[KiraYamatoFan]

Originally Posted by Semblance_of_Power

The issue is that we know so few facts about how the NK regime actually works that it makes it difficult to understand why they act the way they do and who exactly is responsible for their policies.

Maybe Kim Jong-un is a perfectly reasonable person, as much as the leader of a homicidal regime can be such a thing, that's all for better relationships with the world but there's some old school hard-line military faction that wields too much power and he has to keep doing crazy, provocative shite to keep them happy. Maybe it's the other way around.

In any case, the fact that the country is led by one or more loose cannons is a situation that can hardly be tolerable in the longer term for anybody. Throughout history, loose cannons always end up dead or silenced forever because they are simply too dangerous to be kept around.

So i guess the ideal situation for China would be an obedient NK regime that serves as a buffer against the US and SK and is managed well enough not to implode, but direct military action against a supposed "communist" ally would still imply direct confrontation with at least a faction of a regime with a ton of, albeit really outdated, military hardware and possibly short range tactical nukes.

In an extreme case where an invasion takes place, those nukes would be primary targets for bombings. But as for the rest of the North Korean military hardware, they are likely to be targets for a turkey shoot against assault helicopters and fighter-bombers.

The reason why I raised the hypothetical question was that history has shown since 1954 that "allies" who go rogue against any superpower end up being swiftly invaded. Furthermore, some PLA generals might feel the need to test their new toys as well (just as in any big army). Last but not least, Kim Jong-Un's elder brother lived in China for a good amount of time during his exile; he might just be that puppet China would consider putting in place without creating too much controversy inside North Korea.

The military, economic and political cost of that just seems too high, specially because it wouldn't be just a Western style bombing campaign while hoping some third party on the ground gets the job done, it would probably require a full on invasion and temporary occupation and that sure as hell would produce a ton of refugees that would now be their responsibility in the eyes of the international community, plus all the aforementioned panic in global markets. It just seems like a solution that's worse than the problem itself.

Well, it could also be a swift invasion with tons of NK soldiers surrendering at the sight of the PLA. In such case, we may not talk about a refugee crisis, but only about minor migrations that don't even make up for one million people. I still remember the old videos in which Saddam called for jihad before Desert Storm and reporters talking about the prospect of chemical warfare, but only to later see that Iraqi troops surrendered by the thousands within 4 days of open battles.

On a sidenote: I'm quite surprised that for all the usual hawkish talk by the CCP/PLA against the US and Japan, they don't push to have a good testing battleground somewhere (like North Korea). Is there such a lack of faith in the PLA's capabilities?