U.S. stands for Unconditional Surrender

rick

Banned
This is my first post so let's see what happens. What if the United States had taken the position in the Korean Conflict that it had taken during the Second World War and had accepted nothing less than the unconditional surrender of the DPRK (North Korea)? What would the UN's position be? What would China's reaction be? I am looking forward to the discussion!
 
This is my first post so let's see what happens. What if the United States had taken the position in the Korean Conflict that it had taken during the Second World War and had accepted nothing less than the unconditional surrender of the DPRK (North Korea)? What would the UN's position be? What would China's reaction be? I am looking forward to the discussion!

Basicly that was the U.S. goal after Inchon. Problem was, that the PLA had other plans.
 
This could get ugly if they decide to do it McArthers way and use the A-Bomb against the Chinese. But why would the US want to do that? N. Korea is not worth WWIII.

Well you see the U.S want so much North Korea to surrender they don't burn it to the ground because they would be no one left to ask for surrender
 

rick

Banned
The Chinese were still a weak nation in 1950, so I am wondering how much they would be willing to bleed to save North Korea if the US was determined to win and unify the peninsula!?!
 
The Soviet Union was just beginning to turn out atomic weapons at this time.

We'd still be before the point of MAD though. For that matter the Soviets would have a difficult time dropping a nuke on the continential US.

Guess they would retalaliate against Britain or France though.

But in a nuclear exchange in the Korean war, the US would win.
 
I think China, and to a lesser extent, the USSR, successfully cause the US to back down from unconditional surrender. Setting aside the atomic weapons, China can bring more chips, er, soldiers, to the table - Truman (and even Eisenhower) cannot politically justify removal of the DPRK if status quo ante is available.

Expect the Chinese and the Soviets (the former as petitioners as Taiwan held the seat at that time) to make greater use of the United Nations as a forum, and they'll probably pull many other nations to their side when the cost in troops is seen as too high.
 
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This is possible if you can somehow avert Chinese involvement, but once the PLA begins its offensive, unconditional surrender just isn't feasible.

On the one hand, the PLA was losing steam by '53, beginning to show cracks in the face of superior logistics and technology. On the other, the PLA still wasn't just going to pack up and leave. This turns the conflict into a bleeding match between the U.S. Army and the PLA, which still gives the advantage to the Chinese. The PRC had more men to throw around, and had a greater personal stake in defeating the Americans (they believed that the PRC was next on the menu if the DPRK fell). Sooner or later, the U.S. is going to have to seek terms, unless it can somehow convince the USSR and the PRC to let Korea go.
 

rick

Banned
I believe that if President Eisenhower had guaranteed to the Russians and the Chinese that all American troops would be withdrawn after the successful conclusion of the war, then support for Kim Il Sung would have been withdrawn. I just don't believe that China would continue to suffer the terrible casualties they would have taken in the face of a determined American effort to win.
 
I just don't believe that China would continue to suffer the terrible casualties they would have taken in the face of a determined American effort to win.
I'm going to have to disagree with you there. As I said before, China had more to lose in the equation than the U.S., making their determination to win just as resolved as that of the Americans in this scenario. Further, the Chinese had grown quite accustomed to enduring horrendous casualties during the Japanese invasion and their Civil War. Additionally, even if the war grew unpopular in the PRC, its authoritarian politics meant that public opinion wasn't likely going to cause a Chinese withdrawal.

These factors being considered, along with more Chinese bodies, makes it more likely that the U.S. would flinch first in such a contest of bloodletting.

I'm not saying its impossible for the U.S. to defeat the PLA in Korea if it possessed the will and the corpses, as the U.S. still possessed a very notable tactical and logistical advantage, but in terms of the psychological war the Chinese aren't going to blink.
 
Under no circumstances was China going to accept a united, anti-Communist Korean Republic right on its border, garrisoned by US troops, a base for our ships, aircraft and electronic listening posts. Not even under threat of nuclear bombardment would they have abandoned Kim Il Sung: they needed him as a friendly buffer. And they knew they had a sufficiently large population to absorb our nuclear strikes and keep coming after us: they understood that we could never have invaded and tried to occupy China itself. The very idea is ludicrous.
If only the Chinese had decided to dispense with the Great Leader and his regime and just abolished the DPRK, absorbing it as the Korean Autonomous Republic. Too bad it didn't happen. The South Koreans would have resented the hell out of it, though.
 
I think that given MacArthur's idea to commit nuclear weapons for the Korean War, the United States could PROBABLY get the PLA to back down, although this could mean nuclear attacks on Chinese Cities. The Soviets, which are content to supply North Korea and China for this war effort, don't want to get wiped out in a nuclear war, but the cold war turns colder at this point.

The Soviets don't want to die; they'll accept the loss of North Korea--the war was, apparently, Kim Il-Sung's idea. Expanding the war to a full scale-China vs. United States conflict would deeply antagonize the Soviet Union, but the Soviets are going to have to swallow that China is going to be "Democratic" once again.

But playing this kind of nuclear hardball is almost certainly going to lead to serious ramifications in future conflicts. MAD remains in place, but the use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear powers might become acceptable. We are looking at a doctrine where nuclear armament gets used in wars between asymmetrical combatants...

Westmoreland: We need more nuclear strikes against North Vietnam to win the war!
 
Good arguments. However, remember that nuclear weapons have already been used against Japan, which didn't have them.
 
Good arguments. However, remember that nuclear weapons have already been used against Japan, which didn't have them.

Right, but this changes what could be considered a "experimental" use to a "doctrinal" use of nuclear weapons.

I agree that China will not lightly concede North Korea--but once the nukes start landing on Chinese Cities, how can they hope to argue? If the US and China fall into full scale war and Nuclear Weapons are used to simply shut down Communist China, this would mean hundreds of nuclear weapons and the deaths of tens of millions.

The United States might very do this. Mao would be insane to find out. Either unconditional surrender means that North Korea is gone and China has taken nuclear hits that have persuaded it to give up on North Korea, or it means China has surrendered in the wake of a nuclear holocaust--I mean that litterally. China, a nation which essentially beat Japan through human waves and endless partisan activity, can't be taken down any other way.

This is a very bad series of events, and while the United States can claim to have extended its lead in Asia, not even Stalin can claim to have killed so many people...
 
What if the US used nukes on China and ended up causing China to fall in chaos after the Communist government collapsed?

That would require an all out nuclear war against China. I think China's communist government might rather opt to yield North Korea after nuclear attack. Still, a China-US war at this point would be a massive escalation of the Korean War.

China collapsing is certainly possible, but I wonder whether the United States has the will to really do this. An expansion in Korea--the simple use of nukes on a tactical level--might simply force China to concede. If this is insufficient perhaps Manchuria can be hit as its a staging ground. But to take China, with its hostile population, as an ally of the United States? Japan couldn't do it and they played very dirty. The United States is looking at Vietnam times one hundred in population and area--nothing less than genocide is going to subdue China, and we are talking about making Stalin look like the lesser evil here.

Mao can get killed, perhaps the Revolutionary government can get toppled. But a Pro-US regime isn't happening if the United States decides just to launch a rampage...
 
That would require an all out nuclear war against China. I think China's communist government might rather opt to yield North Korea after nuclear attack. Still, a China-US war at this point would be a massive escalation of the Korean War.

China collapsing is certainly possible, but I wonder whether the United States has the will to really do this. An expansion in Korea--the simple use of nukes on a tactical level--might simply force China to concede. If this is insufficient perhaps Manchuria can be hit as its a staging ground. But to take China, with its hostile population, as an ally of the United States? Japan couldn't do it and they played very dirty. The United States is looking at Vietnam times one hundred in population and area--nothing less than genocide is going to subdue China, and we are talking about making Stalin look like the lesser evil here.

Mao can get killed, perhaps the Revolutionary government can get toppled. But a Pro-US regime isn't happening if the United States decides just to launch a rampage...

Perhaps in this scenario, China balkanizes into a super-Taiwan is southern China and a communist remnant in northern China.
 
Perhaps in this scenario, China balkanizes into a super-Taiwan is southern China and a communist remnant in northern China.

Unlikely. Don't forget that the Soviet Union BORDERS China.

China can go back into warlord hell, but its probably going to be Soviet Dominated when it comes out.
 
The United States might very do this. Mao would be insane to find out. Either unconditional surrender means that North Korea is gone and China has taken nuclear hits that have persuaded it to give up on North Korea, or it means China has surrendered in the wake of a nuclear holocaust--I mean that litterally. China, a nation which essentially beat Japan through human waves and endless partisan activity, can't be taken down any other way.

...
What? China did not survive up until 1941 against Japan because they used Human Wave Tactics. They won the because they a) sacrificed their best divisions during the Battle of Shanghai in order to garner international support, b) managed to maintain a better logistic lines as the fighting progressed inwards towards China, c) Japan did not have the industry to maintain a prolonged war agaisnt a united Chinese front, d) The Chinese factions put aside their differences in order to form an uneasy alliance, and e) the Japanese knew they couldn't maintain naval superiority as embargos were placed on them.

Also, I believe that people are reading too much into the stereotype of Chinese Human Wave Tactics. It's like saying Third Reich tanks were completely superior to Soviet Tanks, and that the French Army was compeltely useless.
 
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