North Korea vs South Korea armor

[John Dudek]

With all the latest hub-bub coming from the Land of the Morning Calm, how does South Korea stand up to the North in terms of tanks and supporting arms? I know they have LOTS of old and dated, Soviet vintage artillery dug into gun galleries deep in the mountains along the 38th Parallel that could bring down some serious steel onto Seoul, should war break out. I also remember reading that they have some serious Special Forces units, along with many probable "sleeper cells" of people living in the south, waiting for the balloon to go up. I hear their tanks and airforce are extremely out of date. What say you guys?

[Special-K]

I don't really have much for answers, but my understanding is that the North is MUCH more impressive on paper than in real life. I have read that most of their tanks and other AFV's mostly sit and rot due to lack of fuel to run them.

 

The South has a real technological edge, and I'm sure their crews are far better trained.

 

 

 

-K

[DemolitionMan]

Until the early 90s the North would have had the South for breakfast in terms of armor. Now with the K1, K1A1 and the soon to follow K2 the tide has totally turned. Same is true with IFVs.

[stimpy75]

a nice research on DPRK and RoK....

http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/showthread.php?162240-Bluffer-s-Guide-North-Korea-strikes!-(2009)

[Marcello]

With all the latest hub-bub coming from the Land of the Morning Calm, how does South Korea stand up to the North in terms of tanks and supporting arms? I know they have LOTS of old and dated, Soviet vintage artillery dug into gun galleries deep in the mountains along the 38th Parallel that could bring down some serious steel onto Seoul, should war break out. I also remember reading that they have some serious Special Forces units, along with many probable "sleeper cells" of people living in the south, waiting for the balloon to go up. I hear their tanks and airforce are extremely out of date. What say you guys?

 

By some estimates most of their artillery is self propelled now, they have realized long since that towed guns sitting in fixed shelters are vulnerable and inflexible. Their best tank available in quantity is a T-62M1 lookalike, which will be eaten for breakfast by SK K1s and K1A1s.

In general however in evaluing such scenarios one should avoid the trap of concentrating exclusively on direct hardware to hardware comparisons.

Their air force for example is completely outdated, with only a few MIG-29s and SU-25s that can be called modern (and even then they are hardly state of the art versions). However one hundred of MIG-17 and MIG-19 coming at once loaded with bombs and rockets are still nothing to sneeze at if you are on the receiving end and they can rely on a significant number of airstrip for dispersal and hardened shelter and communication facilities. Thus despite being massively outdated to a degree that would make them target practice on a one for one basis they can still conceivably inflict damage and thus act as sortie sinks relieving some of the pressure put on the army by western air superiority.

[Jonathan Chin]

I don't claim any kind of special or even superficial understanding of North Korean military but according to the fella who runs China Defense dot com, North Korea haven't had a real war game for ten years now and their capabilities had atrophied to nothing due to the combination of down-in-the-drain economy, malnutrition and incompetent management. Large amounts of hardware are probably inoperable dead-liners gathering dust in stowage facilities now.

[Marcello]

I don't claim any kind of special or even superficial understanding of North Korean military but according to the fella who runs China Defense dot com, North Korea haven't had a real war game for ten years now and their capabilities had atrophied to nothing due to the combination of down-in-the-drain economy, malnutrition and incompetent management. Large amounts of hardware are probably inoperable dead-liners gathering dust in stowage facilities now.

 

AFAIK they have large scale exercises every year, though of course one can wonder how much useful and up to date training is actually performed.

While certainly the economic decline has hurt them "military first" isn't just an empty platitude, the Army there is in the position of cutting itself a a fairly huge piece of the economic pie, and with the Dear Leader approval to boot. They control directly several economic activities, such as coal export to China IIRC and they have the organization (working trucks etc.) to go and pick up directly their share of the harvest in the farms.

[Jacques]

I agree with the analysis posted by Stimpy. They truly are a paper tiger with only one solid tooth...nukes. How far Russia and China would be willing to back up N. Korea if a non-nuke skirmish broke out is another wild card. Both are hard to quantify and I would guess that they are actually moving targets day-to-day, meaning I do not know the "stability" of the NK nukes or the relationships between NK and Russia/China.

 

IF NK got really stupid and provoked, I could see a situation where they would get swatted hard by the SK/US/NATO without help from China/Russia. I can also see a situation where it could respark a solid cold war flash against both Russia AND China. Tough situation, better for "Dear Leader" to pass on and the inevitable power fight to commence...

[eckherl]

With all the latest hub-bub coming from the Land of the Morning Calm, how does South Korea stand up to the North in terms of tanks and supporting arms? I know they have LOTS of old and dated, Soviet vintage artillery dug into gun galleries deep in the mountains along the 38th Parallel that could bring down some serious steel onto Seoul, should war break out. I also remember reading that they have some serious Special Forces units, along with many probable "sleeper cells" of people living in the south, waiting for the balloon to go up. I hear their tanks and airforce are extremely out of date. What say you guys?

 

ROK does have modernized tanks that are more capable, please keep in mind though that artillery and ground pounders will rule the battle field due to the road network system in North Korea, I say North Korea because after the first 24 hours of conflict ROK forces will be pushing North to clean up what is left after the U.S and ROK air and naval assets gets through with them.

[BP]

If the DRPK attacked at o'dark thirty, I wonder what the ROK tank crews would do with the rest of the afternoon.

[Simon Tan]

Drive up to Pyongyang to liberate members of the Happy Corps.

[Marcello]

ROK does have modernized tanks that are more capable, please keep in mind though that artillery and ground pounders will rule the battle field due to the road network system in North Korea, I say North Korea because after the first 24 hours of conflict ROK forces will be pushing North to clean up what is left after the U.S and ROK air and naval assets gets through with them.

 

You make it sound like a cakewalk. In reality should the ballon go up a huge amount of stuff is going to fly, crawl and swim south; however poor the quality may be it will still take time to go throught it. As far it is known OPLAN 5027 does not envision a counteroffensive before a week or two, as it would take days to absorb the intial punch, as well replenishing and so on.

[Jacques]

You make it sound like a cakewalk. In reality should the ballon go up a huge amount of stuff is going to fly, crawl and swim south; however poor the quality may be it will still take time to go throught it. As far it is known OPLAN 5027 does not envision a counteroffensive before a week or two, as it would take days to absorb the intial punch, as well replenishing and so on.

 

True enough, but I believe the timeframe would be compressed due to the shock factor. People in the South, and the soldiers on the DMZ, have always felt like they have a target on their chests. The North has to rely on propoganda of how much better they are than the rest to simply stay in power AND they must remain fearfull of any one unit/group being powerfull enough to overthrow them. This is a fatal handicap. While the South would indeed need to recover from the initial shock (what human in the middle of all that would not), I think those of the North would endure their shock far longer due to the collapse of their beliefe in their leaders and the massive amount of damage being dealt (Iraq was a show-off, North Korea is business - the US has pretty much been holding for this day for decades. It was a personal war for us - I think only the Nukes get held back).

 

I would refer to the Iraq invasion of '03 to make my point...there are several similarities. Including the amount of infrastructure we would have to rebuild/build after an invasion took place...

[Sikkiyn]

I would refer to the Iraq invasion of '03 to make my point...there are several similarities. Including the amount of infrastructure we would have to rebuild/build after an invasion took place...

 

If China backed the rebuilding project, why would we have to do anything? I am looking at the long-term economic and agricultural ties this could spawn for Chincom Inc.

[Marcello]

True enough, but I believe the timeframe would be compressed due to the shock factor. People in the South, and the soldiers on the DMZ, have always felt like they have a target on their chests. The North has to rely on propoganda of how much better they are than the rest to simply stay in power AND they must remain fearfull of any one unit/group being powerfull enough to overthrow them. This is a fatal handicap. While the South would indeed need to recover from the initial shock (what human in the middle of all that would not), I think those of the North would endure their shock far longer due to the collapse of their beliefe in their leaders and the massive amount of damage being dealt (Iraq was a show-off, North Korea is business - the US has pretty much been holding for this day for decades. It was a personal war for us - I think only the Nukes get held back).

 

I would refer to the Iraq invasion of '03 to make my point...there are several similarities. Including the amount of infrastructure we would have to rebuild/build after an invasion took place...

 

I disagree. They have already faced the full might of american airpower once, North Korea was massively bombed and then almost overrun. They were basically defeated but they did not just give up en masse, many units kept fighting even in the UN rear.

It is unclear to me while bombing them should cause a collapse in their beliefs instead of, say, an outburst of nationalism (the propaganda about the evil imperialists dogs was right!) even if a short live one.

Massive bombing not exactly news for them and they have spent decades preparing for that. Many of the measures they have taken are obsolete (their SAM network and interceptors for example) but some aren't. And they have also spent decades preparing and stockpiling for an offensive against the South; it will only get them massacred of course, but it won't be over in an afternoon in all likelyhood and as far it is known nobody paid to think about it counts on that.

Iraq was a different case, Saddam faced internal threats that junior Kim does not have to worry about.

Edited June 2, 2010 by Marcello

[Marek Tucan]

I disagree. They have already faced the full might of american airpower once, North Korea was massively bombed and then almost overrun. They were basically defeated but they did not just give up en masse, many units kept fighting even in the UN rear.

It is unclear to me while bombing them should cause a collapse in their beliefs instead of, say, an outburst of nationalism (the propaganda about the evil imperialists dogs was right!) even if a short live one.

Massive bombing not exactly news for them and they have spent decades preparing for that. Many of the measures they have taken are obsolete (their SAM network and interceptors for example) but some aren't. And they have also spent decades preparing and stockpiling for an offensive against the South; it will only get them massacred of course, but it won't be over in an afternoon in all likelyhood and as far it is known nobody paid to think about it counts on that.

Iraq was a different case, Saddam faced internal threats that junior Kim does not have to worry about.

 

OTOH both sides had generally comparable technologies...

Guess that JDAMs and SDBs raining from nowhere without enemy to be seen would be a tad more demoralising - though I do not doubt there will be many many fanatics willing to fight to death.

[JasonJ]

OTOH both sides had generally comparable technologies...

Guess that JDAMs and SDBs raining from nowhere without enemy to be seen would be a tad more demoralising - though I do not doubt there will be many many fanatics willing to fight to death.

 

You can add what S. Korean tanks will also do what M1 Abrams did to Iraqi tanks in the 1st Persian gulf. The mountainous terrain may just make it not as crushing.

[Marcello]

OTOH both sides had generally comparable technologies...

Guess that JDAMs and SDBs raining from nowhere without enemy to be seen would be a tad more demoralising - though I do not doubt there will be many many fanatics willing to fight to death.

 

After the initial shock was over and before russian hardware and chinese numbers came to the rescue they had to face jets in Yak-9s, take pot shots at enemy planes with small arms for lack of anything better and watch B-29s bombing everything with almost complete impunity. They were losing badly but did not just throw up their hands and go home.

I doubt that JDAMs would be more demoralizing of watching your comrades burn to death in a blanket of napalm.

[Marek Tucan]

After the initial shock was over and before russian hardware and chinese numbers came to the rescue they had to face jets in Yak-9s, take pot shots at enemy planes with small arms for lack of anything better and watch B-29s bombing everything with almost complete impunity. They were losing badly but did not just throw up their hands and go home.

I doubt that JDAMs would be more demoralizing of watching your comrades burn to death in a blanket of napalm.

 

But in all these cases they could see the enemy. They could see it's coming.

ISTR one German veteran from Normandy describing, that naval gunfire was much more demoralising than normal artillery or air raids because it came form "nowhere" .

[Marcello]

But in all these cases they could see the enemy. They could see it's coming.

 

B-29 and A-26 often attacked at night using radar sights, even against tactical targets (suspected troop concentrations etc.). Besides JDAMs haven't caused the talibans and others to just give up, so while there may well be a definite morale effect in "bomb out of nowhere" one should not overstate it.

Edited June 2, 2010 by Marcello

[swerve]

After the initial shock was over and before russian hardware and chinese numbers came to the rescue they had to face jets in Yak-9s, take pot shots at enemy planes with small arms for lack of anything better and watch B-29s bombing everything with almost complete impunity. They were losing badly but did not just throw up their hands and go home.

I doubt that JDAMs would be more demoralizing of watching your comrades burn to death in a blanket of napalm.

Actually, quite a lot did just throw up their hands & go home, especially those conscripted in S. Korea as the N. Koreans advanced. Many others surrendered. By the end of October 1950, half of the initial strength of the KPA was in PoW camps.

Edited June 2, 2010 by swerve

[Marcello]

Actually, quite a lot did just throw up their hands & go home, especially those conscripted in S. Korea as the N. Koreans advanced. Many others surrendered. By the end of October 1950, half of the initial strength of the KPA was in PoW camps.

 

That's true of course. But the thing is, they kept fighting in face of massive enemy firepower, despite complete enemy air dominance and sometimes (not always, naturally) even after having been cut off. No, they were not quite as fanatic as the IJA at Iwo Jima but still they did not evaporate like the iraqis did in 2003.

Edited June 2, 2010 by Marcello

[Simon Tan]

The kept fighting because the PVA had been activated and was committed as soon as the UN forces crossed the 38th parallel. Both the Soviet Union and the PRC had signed onto the plan beforehand. The Great Leader was not willing to risk a war without his Communist masters covering his back. Without the PVA, there would be no DPRK. You might be forgiven for not realising this when reading NoKor accounts of the War Against Imperialist Aggression (how ironic). The Kims are most unworthy and troublesome vassals at home but are remarkably toadlike when summoned before the Sons of Heaven (as it has always been......)

NoKor is a handy proxy to counter US hegemony and Beijing is loathe to trade such a useful asset away for no gain. Quite the contrary, any regime change is likely to result in Reunification and bring the hegemon's puppets to the Yalu.......

The North Koreans beat feet north. The UN forces were hampered as much by terrain and weather as they were by 'fanatical' resistance. Inmun Gun sought to preserve itself as best as possible to take advantage of the PVA Offensive Impulses forming in the north of the country.

Edited June 2, 2010 by Simon Tan

[Marcello]

The kept fighting because the PVA had been activated and was committed as soon as the UN forces crossed the 38th parallel.

 

They still kept fighting though. They did not simply melt away once they faced overwhelming firepower.

Of course they would have lost without chinese/soviet intervention, just like they will lose a new war and get massacred in the process. I don't think that me or anybody else has said anything different.

 

You might be forgiven for not realising this when reading NoKor accounts of the War Against Imperialist Aggression (how ironic)

 

Never read anything written by the North. My source is mainly US Army "History of the North Korean Army"

Edited June 2, 2010 by Marcello

[swerve]

That's true of course. But the thing is, they kept fighting in face of massive enemy firepower, despite complete enemy air dominance and sometimes (not always, naturally) even after having been cut off. No, they were not quite as fanatic as the IJA at Iwo Jima but still they did not evaporate like the iraqis did in 2003.

True, but consider who kept fighting.

 

For a start, there were the Korean veterans of the Chinese wars, who had fought Japanese occupiers and/or the US-supported Kuomintang. They were experienced, tough, & highly motivated. I suspect it was all the same war to them. From what little I know, it seems that they mostly fought to the end - and had no scruples about making damn sure that other troops kept fighting.

 

There were also North Korean conscripts, who knew that their families were within the reach of the N. Korean state, which for many was a powerful motivating factor. IIRC the KPA also used all the old Red Army tricks, e.g. machine-gunners behind infantry charges.

 

We can disregard the S. Koreans forced into KPA units. They fought as long as there were commissars or KPA veterans overlooking them, but otherwise mostly surrendered or deserted at the first opportunity.

 

The current lot have no experience of war, unlike the core of the old KPA. I assume they've been subjected to a lifetime of indoctrination, but I wonder how that would be affected by being brought face to face with just how much they've been lied to all their lives about S. Korea, which would happen to any N. Korean troops advancing into the south.