Completely hypothetical scenario.

North Korea attacks S. Korea, killing tens of thousands in an initial assault, including U.S. forces and civilians.

What response would you support?


(btw, I think this scenario is unlikely)

and other military targets.

US and south korea, possibly a UN mandate which would bring the germans, french, british, canadians, auzzies and new Z. the thing is Millions are going to die even without Nukes, there are still chemical and biological weapons in the NK stockpile.

If there is a response, who would do it and how? I just think the who and how depends on which countries are involved.

Since North Korea is a nuclear armed country, the conflict would hardly stay conventional even if it started as such. I think that a direct confrontation between two nuclear powers will inevitably lead to nukes beeing exchanged.

Furthermore, if the powers that be in N. Korea are nutty enough to attack the south (which I doubt) than they may be nutty enough to start out with nukes.

will not agree to fight each other with knives. In a conventional conflict between two nuclear armed countries, the country that is losing will eventually use nukes rather then surrender.

But on the other hand, IF they (or Iran to offer another example) were to use them they certainly wouldn't have the ability to use very many (less than 5 at the most, I would imagine). A retaliation would surely wipe out the offender, but then we're left with the aftermath.

If, on the other hand, the stronger nation remains conventional, there will certainly be a hell of a lot of help from the offenders' neighbors (China, South Korea, Japan and/or Saudi Arabia, Israel, Egypt etc...) who are none to happy to be evacuating their cities and dealing with all the radioactive fallout.

In other words, I think such a rogue could be completely destroyed regardless of method and without resorting to The Bomb, which would work out much better when the conflict was (quickly) done. And it would surely discourage other rogue nations from attempting the same.

would affect S Korea, China, Japan and Russia.

Multinational force would have to include China, Russia, and Japan as well as the usual 'others.'

I wouldn't count on that.

The notion of "a nuke for a nuke" scares me a lot.

I sincerely hope that nuclear bombs are never again unleashed upon any population, but if some rogue nation or terrorist group does so I very much hope the response will lie elsewhere.

I'm not saying don't wipe them out. By all means, start annihilating them until then give in (as much force as is necessary to obtain an unconditional surrender and subsequent occupation...none of this "measured response" crap), but please, no atomic bombs. That's a slippery slope I loathe to even think about (just like the Bush notion of "mini-nukes" turns my stomach..conventional works fine thanks).

By the way, it's an interesting hypothetical but given the nature of the region I have a feeling the attack would be on Japan, not South Korea. Or, if they had the capacity, someplace in America.

Vietnam and Korea 1.0 teach us anything?

millions of civilians, basically just walking around shooting people in the head and raping everything that moves, I'm sure you'll change your mind.

What diplomacy could we possibly have with Kim Jong-Il, a raving lunatic who would make Hitler proud? What you really mean is "throw them to the wolves."

Okay, different situation. Let's say you live in Arizona or New Mexico, and Mexican death squads cross the border and start shooting everybody, and a massive battle erupts between the police and the cartels. The US Army just sits back and lets the cities burn because it's a civilian matter. Wouldn't you be a little pissed off?

Secondly, U.S. troops would be among the fatalities in a N. Korean attack. And it would hardly just be the U.S. who would respond to any N. Korean attack.