Can you win a war with only light infantry in the 21st century?

solarz said:

Great posts, t_co! Very informative!

However, what you presented regarding a combined-arms army's see-deep/strike-deep capabilities sounds more like a *potential* than common practice. It relies on the ability of the more advanced army to get accurate intelligence on the infantry army.

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Not really. Long range strike/recon capabilities have been standard for the US since the first Gulf War. That's why the Gulf War prompted PLA planners to shrink and modernize their force so much. Those capabilities are now standard in the PLA and Russian militaries, too. Accurate intelligence on a uniformed (not plainclothes) infantry army is easy to get now, thanks to heat-detecting satellites and drones. All the other army has to do is swarm the skies with drones operating at 60,000 feet, out of reach of MANPADS, that look for body heat, and whenever a clumping of dudes is sighted, it calls down surface-to-surface missiles loaded with anti-personnel cluster munitions.

As you said, mobility is no advantage if you're rushing headlong into an ambush, which is exactly what the Americans did in the Korean War. This ties in to the idea of defense: in defensive warfare, the defenders have the advantage of home ground. They would have an extensive information network already in place, while the attackers have to penetrate a fog of war.

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Quite true--in defense, the odds get a lot closer, but they'd still be tilted against the infantry army.

So what do you think of my proposed scenario of a South Korean invasion of a fuel-deprived North Korea?

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It's not entirely impossible for the North Koreans to do what you described, but the big issue will be how the Chinese could actually resupply the North Koreans with modern weaponry if the DPRK forces themselves don't have trucks or trains. E.g. China could offload tons of food and ammo at, say, Wonsan, or sneak them over the Yalu, but once they've done that, how do they distribute it further to tons of DPRK troops spread out over North Korea?

Remember that in the 1950 Korean War, the biggest issue for the PVA wasn't that they couldn't do infiltration assaults in the face of superior firepower (they could); it was that lack of trucks + US air power made it so that their troops were chronically undersupplied with fuel, food, and ammo, seriously handicapping their ability to fight. This problem grows ten times worse in the modern era, as the high-tech light infantry systems you're describing--21st-century body armor, MANPADS, light artillery, crew-served weapons, small arms--all chew up ammo and supplies like popcorn. Those weapons were designed to operate in the context of a beefy, Chinese, US, or Russian, resupply network, not in the context of a guerrilla war against an adversary with complete control of all supply routes.

t_co said:

It's not entirely impossible for the North Koreans to do what you described, but the big issue will be how the Chinese could actually resupply the North Koreans with modern weaponry if the DPRK forces themselves don't have trucks or trains. E.g. China could offload tons of food and ammo at, say, Wonsan, or sneak them over the Yalu, but once they've done that, how do they distribute it further to tons of DPRK troops spread out over North Korea?

Remember that in the 1950 Korean War, the biggest issue for the PVA wasn't that they couldn't do infiltration assaults in the face of superior firepower (they could); it was that lack of trucks + US air power made it so that their troops were chronically undersupplied with fuel, food, and ammo, seriously handicapping their ability to fight. This problem grows ten times worse in the modern era, as the high-tech light infantry systems you're describing--21st-century body armor, MANPADS, light artillery, crew-served weapons, small arms--all chew up ammo and supplies like popcorn. Those weapons were designed to operate in the context of a beefy, Chinese, US, or Russian, resupply network, not in the context of a guerrilla war against an adversary with complete control of all supply routes.

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Good points all. However, North Korea has an extensive system of anti-air defense, so it might not be so simple for SK to fly behind their lines to bomb their supply routes.

delft said:

A war on the Korean peninsula would be extremely damaging to the Koreans and to the Chinese. China's likely response to an aggression prepared by the US and South Korea would be to bring the matter to the Security Council ( which will of course not reach a conclusion ) and to demand of South Korea the expulsion of the US forces. South Korea would be very stupid if it didn't comply.
China might well mobilize as described by Sampan Viking and if aggression still started intervene in the first instance with the Second Artillery.
The political developments in Japan might suggest to South Korean leaders that a change of alliances has become more attractive than preparing for war.

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If South Korea has prepared for war alongside the US to forcefully reunify with North Korea under South Korean leadership, why would it listen to any demands from China to suddenly switch sides? Presumably if this happened the US and South Korea at the very least would already have taken into account the likelihood of China getting involved. Its not like China's involvement with North Korea is exactly secret.

solarz said:

Good points all. However, North Korea has an extensive system of anti-air defense, so it might not be so simple for SK to fly behind their lines to bomb their supply routes.

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You see? This is why NK cannot be considered a light infantry with all those AAA's. Like I said, for the sake of our argument, NK vs. SK is not a good example for combined force vs. light infantry.

How about China and Korea invade and destroy Japan? Only then can peace be achieved throughout Asia. Get rid of the parasites.

Kid NOVA said:

How about China and Korea invade and destroy Japan? Only then can peace be achieved throughout Asia. Get rid of the parasites.

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1. This would need more than light infantry. It's rather infantile to post it in this thread.
2. A political solution would do much less damage to all concerned. A coalition led by China and including a reunited Korea and Russia would deter Japan from any aggressive move. Japan can then be invited to contribute to freedom of navigation in the Western Pacific together with the other countries in the area. This would also save a lot of money for the US as they wouldn't need to maintain the Seventh Fleet.

t_co said:

Not really. Long range strike/recon capabilities have been standard for the US since the first Gulf War. That's why the Gulf War prompted PLA planners to shrink and modernize their force so much. Those capabilities are now standard in the PLA and Russian militaries, too. Accurate intelligence on a uniformed (not plainclothes) infantry army is easy to get now, thanks to heat-detecting satellites and drones. All the other army has to do is swarm the skies with drones operating at 60,000 feet, out of reach of MANPADS, that look for body heat, and whenever a clumping of dudes is sighted, it calls down surface-to-surface missiles loaded with anti-personnel cluster munitions.

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What if the light infantry moves under forrest, jungle? And in tropical countries, outdoor temperature can reach to 37 degree Celsius

Can heat be detected effectively there?

Okay, how about this:

After coming across , implausible as it is, I think it makes for an interesting scenario.

The Canadian Forces vs Native Rebels.

Consider that some of the best and most elite soldiers in the CF are natives. The Canadian Rangers force in the north is almost exclusively native. This is a force of several thousand soldiers who have been trained to be self-reliant and live off the land.

The objective of the Native Rebels is to hold territory in the North and declare independence. While there are very few settlements in the North, there is valuable energy and mineral resources. The Native Rebels' strategy is to attack energy pipelines, and to force the Canadian government to recognize that they cannot protect their assets in the North, thus creating de-facto independence and forcing private energy corporations to deal with them rather than the Federal government.

Assume that Canada is on its own in this conflict.

solarz said:

Okay, how about this:

After coming across

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, implausible as it is, I think it makes for an interesting scenario.

The Canadian Forces vs Native Rebels.

Consider that some of the best and most elite soldiers in the CF are natives. The Canadian Rangers force in the north is almost exclusively native. This is a force of several thousand soldiers who have been trained to be self-reliant and live off the land.

The objective of the Native Rebels is to hold territory in the North and declare independence. While there are very few settlements in the North, there is valuable energy and mineral resources. The Native Rebels' strategy is to attack energy pipelines, and to force the Canadian government to recognize that they cannot protect their assets in the North, thus creating de-facto independence and forcing private energy corporations to deal with them rather than the Federal government.

Assume that Canada is on its own in this conflict.

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Couldn't Canada just bomb or Predator-drone them? It's pretty hard to hide a heat signature in the middle of the tundra.

t_co said:

Couldn't Canada just bomb or Predator-drone them? It's pretty hard to hide a heat signature in the middle of the tundra.

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Actually, I think it'd be a lot harder than you think.

First, what kind of resolution would you need to pick out the heat signature of a small group of people in a land as vast as the Canadian North?

Second, how would you distinguish such signatures from herds of caribou, for example?

Third, it's doubtful that there is even much heat signature at all. The very purpose of winter clothes is to keep our body heat inside instead of radiating it outside.