Air Force squadrons available as well.) Okinawa is not ideally placed to support a war in Korea, but there are plenty of excellent airfields in Kyushu, and I think that the Japanese government would permit their use. A new outbreak of combat in South Korea would be something that Japan would greatly fear, and there can be no question that it would actively help.
And it should probably be pointed out that the niceties of the Japanese constitution notwithstanding, I strongly suspect that the Japanese would use their air force as well. (Someone would find a legal pretense quickly; perhaps the South Korean government would invite them in.) While many of their jets are obsolescent by our standards, they still outclass anything that North Korea would fly (for about as long as it took us to shoot them all down and sweep the skies clear) and their primary job would be bombing.
South Korea itself has a huge air force, including more than 100 F-16's. What with all these combined, I suspect that there would be more than 400 friendly aircraft able to participate almost immediately, with the US able to add at least 200 more from CONUS within a week, and if the situation is desperate we could deploy a couple hundred more out of Europe shortly thereafter.
Our naval contribution would be one or two carriers, plus an adequate force of destroyers and cruisers to patrol the coasts of North Korea to make sure they didn't try any kind of amphibious operation. Surface naval forces would also contribute missile and gun fire support when possible, but that would not be a major factor in the war.
I can't find the letter now, but someone wrote in to tell me that South Korea is one big defense-in-depth. Highways everywhere include big long straight sections specifically designed to be usable as airfields. There are concrete gun emplacements all over the place. They have apparently spent the last fifty years making sure that there is no "soft underbelly" there; it's all designed to permit a fighting withdrawal to a series of strong positions, all the way down to the southern tip if need be. And the South Korean Army consists of some fifty divisions as well as many other units on active duty plus huge reserves; there are more than enough ground forces there already. South Korea has excellent transportation resources available to move supplies and men anywhere needed. In case of a major ground war there, the one thing we would not need to deploy would be transportation units, and it's hard to see why we'd need to deploy any further ground units beyond those already there.
Which means that what we'd need to use in Korea would be different from what we're going to use in Iraq. We actually could fight both wars simultaneously even if we didn't use nukes. The only thing that we might conceivably be short of would be JSTARS, and given the way that South Korea is built up and the amount of ground clutter, I'm not sure that JSTARS would actually be any more useful there than AWACS, of which we would have plenty.
Of course, it goes without saying that we'd rather not have to fight in Korea at all, let alone simultaneously with war in Iraq. But what this means is that North Korea's bargaining hand is not as strong as they'd like everyone to believe. They do not actually have the ability to attack and win while we're preoccupied with Iraq.
What they're trying to do right now is to create panic. They are in deep trouble and their clock is ticking. Given that they actually are running out of time (and fuel oil, and food, and damned near everything else) then it is clear that it's to their advantage to try to make everyone else feel as if time is running out with as many provocations as they possibly can come up with. I believe that the cessation of fuel oil shipments is what set this crisis off; North Korea may well grind to a halt soon from simple inability to generate energy. As their fuel supplies dwindle, they are trying to force rapid movement by us; they are trying to make us feel as much urgency as I believe that they feel.
In actuality, there is no rush, relatively speaking. We can't ignore the situation for years, but we do not need to start negotiations in the next few days and finish them in a few weeks. One time limit for us is the reactor/reprocessing-facility that they're reactivating, but if that goes on and reaches the point where it is actually beginning to turn out refined plutonium in quantity, then it would be necessary to destroy it, and risk setting off a ground attack. That would be a terrible risk, but one we'll be forced to face if that time comes. But in other regards we do not face manifest urgency.
I believe that the best course of action is to refuse to even talk to them until they ratchet down the hysteria. If I'm right and they are actually running out of time, then either they'll end up preparing for war (which we would be able to detect) or else they'll back down, which I think is more likely. I think what we're seeing is a manifestation of their panic. As bad as the situation there is for us, it has to be remembered that it is vastly worse for them in every regard. They are looking at catastrophe.
The one thing that the North Korean governing elite apparently wants is to remain in power. If they attack, their regime ends and they know it. And they all die, and they know it. If they launch a nuke-tipped missile at anything, anywhere, they all get vaporized and they know it. If they back down, there might still be a chance to stay in charge. So I think that if we ignore them that they will back down. The only reason they might try to increase the pressure would be if they thought there was a chance that we'd crumble. It is at least conceivable that trying to look dangerous could be to their advantage, but if they actually launch an attack all scenarios lead to their doom.
And they know it.
As long as we remain strong and patient and apparently unafraid and unimpressed, and as long as we refuse to even negotiate with them (so that they cannot even deliver their demands) then it leaves them alone, screaming into the wind, growing increasingly frustrated as their situation deteriorates. Eventually they'll give up on what they're doing now and try something else, and then we'll see.
As strange as it may sound, time is actually on our side. The actions of the North Korean government right now are all aimed at trying to convince us otherwise, and the Bush administration quite correctly isn't falling for it. When Powell says that there is no crisis, he's quite correct: North Korea has a crisis. We do not, and we can't allow them to make their crisis ours too. |
