Being a country that still has a mandatory military service period enforced on all of its populace; North Korea is certainly different in nature from South Korea and even the United States. According to North Korean legislation every citizen of the country is supposed to serve at least five years in the Korean People’s Army (KPA).
Looking at the country’s past we can surely say that they have never acted in aversion when it comes to warfare. Having an aggressive military focused point of view about all their national and international matters, North Korea has been in the line of fire more than once. It appears from the steps taken by their leadership in the past seven years, since their first nuclear experiment in 2006 that they won’t hold back when it comes to the time of showdown.
The tension between North and South Korea has always been armed, and similar, if not worse are their sentiments towards America. It was made certain by their recent experiments that Kim Jong Un is not willing to show any signs of flexibility, when it comes to nuclear power retention.
As a direct consequence of their 3rd nuclear test, the international community spearheaded by the US vowed to strengthen sanctions on the problem child to the maximum levels. North Korea has reacted as expected by announcing that they are now practically working towards an actual attack on the US -something that has been termed as impractical by all the leading war analysts.
But is that the real question at hand? Instead of asking whether North Korea can wage a war against the United States of America, the question we should be worrying about is; if they will. Based on their past, the answer is fairly evident yet dangerously unsettling!
North Korea has more than 1.1million of active army personnel making it the 5th largest army of the world; an even more alarming statistic is their reserve personnel count of 8.2million -world’s largest! As unbelievable as it may seem, it is true that they honestly believe that military is their sole way of survival. Putting as much as 25 percent of its GDP into the development and maintenance of army, North Korea is steadying itself as much as it can for the looming war. Since the strength of the country in terms of capabilities has been restricted due to a long standing embargo, they have developed other mediums to make up for the lack of technology like stealth based semi-submersible infiltration crafts or huge air lifters.
When it comes to facing a super power like America, one should obviously think twice. The deciding factor in the actual war, if there is one, would be resources. Looking at it from a more practical approach, North Korea doesn’t even have missiles to cover up enough area in the US if it comes to a direct assault -something N. Korea denies. Yes, they have enough ammo to sustain a battle lasting for a hundred days, but I don’t think they have enough defenses to withstand an assault from America.
Lets just hope that their recent threat turns out to be another one of their well versed tactics to trigger dialogue on flexible terms - for their own sake and the world’s. The first two world wars have given us enough loses to grieve upon that I don’t think this planet would survive another one.
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