The original OPLAN 5027 dealing with that threat was written in the early 1980's such threats was more prominent before the availability of our bases in Japan in the event of war with North Korea was guaranteed during the mid 90's. The OPLAN 5027 has been completely revised since then to a much more offensive battle plan to reflect our surveillance system's ability to detect, pinpoint and destroy and threats with minimal damage done to South Korea. Also the deployment of a significant number of patriot missiles and Aegis trackers in the region negates the threat of a missile attack from North Korea. The ability of the North Koreans to hit Seoul had always been dependent on their ability to move their artillery and launchers into range undetected. Keep in mind most if not all of their weapons dates back to the late 70's and our ability to deter such attacks have significantly improved while their hardware have received little upgrade. Will North Korea's threat be completely eliminated? No, not without a full invasion of the country. But our abilities to detect and deter such threats have vastly improved. It is perfectly clear to everyone, the North Koreans included, that they could always start a war, a war that they will not survive.
Otto's already answered to this but just to add a couple of things. Consider that NK also has rockets and missiles that can easily reach Seoul. Also it is well known that NK has dug tons of tunnels through the DMZ and its not clear how much is known about their locations. In a surprise attack NK could still pour a lot of forces and resources across the DMZ.
The key to this conflict is Chinese policy toward NK. I understand the reasoning once upon a time of supporting a puppet government in North Korea. But, nowadays I don't see how it even makes sense for China to continue with the status quo.
We have significant number of anti missile system there, and the last tunnel was discovered in 1990 and with the technology we have how it would be easy to detect large tunnels that could move a large number of men and armor. I think people are looking too much into the wording of "significant threat" by the US military. It is their job to look into and highlight any and all form of threat from North Korea. In terms of threat level, the most likely approach by the North Koreans would be an attempted artillery strike, but when you look at the difference in military hardware and steps taken by the US and South Korean military any attempt by North Korea on Seoul would only be suicide.
I think you are overestimating the amount of influence China have on North Korea. The best comparison between their influence on North Korea would be like ours with Pakistan. Just like how we are supplying Pakistan in order to keep it from being taken over by terrorists, China is supplying North Korea to keep it from collapsing and sending millions of refugees flooding across the border to China.
Except our track record hasn't been that good with actual use of anti missile technology. I agree it would be suicidal but NK could do a lot of damage in a short of amount of time.
And those haven't proven to be complete effective in taking out hardened targets. We would've completed wiped out the Taliban at Tora Bora without having to rely on the Northern Alliance if that were the case.
There is a difference between people hiding deep in a cave in a mountain and having a hardened target that is operationally effective. Artillery has to be able to fire to be effective. Those are in hardened bunkers that munitions like the JDAM are highly effective at neutralizing.
Has that been the case in a battle? My understanding from the first Gulf War and the Balkans were that they JDAM's didn't perform that great against hardened targets.
That's what I'm referring to. NK relies heavily on China for commerce, food, and energy. If they chose to stop supplying those things, the regime would collapse and the whole country would be is sudden crisis (moreso). That makes Chinese policy pretty important. China could reunite the Korean peninsula if they chose to (and were willing to take some collateral damage from the mess it would make).
JDAM's were less than 10% of expenditures in PG1, although they were stunningly effective for their combat trial run. In Kosovo they were highly effective: "In all, 49 B-2 combat sorties were launched out of Whiteman, of which 45 made it to target and were cleared to drop munitions. Although that was less than half a percent of the 9,500 strike sorties flown in Allied Force altogether, the B-2 dropped 11 percent (some 700) of the bombs delivered against fixed targets in Serbia and Kosovo. It also dropped a full third of all precision munitions expended during the air effort.12 In addition to its normal load of JDAMs, the B-2 was also configured to carry the GPS-guided GBU-37 for special missions against deeply buried or superhardened targets. 13 A total of 652 JDAMs and 4 GBU-37s were dropped, with more than 80 percent of the B-2’s assigned targets being hit on a single pass.14 In a major improvement in the combat leverage and versatility of the American air weapon, the aircraft proved itself capable of operating effectively above weather that grounded all other allied combat aircraft. It also consistently achieved up to 16 separate target hits per sortie." http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1365/MR1365.ch5.pdf Also, remember the original quote I provided specifically analyzes the scenario in Korea. Almost no literature concludes the North Koreans would do anything but get crushed in the long term in a conflict. Their main advantage would be the scope of the artillery advantage targeting Seoul in the initial stages of the conflict. Those assets aren't the same type of "inside a mountain" bunkers you are referring to earlier.
