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 d-usa wrote:

I've heard this one from both Navy and Marines, so....


You can tell what branch of the service built a base by what the oldest building on the post is.

If it's a bunker, the marines built it.

If it's a barracks, the army built it.

If it's a dock, the coast guard built it

If it's a bar, the navy built it.

If it's a golf course, the air-force bought it for five billion dollars and then built a base around it.

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Are the North Koreans fit enough to fight for more than 5 minutes though?

There was that article a few days ago about that North Korean defector, a soldier, and his intestines were riddled with large parasites

If that's the general state of your average North Korean infantryman, then I don't think the US military has much to worry about.

Just like they didn't have to worry about SE Asian peasants in pajamas, or illiterate Central Asian hill tribes, or poor Caribbean communists.

It's always funny to see the collective amnesia in the US. Very keen to show off their big expensive military but after a few years of flag-draped boxes coming home the public soon loses interest. Take a break for a few years to drum up some more nationalism, throw around a few inane buzzwords like `liberty` `tyranny` and the big `freedom` and the American public is soon ready to invade another sovereign nation again. Since WWII nobody has started - and lost - more wars, yet here they are again rattling the sabre.

The whole 'state sponsor of terrorism' would be funny if the US didn't have such a history of using this as an excuse to start slaughtering people. Nobody has sold more weapons to dangerous regimes, tinpot dictators and violent fractional groups than the US. They'll point to Iran all day, while their ally Saudi Arabia continues to stomp it's neighbour with a significant arsenal of predominantly American weapons.

 BaronIveagh wrote:


You can tell what branch of the service built a base by what the oldest building on the post is.

Usually you can tell by what's its called. Base and post (or fort) are used by different branches.

 BaronIveagh wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

I've heard this one from both Navy and Marines, so....


You can tell what branch of the service built a base by what the oldest building on the post is.

If it's a bunker, the marines built it.

If it's a barracks, the army built it.

If it's a dock, the coast guard built it

If it's a bar, the navy built it.

If it's a golf course, the air-force bought it for five billion dollars and then built a base around it.

One I heard from a Professor who served in the Army.

Each branch is told to secure a building

The Marines storm the building, sweeping and clearing every room before declaring it secure.

The Army rolls in, surrounds the building, and obliterates it with artillery.

The Navy sends in a petty officer to turn off all the lights and lock all the doors.

The Air Force secures a 20 year lease with an option to buy.

 MarsNZ wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:
Are the North Koreans fit enough to fight for more than 5 minutes though?

There was that article a few days ago about that North Korean defector, a soldier, and his intestines were riddled with large parasites

If that's the general state of your average North Korean infantryman, then I don't think the US military has much to worry about.

Just like they didn't have to worry about SE Asian peasants in pajamas, or illiterate Central Asian hill tribes, or poor Caribbean communists.

While I'm certainly in no way advocating military action against North Korea, and in fact am very much against in currently, there is a difference between fighting extended guerilla conflicts against unconventional forces, and fighting against a woefully outdated and poorly prepared conventional state military that rests heavily on state control and a cult of personality that would be obliterated in short order in any real conflict. Could the North Koreans fight an extended guerilla war? Possibly, but that's not what they appear to have designed their military defense strategy around.

We can look at Iraq. The issue of the Iraqi military was obliterated quite quickly despite being very large, once engaged in open battle with Western forces, they were overmatched and destroyed in short order and the State control mechanisms failed very quickly. Any threat to neighbors like Saudi Arabia or Kuwait was swiftly removed. The problem issue was with long term occupation. In the case of North Korea, the former issue would have the problem of Seoul being in range of lots of artillery that would need to be dealt with, while the latter issue would be a very different thing, particularly if it involved re-unification with South Korea.

Voss wrote:
[
Usually you can tell by what's its called. Base and post (or fort) are used by different branches.

'Camp' has been used by all of them at one point or another (even the navy).

And please read the whole post before responding, you might have understood the humorous nature of the post.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:
One I heard from a Professor who served in the Army.

Each branch is told to secure a building

The Marines storm the building, sweeping and clearing every room before declaring it secure.

The Army rolls in, surrounds the building, and obliterates it with artillery.

The Navy sends in a petty officer to turn off all the lights and lock all the doors.

The Air Force secures a 20 year lease with an option to buy.

I actually heard that one before from an airforce photographer. I'm guessing it's an old one.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
They might have if they had many times the numbers they have, and had the weapons needed for waging modern war such as missiles, tanks and aircraft. It isn't being well-fed that makes the soldiers of richer countries better, it is being more numerous and having advanced weapons.

Soldiers perform better when they are physically healthy and well educated. I can't believe I had to type that, to be perfectly honest. It's such an obvious thing.

A soldier that grew up in a harsh environment will be more accustomed to hardships, hard labour, surviving on little food and surviving in difficult environments. Not to mention being more likely to come in contact with diseases and therefore having better resistances.

Harsh environments teach survival, that's true. On the battlefield survival means skulking to the back of the unit when the offensive is about to start, it means learning how to do as little as possible to risk your life without drawing the ire of your seniors. In other words, it teaches everything that an effective military will train out of its soldiers.

And poor health doesn't make you more resistant to disease, it makes you more susceptible. Poor health and disease outbreaks go hand in hand. That North Korean soldier had a gut full of parasites because he suffered poor nutrition.

But an appropriate amount of harshness makes people stronger.

There is a level of harshness needed to develop discipline. But you can apply that to your troops. That's basically what training is.

Whereas the problems that come from poverty, the physical weakness, the low levels of education, those are things you are stuck with and cannot fix, and it means you will be facing an uphill battle against troops from another country.

I didn't claim that! Obviously a diesel truck doesn't perform as well as a wood truck. But both can get their job well enough that using one or the other isn't going to make a major difference. A truck is still a truck, no matter what it runs on.

No, not all trucks are equal. Again I am just staggered that you would claim that. Better trucks have far greater load capacities, are able to move quicker, and across more difficult roads. There is no way you are ignorant of this.

But in a long war, wood gas actually beats out diesel or other fuels eventually in terms of efficiency simply for the fact you are going to be running out of oil long before you are going to be running out of wood.

That woodgas trucks will be needed by countries with poor oil access and reserves is not an argument in favour of NK, it is an admission that their strategic position means there logistics are weak and prone to collapse within days of open warfare.
Which is the exact point.

I didn't say it could compete. It can not. It is 50 years old. It is not for nothing that the Soviet Union and Russia have always been constantly updating their weapon systems and designing new ones.
What I did say, is that those 50 year old guns and howitzers are still lethal. And that they can still do a lot more damage to a city like Seoul than anybody would like (well, except for the North Koreans I guess). Don't underestimate something simply because it is old. The difference in performance between a D20 howitzer and say, a M109 howitzer isn't all that big. Enough to want to upgrade if you can, but not enough to make the old gun suddenly not dangerous anymore. Especially when you are shooting at a target you can hardly miss.

The difference in the two units, in terms of mobility and first round accuracy is huge. However I agree with you that in this situation, with the artillery pieces fortified and shooting at large civilian centres, those differences don't count for much.

Agreed. But they do not need parity. They just need to do be able to inflict enough damage to make an attack on them too costly, and for that old weapons will do just fine.

Yep, agreed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 whembly wrote:
How is this, in any way different than what I described up thread?

When asked what terrorism NK sponsored, you listed a bunch of crimes committed by NK itself, to state that was the terrorism that NK was sponsoring. That they were sponsoring themselves, or something.

That statement was wrong. As such, we should all just be honest and say the US claim that NK is sponsoring terrorism is a legal fiction, done so the US can tighten sanctions.

If you think it's fiction now... was it fiction when they were on this list in the first place? IF the answer is yes, then your point stands. But, they were originally put on this list for a reason and dubya removed it in the hopes to garner some cooperation.

That's right, it was a fiction done to increase pressure on NK and bring them to the table, which Bush removed as a reward for NK beginning some level of co-operation.

I think we're mostly in agreement with each other.

I think there is a clumsiness to this approach - with NK so clearly detested by everyone, including China, and universal concern for NK's nuclear program, it shouldn't be necessary to rely on a legal fiction to increase sanctions. But that same universal support for sanctions also means it doesn't really matter, everyone knows what the US is really trying to achieve and they're okay with that so it works okay.

What was the mod edit about? Funny picture? If it was good pm it to me.

The divergence it seems is this nomenclature of the US Treasury's program called "State Sponsor of Terrorism™". Furthermore, it's accepted fact that the NK are working with other unsavory countries (ie, Iran) to advance their nuclear ambitions that easily fit this program's definition.

Having links with countries who sponsors terror terror doesn't make you a sponsor of terror. That would make every country on Earth a sponsor of terror, because all countries have trade relations with countries that do some very unsavoury things.

EDIT... wrong post.

Regarding the artillery discussion, I think we talked that one to death earlier in the thread.

Nothing has really changed in the last few weeks.

The lessons of history are that troops from backward countries like Russia (1812, 1941) and Turkey (1914, 1951) are good at enduring miserable conditions that would reduce the morale of troops from developed countries like the UK or USA, whose troops are used to a higher "standard of living".

However, history also teaches that developed countries are much more capable of providing their troops with the logistics not to have to endure the peasant lifestyle that would cripple their morale.

The third lesson of history is that however tough or namby-pamby or parasite riddled/resistant you are, a 155mm shell on your head is bad news. The side that is better at targetting large amounts of destructive ordnance on to the enemy troops is likely to win.

The above applies to conventional warfare. Insurgency is a different kettle of fish.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The third lesson of history is that however tough or namby-pamby or parasite riddled/resistant you are, a 155mm shell on your head is bad news. The side that is better at targetting large amounts of destructive ordnance on to the enemy troops is likely to win.

This gets to the truth of the matter. And ultimately, wouldn't you prefer your side's artillery is being planned and directed by people who finished 12 years of school at a minimum?

 sebster wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The third lesson of history is that however tough or namby-pamby or parasite riddled/resistant you are, a 155mm shell on your head is bad news. The side that is better at targetting large amounts of destructive ordnance on to the enemy troops is likely to win.

This gets to the truth of the matter. And ultimately, wouldn't you prefer your side's artillery is being planned and directed by people who finished 12 years of school at a minimum?

True but NK had also had thr same decades to plan, dig in, decoy and calculate vectors, angles and such for there own guns and rocket artillery.

There heaviest weaponry is likely very well emplacement, fortified and bunkered down or with air raid shelters and decoys positions.

Us same. There mobility might be alot weaker, logistics weaker but those fixed batteries and rocket brigades are a pretty potant danger.

 jhe90 wrote:

 sebster wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The third lesson of history is that however tough or namby-pamby or parasite riddled/resistant you are, a 155mm shell on your head is bad news. The side that is better at targetting large amounts of destructive ordnance on to the enemy troops is likely to win.

This gets to the truth of the matter. And ultimately, wouldn't you prefer your side's artillery is being planned and directed by people who finished 12 years of school at a minimum?

True but NK had also had thr same decades to plan, dig in, decoy and calculate vectors, angles and such for there own guns and rocket artillery.

There heaviest weaponry is likely very well emplacement, fortified and bunkered down or with air raid shelters and decoys positions.

Us same. There mobility might be alot weaker, logistics weaker but those fixed batteries and rocket brigades are a pretty potant danger.

True, the DMZ/Seoul problem still exists. But I think Kilkrazy and Sebster were talking about the wider concept/war. So the moment fighting moves beyond the DMZ the 12 years of high school thing kicks in.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 sebster wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The third lesson of history is that however tough or namby-pamby or parasite riddled/resistant you are, a 155mm shell on your head is bad news. The side that is better at targetting large amounts of destructive ordnance on to the enemy troops is likely to win.

This gets to the truth of the matter. And ultimately, wouldn't you prefer your side's artillery is being planned and directed by people who finished 12 years of school at a minimum?

True but NK had also had thr same decades to plan, dig in, decoy and calculate vectors, angles and such for there own guns and rocket artillery.

There heaviest weaponry is likely very well emplacement, fortified and bunkered down or with air raid shelters and decoys positions.

Us same. There mobility might be alot weaker, logistics weaker but those fixed batteries and rocket brigades are a pretty potant danger.

True, the DMZ/Seoul problem still exists. But I think Kilkrazy and Sebster were talking about the wider concept/war. So the moment fighting moves beyond the DMZ the 12 years of high school thing kicks in.

Yeah. Once things go beyond the miles of pre planned targets and into the mountains and valleys of South Korea.

The professional training and well supplied air, satilite and micro drone Intel systems soon play a big advantage.

Not that the NK lack training and schools. We may underestimate them but they are still a professional army and trained soldiers. Despite there logistical problems.

 jhe90 wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 sebster wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The third lesson of history is that however tough or namby-pamby or parasite riddled/resistant you are, a 155mm shell on your head is bad news. The side that is better at targetting large amounts of destructive ordnance on to the enemy troops is likely to win.

This gets to the truth of the matter. And ultimately, wouldn't you prefer your side's artillery is being planned and directed by people who finished 12 years of school at a minimum?

True but NK had also had thr same decades to plan, dig in, decoy and calculate vectors, angles and such for there own guns and rocket artillery.

There heaviest weaponry is likely very well emplacement, fortified and bunkered down or with air raid shelters and decoys positions.

Us same. There mobility might be alot weaker, logistics weaker but those fixed batteries and rocket brigades are a pretty potant danger.

True, the DMZ/Seoul problem still exists. But I think Kilkrazy and Sebster were talking about the wider concept/war. So the moment fighting moves beyond the DMZ the 12 years of high school thing kicks in.

Yeah. Once things go beyond the miles of pre planned targets and into the mountains and valleys of South Korea.

The professional training and well supplied air, satilite and micro drone Intel systems soon play a big advantage.

Not that the NK lack training and schools. We may underestimate them but they are still a professional army.

North Korea has had some problems efficiently training as a professional army. Mainly training is hindered by a critical lack of almost everything, from spare parts to ammunition. Even large scale exercises are very much frowned upon in NK because they take a heavy toll on what little they have as well as food wise. Its why SK-US exercises work so well, forcing NK to respond in kind and drain much more valuable resources. However, it is hard to say how much actual live firing exercises North Korean soldiers get, which is a very important factor. Theory is worth a lot, but experience more so.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:

 sebster wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
The third lesson of history is that however tough or namby-pamby or parasite riddled/resistant you are, a 155mm shell on your head is bad news. The side that is better at targetting large amounts of destructive ordnance on to the enemy troops is likely to win.

This gets to the truth of the matter. And ultimately, wouldn't you prefer your side's artillery is being planned and directed by people who finished 12 years of school at a minimum?

True but NK had also had thr same decades to plan, dig in, decoy and calculate vectors, angles and such for there own guns and rocket artillery.

There heaviest weaponry is likely very well emplacement, fortified and bunkered down or with air raid shelters and decoys positions.

Us same. There mobility might be alot weaker, logistics weaker but those fixed batteries and rocket brigades are a pretty potant danger.

True, the DMZ/Seoul problem still exists. But I think Kilkrazy and Sebster were talking about the wider concept/war. So the moment fighting moves beyond the DMZ the 12 years of high school thing kicks in.

Yeah. Once things go beyond the miles of pre planned targets and into the mountains and valleys of South Korea.

The professional training and well supplied air, satilite and micro drone Intel systems soon play a big advantage.

Not that the NK lack training and schools. We may underestimate them but they are still a professional army.

North Korea has had some problems efficiently training as a professional army. Mainly training is hindered by a critical lack of almost everything, from spare parts to ammunition. Even large scale exercises are very much frowned upon in NK because they take a heavy toll on what little they have as well as food wise. Its why SK-US exercises work so well, forcing NK to respond in kind and drain much more valuable resources. However, it is hard to say how much actual live firing exercises North Korean soldiers get, which is a very important factor. Theory is worth a lot, but experience more so.

Yeah, and also drains valuable petrol, fuel. They have a limited supply. Little local and all via China. No petrol, aviation fuel etc no army.

Wood gas trucks seemed in use. That's one way to do it when fuel is not in surplus.
True. Though I and many others have likely underestimated at times. There generals have had 60+ years to sit round tabled. Plotting how to invade SK..

Yes they cannot train heavily in live fire or do mass tank exercises easily. But also there not totally incompatant. They indoctrinated constantly for war.l, that's all they know.

 jhe90 wrote:
Yeah, and also drains valuable petrol, fuel. They have a limited supply. Little local and all via China. No petrol, aviation fuel etc no army.

Wood gas trucks seemed in use. That's one way to do it when fuel is not in surplus.
True. Though I and many others have likely underestimated at times. There generals have had 60+ years to sit round tabled. Plotting how to invade SK..

Yes they cannot train heavily in live fire or do mass tank exercises easily. But also there not totally incompatant. They indoctrinated constantly for war.l, that's all they know.

Yeah, but even trucks get cannibalized for spare parts. NK equipment just gets more outdated and less reliable every year. What would still work during actual war time operations? How many shells are usable, are they all properly manufactured? Etc etc. Lots of question marks around actual performance.

Sure, they aren't incompetent, they are trained as well as possible under NK conditions and conscription is invasive and long term so most men (and recently women) will have had some training. But training and planning a war are very different from fighting it. Since the Korean War NK has known it doesn't stand a chance in a conventional conflict. With the loss of its Cold War allies nuclear weapons are their only guarantee for a military stalemate. They just have to survive to the stage that the nuclear threat is credible enough. Its massive army is a enormously expensive and resource draining 'relic' in that sense.

They're indoctrinated a lot, but it doesn't necessarily mean they're fit to fight, especially for anything more than very brief time periods, and that indoctrination is not ironclad by any means.

Watching the reaction of the DMZ guards and the defector, their handling of weapons (muzzle flashing each other, casually laying live weapons on the ground and sitting around minutes after a live fire incident and still while in direct sight of the enemy), lack of coordination or cohesion, clear lack of orders or protocol, standing around in big clumps in the open, etc, they really did not give the appearance of a force fit for actual fighting. Thats not even getting into the resource issues.

Disciple of Fate wrote:

 jhe90 wrote:
Yeah, and also drains valuable petrol, fuel. They have a limited supply. Little local and all via China. No petrol, aviation fuel etc no army.

Wood gas trucks seemed in use. That's one way to do it when fuel is not in surplus.
True. Though I and many others have likely underestimated at times. There generals have had 60+ years to sit round tabled. Plotting how to invade SK..

Yes they cannot train heavily in live fire or do mass tank exercises easily. But also there not totally incompatant. They indoctrinated constantly for war.l, that's all they know.

Yeah, but even trucks get cannibalized for spare parts. NK equipment just gets more outdated and less reliable every year. What would still work during actual war time operations? How many shells are usable, are they all properly manufactured? Etc etc. Lots of question marks around actual performance.

Sure, they aren't incompetent, they are trained as well as possible under NK conditions and conscription is invasive and long term so most men (and recently women) will have had some training. But training and planning a war are very different from fighting it. Since the Korean War NK has known it doesn't stand a chance in a conventional conflict. With the loss of its Cold War allies nuclear weapons are their only guarantee for a military stalemate. They just have to survive to the stage that the nuclear threat is credible enough. Its massive army is a enormously expensive and resource draining 'relic' in that sense.

Vaktathi wrote:They're indoctrinated a lot, but it doesn't necessarily mean they're fit to fight, especially for anything more than very brief time periods, and that indoctrination is not ironclad by any means.

Watching the reaction of the DMZ guards and the defector, their handling of weapons (muzzle flashing each other, casually laying live weapons on the ground and sitting around minutes after a live fire incident and still while in direct sight of the enemy), lack of coordination or cohesion, clear lack of orders or protocol, standing around in big clumps in the open, etc, they really did not give the appearance of a force fit for actual fighting. Thats not even getting into the resource issues.

Yes, you have a point on shells and stuff hitting expiration dates.

Rockets, shells and ammo only good for so long before it's dangerous and less effective. Trucks wear out.

Some who North Korea still holds there things runnig. Salvage, and home made parts.

.

OK. And DMZ guards are Ment to one of the better equipped units too...

There the border guards and ones on show. OK that is rather telling if there potential best are so badly trained and displined.

The DMZ incident was a pretty good example of what too much rigorous training and indoctrination/loyalty/rigidness gets you. People who are so dependent on being told what to do by their superiors they kinda lose it/panic when presented with an new event. There seems to be little initiative and a lot of bewilderment.

NK has just fired off a new kind of ballistic missile.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-42160227

They'll keep trying to blow up the Sea of Japan, they try so hard...yet still it remains

On a more serious note, they at least didn't launch it *over* Japan this time.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
NK has just fired off a new kind of ballistic missile.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-42160227

Oh great, he fired his missiles again.
Higher, further, heavier payloads.

They are slowly, slowly getting able to hit more than just water.
Eventually at this rate he will reach mainland US. And then that would be scary if he could follow through with his threats.

Him vs trump both able to nuke each other.... :(

 jhe90 wrote:
True but NK had also had thr same decades to plan, dig in, decoy and calculate vectors, angles and such for there own guns and rocket artillery.

There heaviest weaponry is likely very well emplacement, fortified and bunkered down or with air raid shelters and decoys positions.

Us same. There mobility might be alot weaker, logistics weaker but those fixed batteries and rocket brigades are a pretty potant danger.

That's a fair point, and I agree. I was speaking more in the general sense of troop quality from poor vs prosperous societies that the conversation had evolved towards.

In terms of NK, well there's no doubt their troop quality is a of a lower standard, and that's in part due to their poorer upbringing, but you are right they will still be extremely deadly firing from their dug in positions, because that's a role that doesn't really need much in terms of troop quality or modern tech to be effective.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
With the loss of its Cold War allies nuclear weapons are their only guarantee for a military stalemate. They just have to survive to the stage that the nuclear threat is credible enough. Its massive army is a enormously expensive and resource draining 'relic' in that sense.

They don't need to last out long to cause major damage. Also you say about loss of allies but China has already stated they will defend them if US launches first strike attack.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 jhe90 wrote:
Eventually at this rate he will reach mainland US. And then that would be scary if he could follow through with his threats.

Him vs trump both able to nuke each other.... :(

Threats. Trump is threatening all the time as well. What Kim wants is stay in power. US tries to attack and they will fire up(and have China as allies). US doesn't attack, NK isn't exactly going to make suicide by attacking first either. He's looking to stay in power. Not suicide.

 jhe90 wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
NK has just fired off a new kind of ballistic missile.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-42160227

Oh great, he fired his missiles again.
Higher, further, heavier payloads.

They are slowly, slowly getting able to hit more than just water.
Eventually at this rate he will reach mainland US. And then that would be scary if he could follow through with his threats.

Him vs trump both able to nuke each other.... :(

The thing is... if this new missile was to travel on a more standard trajectory it very likely could hit the east coast of the US.
How reliably, and could it do so with a heavier nuclear warhead? That's unknown. But NK has just developed a missile that can hit basically everywhere in the world.
We're likely going to find out how well the missile handles a nuclear warhead, as undoubtably NK is going to want to test that sooner rather than later.

tneva82 wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
With the loss of its Cold War allies nuclear weapons are their only guarantee for a military stalemate. They just have to survive to the stage that the nuclear threat is credible enough. Its massive army is a enormously expensive and resource draining 'relic' in that sense.

They don't need to last out long to cause major damage. Also you say about loss of allies but China has already stated they will defend them if US launches first strike attack.

I seriously don't consider the possibility of China taking such a huge risk to defend a country that has become such a burden. A good deal with the US and South Korea on the occupation of North Korea is far better than the economic disruption a war between the US and China would mean for the domestic economy. A kind of remove Kim and the nuclear threat and then let China step in as the protector of North Korea and take over type deal. Its all talk on the international stage. Unless you meant nuclear first strike, in which case the Chinese don't want to get contaminated by proximity.

But being more realistic, I think it might be getting a bit too late for an invasion. Every month NK gets closer to being able to put a nuclear warhead on a missile. It doesn't even have to hit the US, NK could hit SK or Japan and inflict massive casualties. Are all those Japanese and South Korean lives worth any possible US ones? As well as the fact that there seems to be little in the way of preparation going on by the US currently.

Tillerson is out.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/us/politics/state-department-tillerson-pompeo-trump.html

The White House has developed a plan to force out Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson, whose relationship with President Trump has been strained, and replace him with Mike Pompeo, the C.I.A. director, perhaps within the next several weeks, senior administration officials said on Thursday.

Mr. Pompeo would be replaced at the C.I.A. by Senator Tom Cotton

Astounding, simply astounding.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:
With the loss of its Cold War allies nuclear weapons are their only guarantee for a military stalemate. They just have to survive to the stage that the nuclear threat is credible enough. Its massive army is a enormously expensive and resource draining 'relic' in that sense.

They don't need to last out long to cause major damage. Also you say about loss of allies but China has already stated they will defend them if US launches first strike attack.

I seriously don't consider the possibility of China taking such a huge risk to defend a country that has become such a burden. A good deal with the US and South Korea on the occupation of North Korea is far better than the economic disruption a war between the US and China would mean for the domestic economy. A kind of remove Kim and the nuclear threat and then let China step in as the protector of North Korea and take over type deal. Its all talk on the international stage. Unless you meant nuclear first strike, in which case the Chinese don't want to get contaminated by proximity.

But being more realistic, I think it might be getting a bit too late for an invasion. Every month NK gets closer to being able to put a nuclear warhead on a missile. It doesn't even have to hit the US, NK could hit SK or Japan and inflict massive casualties. Are all those Japanese and South Korean lives worth any possible US ones? As well as the fact that there seems to be little in the way of preparation going on by the US currently.

Indeed. China says they'll defend North Korea if they are defending, but I think that is a bluff. China would lose far more defending North Korea economically and militarily than they would lose simply letting North Korea fall and reunite with South Korea.

A bordering democracy, which is now dealing with integrating a 3rd world country into itself, is far better than having your economy collapse because you just lost your US, and likely European, markets. Plus all that US debt they hold which would go poof and become worthless.

 avantgarde wrote:
Tillerson is out.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/30/us/politics/state-department-tillerson-pompeo-trump.html

The White House has developed a plan to force out Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson, whose relationship with President Trump has been strained, and replace him with Mike Pompeo, the C.I.A. director, perhaps within the next several weeks, senior administration officials said on Thursday.

Mr. Pompeo would be replaced at the C.I.A. by Senator Tom Cotton

Astounding, simply astounding.

I'm not sure we can use that word about this administration any more.

I don't know much about rockets and speeds and trajectories, but in theory, if they were to launch something at the US, isn't it big enough to see and shoot outta the sky before it does any real damage? I mean, it takes a pretty long time to fly across the pacific, wouldn't that be enough time to intercept it?