"The U.S. Navy Can’t Fight North Korea Alone" Topic

"How can the U.S. Navy destroy North Korea should Washington give the word? It can't. Or at least it stands little chance of doing so by its lonesome barring improbable circumstances. What the Navy can do is contribute to a joint or multinational campaign that destroys the northern regime or its armed forces. But even that would involve perils, hardships and steep costs.

It bears noting at the outset that destroy is a loaded term, connoting wholesale slaughter of a foe. It need not be so. For martial sage Carl von Clausewitz, destroying an opposing force means incapacitating it as a fighting force. "The fighting forces must be destroyed," insists Clausewitz; "that is, they must be put in such a condition that they can no longer carry on the fight." Disabling a hostile regime so it cannot resist our demands would likewise qualify.

The "best policy," advises Master Sun, "is to take a state intact," and to do so without bankrupting your own treasury and wasting the flower of your military youth. Such forbearance is hard to pull off amid the clangor of combat, but it constitutes an ideal to strive toward. In 1940, for example, German legions destroyed the French army as a fighting force along the Meuse while inflicting minimal destruction by physical measures. It can be done…"
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Amicalement
Armand

If only US had some means of fighting in the air and ground as well.

We have S Korea. Actually if a war breaks S Korea will do the majority of the fighting.

Agree!

Amicalement
Armand

Our ships are all damaged from colliding with each other. How could we possibly win it alone?!

And they (NK) certainly won't be fighting alone either.

Dan

Who's going to fight with them? The Chinese won't.

Caedite Eos: "Who's going to fight with them? The Chinese won't."

Lol. Really?

I think there were many who said the exact same thing in 1950, right before 1.3 million of the Communist Chinese showed up to fight the "UN" forces in Korea.

Dan

Tell me how much US debt China held in 1950. Tell me what their trade surplus was.

Also China isn't lead by a lunatic.

Glup!…

Amicalement
Armand

Was China led by a lunatic in 1950? I thought Mao was utterly ruthless but calculated. And even he had no problem sending 1.3 million troops across the Korean border to fight the only nuclear power of that time. It shocked the hell out of many experts of that time.

As for the debt, where "warfare" is concerned, it comes down to attrition, the ability to redirect your workforce and again to unpredictability (unpredictable to us). We need them way more than they need us. They can eat plain rice* if their government says they have to. But a week without their trinkets and half of us will be raising the white flag. We make almost nothing. And, aside from their other trading partners, they have a small but growing domestic consumer class to buy their wares for a short while.

And good luck trying to collect on any of that debt. Their abacus would reset to zero, if that's how their government wants it.

In other words, careful predicting what China will or will not do. Their actions in 1950 scared the experts because the actions were very calculated and because, even as they were taking shape, we still didn't see them coming.

Every scenario should take into account the possibility of China stepping in. To write them off is dangerous.

Dan
* And even build entire chains of islands with missiles and airstrips for a tiny fraction of what it would cost us in money, red tape and time.

China has stated that they would support NK if anyone attacked NK first, but would not do so if NK initiated the fighting. China is the one holding the debt, not us. Not sure what it would do to their economy if we defaulted and seized their assets here in the USA. China most likely would not accept NK being overrun and incorporated into SK though.

WilliamB

You are exactly right! They said they would not tolerate any attempt at a regime change in NK. They will react with force.

Also, let me bring attention to this part of your post: "but would not do so if NK initiated the fighting"

So far Communist China has not viewed any of the missile tests as "initiating the fighting", though if tables were turned, and missiles from South Korea or Japan were flying over North Korea or even China, they would immediately see that as an act of war. So apparently they see what NK is doing as within its rights, just like China feels that what they themselves are doing down in the SCS is within its rights.

In other words, let's not take their statements to always mean what they would mean to us. No one pulls the trigger for Communist China but Communist China, and you can be sure they already have a detailed action timeline for pulling various triggers.

Dan
PS. Check out some of these recent (2016-2018) missile launched over Japan: