[Skybird]

North Koprea has stationed over 15000 asrtillery pieces at the demarkation line, most of them in striking distance to the bigger area around Seoul with 25+ million inhabitants. Missiles not counted.

Aerial bombardmeent in Yugosloavia was so ineffective due to clever camouflyging by the Serbs that their losses in attacked targets, mostly tanks and artillery, were practically insignificant and the attacked manouver units were able to finally withdraw and pull out practically unharmed, in full cohesion and fully combat capable. The experiences of the NATO air war against active combat units on the ground must be described as extremely sobering.

I do not know where this often seen attitude comes from that America can just defeat any enemy with ease and certainty. The Iraq and Afghanistan and Yugoslavia wars also do not support that optimism. And that were enemies seen as more inferior than North Korea. It still features one of the world's most dangerous and amassed air defence zones.

North Korea is absolutely capable to inflict hair-raising damages and losses to South Korea. They probbaly cannot maintian such an effort for long time, logistically, but a first decisive attack may be enough to break the South's economic backbone and destroy public morale due to unimaginable civilian losses.

An d when you compare Seoul with Pyönyang - what is the rational in assumig that threatening to wipe out Pyönyang in retaliation for striking Seoul has a deterring effect? I would say it is exactly the other way around, Seoul is much more preciosu and juicy a target than Pyönyang. The south has, due to its greater modernity and wealth, much more to lose than the North. And its a relatively open society, compared to the North. Which makes it vulnerable to sabotage, a Northern speciality.

I often have heard a war would most likely be lost by the North. I then usually think that does not mean that the costs for the South are affordable.

China's acting I do no longer predict. They may intervene against the North, to stop them. They may not do so. They may engage actively on behalf of the North. All possible. They will do what maximises the damage for the US and the South, strategically. Or use the opporutnity to open a second front over Taiwan and/or the SCS.