North Korea is no doubt a terrible place with a siege economy but these 'pieced together by South Korean intelligence' stories - emaciated soldiers etc - are embarrassingly Judith Milleresque.
There's zero to nil chance we'll invade North Korea ever. North Korea could devastate the global economy by bombing Seoul which is within artillery range and Japan, which it can fire missiles at.
North Korea would have to act first and they will never do that unless they are cornered.
The other important thing to do is to consider what would happen in the aftermath. Who wants to deal with that mess? Unification will be expensive and will take decades. Reintegration in Germany is still ongoing, and East Germany wasn't nearly as bad off as DPRK is today. They clearly cannot win a shooting war, even if they do damage to the other side. The simple reason nothing is done about them is because no one wants to pick up the pieces when it's over.
It just sucks for those poor people in those horrible detention camps. Maybe there's some kind of diplomatic solution for those people. The ruling elite come across as mafia style corrupt leaders.
They don't seem to have any nukes to launch, nor the ability to sustain conflict. The only thing they are capable of is provocations and a one-time surprise attack (the artillery probably wouldn't do significant damage, but a dirty bomb snuck across the border would).
Given their escalating fondness of low-level provocations, the option of a surgical strike against the leadership gains appeal over time (but doesn't outweigh the downsides of having to deal with a broken nation afterwards yet).
How do you know this? The CIA world factbook puts N Korea's army at 6 million people. Seems like they have the ability to weather a sustained conflict just fine:
The Russians tried that in Afghanistan - but I suspect that if china has some decent SF like the Spetnaz they could take out the leadership in a decapitation strike and put their own guys in and it would probably work cant see there being much resistance from the local population as opposed to Afganistan.
Consider this. NK probably has some degree of decentralization and/or redundancy in their chain of command. You bet they have a fail-deadly system in place to get their conventional artillery (the ones pointed at the north half of Seoul) to fire in case of an attempted decapitation strike, say nothing of their possible WMD systems.
Do you doubt the physical condition of North Korea's military?
There was a picture floating around on the internet. It was an old photo from a meeting between the US and both Koreas. There were three Soldiers in the photograph. There was a typical American Infantryman, over 6' and looking like a badass. Then there was a South Korean soldier almost as tall that looked like he could probably kill a dozen people with his bare hands. Then, there was a young boy, looking about 8 years old and maybe 4' tall, in a military uniform. It was an adult in the North Korean military. Now, when countries get together like this, they send Soldiers who they feel will best represent them, so you have to consider the fact that this on-the-verge-of-death little kid was one of the best that the North Koreans had.
North Korean soldiers on the DMZ, which is the most important place, get about 800 calories a day. Before they joined the military, they got much less. North Koreans frequently have stunted growth and all sorts of development issues because their shit-bag leader spends all of their money developing weapons that even the most hard-up revolutionaries wouldn't be caught dead with.
> their shit-bag leader spends all of their money developing weapons that even the most hard-up revolutionaries wouldn't be caught dead with.
I was under the impression that the attraction of nuclear weapons is that they can help reduce total defence spending. They act as a strong deterrent to any country considering an invasion thus allowing NK to reduce the size of its standing army as well as spending on traditional weaponry and military hardware.
They also spend tons of money developing more conventional weapons that are decades behind the rest of the 3rd-world arms market.
>I was under the impression that the attraction of nuclear weapons is that they can help reduce total defence spending. They act as a strong deterrent to any country considering an invasion thus allowing NK to reduce the size of its standing army as well as spending on traditional weaponry and military hardware.
The North Korean leadership isn't capable of decisions like this based on mature, rational thought. More likely, they spend the money on nukes because we told them they can't have any, and no one tells the Kims no.
As an example of their immature behavior, there was a guy in charge of their agricultural department who built a series of farms that produced record harvests when Kim Jong Il was still around. Kim then demanded that they cut down large swaths of forests in the surrounding area and turn everything into farms, to replicate the successes. The next time they had a Tsunami, the deforestation caused all of the farms to flood and be destroyed. An estimated 2 million people died of starvation as a result.
The Kims are just spoiled children that play with lives instead of toys.
One not parcelled up and handed over by South Korean intelligence. One where the author cultivated North Korean contacts and even went to the country to see for themselves. Journalism.
Well, I agree. First, North Korea would have to allow foreign journalism. Right now, as I understand it, a North Korean contact who was known to be "cultivated" by a foreign journalist would be hauled up on charges of espionage and treason.
North Korea would have to act first and they will never do that unless they are cornered.