The bloodiest conflict of the 21st century starts out quiet enough.
A few dozen street cleaners across Seoul go about their business,
spraying pesticide and disinfectant spray on sidewalks and bushes around the most popular and
important business and cultural sites of Seoul. There's few people out this early in the morning,
and the sun's just starting to rise- but within two hours the South Korean
capital will be swarming with almost 10 million people, and an additional 1 million tourists.
By noon 500,000 will be dead.
The street cleaners are North Korean agents, who snuck across the border months ago
loaded up with backpacks and sprayers full of various chemical and biological agents.
Going about their business largely ignored by authorities, the sprayers
have infected several square kilometers of one of Asia's most important cities,
and the highly contagious agents have reached millions of people in the span of a few hours.
The chemical agents are more immediately lethal,
nerve agents which target the brain's ability to send signals to the various organs of the body.
Hundreds of thousands seize up, paralyzed and unable to breathe as they slowly asphyxiate.
Medical services are immediately overwhelmed, and far too late to save most victims.
The biological agents the North Korean sleeper agents have spread across Seoul
will take longer to take their toll. These include anthrax, hemorrhagic fever,
yellow fever, smallpox, and plague. Highly virulent, those affected will spread the diseases
across the rest of the population and in days the death toll will reach in the millions.
The attack on Seoul is repeated across South Korea's major cities,
especially Busan- a strategically important city for the US's defense of South Korea.
Agents attempt to infect US and South Korean bases,
but these have environmental systems which immediately alert authorities to the attack.
It's not enough to stop all casualties, but it does severely limit the effects of the attack.
By the time it's obvious that North Korea has struck the first blow,
the second, terrible blow falls square on Seoul itself.
Hundreds of long-range guns open up on the South Korean capital from behind
the demilitarized zone. They are joined by over a thousand rocket projectors,
creating a literal rain of steel that falls down on the densely populated city.
Every minute an astonishing 10,000 high explosive rounds falls on the city. The casualties are
immediate and immense, with nearly a million people dying in the first hour of the attack.
But not all of those incoming rounds are conventional.
Thousands of VX gas munitions explode in the skies over Seoul, spreading the incredibly lethal agent
throughout the city. Long range missiles loaded up with VX, smallpox, and other biological agents
are fired by the hundreds at other South Korean cities and military bases. The US bases of
Osan and Kunsan come under direct attack from conventional, chemical, and biological weapons,
but US made Patriot missile batteries succeed in destroying many of the older generation missiles
targeting these critically important bases. A few manage to slip through,
but the damage is limited by the fact that US troops are vaccinated against anthrax,
smallpox, and various other biological agents. South Korean forces however are not,
and attacks against the South Korean military are far more deadly.
US and South Korean warplanes are attempting to take to the air,
but North Korean special forces have launched daring raids against most major air fields.
At Osan and Kunsan, the North Korean special forces soldiers launch suicidal raids against
the American planes stationed there. US security forces manage a robust defense,
but the attacks still manage to destroy or damage many high value American aircraft
and even more importantly, slow down air operations significantly.
With planes in the air within minutes of the shelling of Seoul though,
an immediate hunt for North Korea's deadliest weapons is on.
American and South Korean warplanes scream across the border and into North Korea.
American and South Korean F-15s and F-16s clash with waves of antiquated North Korean Migs. It's
a complete turkey shoot for the American and South Korean air forces, but the sheer number of
defenders slow them from their ultimate objective: the destruction of North Korea's nuclear weapons.
From Japan and operational bases in South Korea, American special forces are being rushed to the
north with one job: seize North Korean nuclear sites before the weapons stored there can be used.
But they're not the only ones trying to get to North Korea's nukes.
China has been monitoring the situation in the Korean peninsula closely,
and for a few years has had an elite cadre of special forces deployed near its border with
the North. At the outbreak of hostilities, Chinese special forces board helicopters
and fly at full speed towards their former ally. Their orders are simple and clear:
seize North Korea's nuclear weapons before they can be used, and kill any who stand in their way.
But does that include American special forces attempting to do the same thing?
Nobody knows, but what is clear is that with most of North Korea's nuclear sites
within 60 miles of its border with China, the Chinese will likely get there first.
But those efforts are moot at the moment, as a dozen long-range ballistic missiles lift off
from launchpads in the mountainous north. The world holds its breath as the missiles streak
up and into the sky, breaking through the atmosphere. It was once believed that Kim
Jong Un would only use nuclear weapons as a last resort, but recently it's become clear
he was willing to use them in the opening stages of a conflict. His gambit is simple:
force the United States to rethink its willingness to defend South Korea.
To achieve his goals, the missiles are aimed at the American air bases in Osan and Kunsang,
the port city of Busan, and several other South Korean cities. A final missile is aimed straight
at the US's base in Guam. Despite having the capability of striking at the US homeland,
Kim Jong Un has decided not to- an explicit message to the American president,
is he willing to trade Los Angeles for Seoul by defending South Korea in this war?
American Terminal High Altitude Defense systems target the North Korean missiles in their terminal
phase, while off-shore AEGIS equipped South Korean and American destroyers lend their
own missile defense support. Working in tandem, the missile defense of the south manages to stop
eight of the missiles. Four hit their mark. The American air base in Osan goes up in nuclear fire,
as does the port city of Busan and two other metropolitan centers. The missile aimed at Guam
is intercepted by the island fortress's robust missile defenses, but the message is clear:
Kim is willing to use nukes against distant American targets, to include the homeland.
The loss of Busan is especially damaging for the US's plans to defend the South. The port
city is the only major port where the US would be able to disembark the large numbers of troops and
combat material needed to defeat the North. While the US has 30,000 troops in South Korea, it's
estimated that it will need at least 200,000 to end the threat of the Kim regime once and for all.
Even as the North's nuclear missiles are falling in the south,
the air war against North Korea has already devastated much of its nuclear infrastructure
and command and control nodes. Despite this, fully eliminating North Korea's nuclear
capabilities will require a ground invasion with conventional forces, even with special
operations forces inserted into the North within hours of the conflict starting in earnest. These
American troops have run into stiff resistance from North Korean defenders, and in some places
have made contact with Chinese special forces that beat them there. Washington is perfectly fine with
Beijing gaining control of North Korea's nukes, so a conflict between the two sides is averted.
However, North Korea has prepared to defend its nuclear weapons from both China and the US,
and not all insertions to seize its nuclear sites have gone to plan. American and Chinese units
have been completely decimated at several key locations, overwhelmed by North Korean defenders.
After a blistering barrage of nuclear, chemical, and biological attacks against
military facilities and civilian targets alike, air operations are having difficulty
meeting the sortie rates required to check the North Korean advance across the DMZ.
The United States is surging air forces from Japan into the battle, and to everyone's surprise Japan
has officially joined the fight. It's long-range strike capabilities are quite limited though,
and instead for now the Japanese air force aids in establishing air superiority
and providing close air support for ground units engaged in fierce combat.
The North's forces have poured across the minefields and barricades of the DMZ
like a massive human wave. The casualties have been absolutely staggering,
but with well over a million men to throw at the South,
the losses have been easily absorbed by the gargantuan North Korean military. American
and South Korean border units fight fiercely but are overwhelmed by the unrelenting assault.
The mass concentration of North Korean artillery has suffered significant
losses during its shelling of Seoul to counter-battery fire and air strikes,
but the sheer numbers of guns deployed by the north still give it blistering firepower with
which to batter the South's defenders. Losses along the South's line units are incredible,
and despite having superior equipment, training, and firepower, the South's much smaller army is
being steadily pushed back towards Seoul by the end of the first day of fighting.
Night slows down the North's advance, as many of its troops and vehicles lack
night vision equipment or thermal imaging. Now is the chance for the South to strike back,
and US and South Korean attack helicopters and armor units launch a brutal counter-attack against
the North's forces. The US only operates a token force of tanks in South Korea- about 50 at any
one time- but the big Abrams easily outmatch and outgun any of the Cold War era tanks the North
has to offer. Fighting alongside South Korean K2 tanks, despite being vastly outnumbered
the Souths' defenders inflict catastrophic losses on the North over a night of fighting.
But it's not enough, and thanks to its massive artillery forces,
the North manages to inflict large losses of its own on the American and South Korean armor units.
The bombing of North Korea has been non-stop since the beginning of the conflict. Massive American
B-52s drop hundreds of thousands of pounds of ordnance on the North's advance into the South,
but flying from bases in Japan and Guam their sortie rates are very low.
Additional B-52s and B-1s are being surged from the US mainland and European theater,
but they will take a few days to be operational.
B-2 stealth bombers however have been flying from the US mainland overnight, refueled by aerial
tankers. They slip through North Korean radar en route to deliver surgical strikes against
North Korean political and military targets. Armed with massive ground-penetrating bunker
buster munitions, the B-2s deliver a crippling strike on key North Korean facilities- but the
plan to decapitate the North Korean government with one swift strike fails. Kim Jong Un has
survived the attack, and intelligence is spotty on where exactly the North Korean leader is.
Notably though, the B-2s are not armed with nuclear weapons. It seems despite the threat
to Guam and successful strikes against a US air base and South Korean cities,
the United States is not willing to escalate up the nuclear ladder.
With the aid of US air power, the South's forces are able to halt the North Korean advance
just past Seoul. The once vibrant capital is now a post-apocalyptic wasteland, with millions dead in
its streets and most of its infrastructure utterly destroyed by a bombardment the scale of which has
never before been seen in human history. Millions more have survived, and are now in desperate need
of food, water, and medical care, but the North is not interested in meeting the needs of a captured
civilian population. Instead, in order to prevent the spread of diseases they themselves infected
the city with, a brutal quarantine has been put in effect around every entry point into the city,
with any violators immediately shot on sight and their bodies burned.
The international community requests that the North Korean government allow
humanitarian flights into the city to treat survivors and evacuate the population,
but with China now considered a mortal enemy of the Kim regime,
there is no nation with the logistical capability to undertake such a massive operation that the
North isn't at war with or trusts. The survivors of Seoul have now become a bargaining chip for
the North- which demands reunification with the South but under its own terms.
The situation is dicey for the democratic South to say the least. While its forces,
backed up by massive amounts of American air and naval power, have checked the North's advance
into their country, they're unable to push them back across the border. The plan was always for
the South to act as a blocking force against the north long enough for the United States to surge
combat troops into the nation. But with the port facilities at Busan devastated, and other ports
contaminated by biological or chemical attack, the offloading of large numbers of American troops and
equipment- a proposition that would have normally required six weeks- will now take months. It
could be as much as four months before the US has enough forces in-theater to drive the North out.
The survivors of Seoul will not last four months- within three weeks uncontaminated
food and water supplies will have run out, and disease will have killed tens of thousands more.
In two months the several million survivors, trapped by North Korean forces, will all be dead.
American combat troops are even now being loaded into their fleet transport ships as
air transports surge small amounts of forces into the country, but the
ultimate choice is on the surviving South Korean government. Are they really willing
to commit five million survivors in Seoul to death as they wait for their American allies?
And are they willing to risk further nuclear attacks, now that it's become
clear the United States will not use nuclear weapons of its own in defense of South Korea?
Now go check out North Korea vs United States 2021 Military comparison,
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