North Korea special forces called credible threat
Troops could inflict a large casualty count
SEOUL - North Korea has massively increased its special operations forces, schooled them in the use of Iraqi-style roadside bombs, and equipped them to sneak past the heavily fortified border that divides the two Koreas.
By expanding what was already the world’s largest such force, the North appears to be adding teeth to what is, in essence, a defensive military strategy. The cash-strapped government of Kim Jong Il, which struggles to maintain and buy fuel for its aging armored forces, has concluded it cannot win a conventional war, according to US and South Korean military officials.
But by combining huge numbers of special forces with artillery that can devastate Seoul and missiles that can pound all of South Korea, North Korea has found an affordable way to remain terrifying, ensure regime survival, and deter a preemptive strike on the nuclear bombs that make it a player on the world stage, say US and South Korean military analysts.
“The North Koreans have done what they had to do to make sure their military is still a credible threat,’’ said Bruce Bechtol, a North Korean specialist who is a professor at the Marine Corps Command and Staff College in Quantico, Va. “They can still inflict tens of thousands of civilian casualties in Seoul on the first day of combat.’’
The havoc-raising potential of North Korea’s special forces has grown as their numbers have increased and their training has shifted to terrorist tactics developed by insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to General Walter Sharp, commander of US forces in Korea.
In a conflict, tens of thousands of special forces troops would try to infiltrate South Korea: by air in radar-evading biplanes, by ground using secret tunnels beneath the Demilitarized Zone, and by sea aboard midget submarines and hovercraft, according to South Korean and US military analysts.
Disguised in the uniforms of South Korean police and military personnel, special forces are also expected to try to walk into Seoul. Dressed as civilians, they may also arrive aboard passenger flights from Beijing and other foreign capitals.
Their primary mission, in the event of war, is to leapfrog the DMZ and create chaos among the 20.5 million residents of Greater Seoul, while harassing South Korean and US forces in rear areas, military and intelligence specialists said.
The South Korean Army is trying to improve the mobility of its trench-bound frontline infantry and has canceled plans to reduce some reserve units. It has reversed the long-planned removal of a special warfare command from southern Seoul and is preparing to buy advanced transport planes to deliver its own special forces inside North Korea.
The South Korean Navy has been ordered to change its focus from patrolling the sea to defending the shoreline from commando attacks, according to Kim Jong-dae, who edits a military magazine in Seoul and who until 2007 was a policy adviser to the minister of defense. The South Korean government declined to comment on the navy’s orders.
South Korea and the United States agree that the size of North Korean special forces is rising, but they disagree on how much.
The number of such troops is now 180,000, according to the South Korean Defense Ministry. That is a 50 percent increase since the South’s last official count three years ago. Sharp, puts the number at 80,000. That dwarfs the special forces of any country, including the United States, which has about 51,000.
Whatever the number, there is widespread agreement that the North’s special forces are increasingly formidable. Sharp describes them as “tough, well-trained, and profoundly loyal,’’ while being capable of illicit activities, strategic reconnaissance, and attacks against civilian infrastructure and military targets across Northeast Asia.
