Um surface to surface rockets and missiles are widely considered a form of artillery. Only here do I need to differentiate. Only here would somebody not include those systems into the artillery tree, then accuse someone of backpedaling because they had to specifically mention it separately. My other replies on this…

Completely agree. I feel for North Korea’s populace, but a preemptive strike makes little or no sense. Regardless of how hard the DPRK tries to isolate itself, it’s impossible to do for the long run. Eventually, the technology and ideals of the outside world will topple the NK leadership. Their control on power is…

Yeah, I dont get it. Your first link said it has a 90% success rate. I’ve seen other sources say it’s even better than that. Also keep in mind, if the rocket’s trajectory indicates that it won’t hit anything, Iron Dome won’t engage. So many of the rockets landing randomly did so because Iron Dome saw it, deemed it…

The Koksan? With RAP shells it can just barely hit Seoul from the area around the Kaesong pocket.

How can you be sure you’ll get a significant number of assets in a preemptive strike, especially if a conflict is imminient? We have little to no HUMINT in N. Korea. Using signals intelligence and air/space recon isn’t enough. They know we watch them 24/7. They know we continually plot the location of equipment. If…

They have plenty that is though, not to mention missiles. Moving additional assets, especially if hostilities hadn’t broken out yet, would be pretty easy.

Additionally, neither Thule AB in Greenland, nor NAS Keflavik has fighters (as far as I know). I know F-15C have operated out of Keflavik at times, but I’m pretty sure there are no fighter/interceptor assets stationed in Greenland or Iceland.

I completely agree with all of that. They’d get decimated, and rather quickly. My point was, they do have the firepower to do tremendous damage for a day or two until we can silence those assets. Maybe things have changed, but when I was there 15 years ago, the general consensus was that our token military presence…

It all depends on where the convoy is. The farther south they are, the more difficult for them it would be. But, convoys traveling through the North Atlantic would be at risk. The Backfire can do Mach 2, with an unrefueled combat radius of 2,000 miles. The KH-55SM has a three-thousand kilometer range. The Russian’s…

Thanks for that. I’m pretty familiar with military stuff, but Russia’s historic demographics/origins are far from something I’m well informed on.

I completely disagree, as do most analysts and most of the military. I’ve been there. I’ve seen enough HUMINT and ELINT to be fully convinced that N. Korea is more than capable of hammering Seoul. They have 15,000 different forms of traditional and rocket artillery. They have an additional 7,500 tanks and APCs, with…

It isn’t crap. This is a widely accepted fact. I did a year with 2nd ID very near to the DMZ. They have ten thousand artillery pieces within range of Seoul. Half of which are self-propelled. More dangerous, they have an additional five-thousand missiles and rockets. Some of which exceed 300mm. Fifteen thousand…

You’re actually 100% on point.

Can’t edit grr!

What? It’s been amazingly successful for Israel. Where’s your source for that?

What you’re advocating just isn’t possible. Any situation that leaves even 25% of their artillery and rockets near the DMZ alive, means they shatter Seoul. Short of nukes, no matter how much firepower you employ, there is no way to keep N. Korea from saturating Seoul for hours. Even if we wiped out every single of…

Yep. I don’t see China or Russia getting directly involved. But, you can bet that they would be involved. The Russian’s would probably limit it to advisors and observers, but I would expect the PLA to offer a decent bit of support. It would be extremely similar to how Russia aided N. Korea back in the 1950s. That…

Preemptive carried out by the DPRK or S. Korea/US? If we launched a preemptive strike it wouldn’t work well enough. First thing you’d do is shatter their communication and command & control structure. That would go a long way towards isolating individual N. Korean units, buying more time to take them out before they…

Where do you get so much confidence in the S. Korean military? I spent a year there before the GWOT terror kicked off. Was at Camp Casey with 2nd ID (very near the DMZ).

The biggest issue is their artillery and rockets along/near the DMZ. It’s all in range of Seoul, and even a large preemptive strike would leave enough alive to decimate Seoul. Without nukes there is no way of negating all of that stuff before it did considerable damage. Much of that artillery is deeply dug in and…