An alternative decisive Korean War.

[Sea Skimmer]

So in real life the Korean situation is still a mess today because back in mid to late 1951 both the US and China decided to stop making big offensives, and cease really major increases in troop levels. The US capped its deployment at about eight divisions and without very lavish supporting arms. However the total US mobilization during the war involved forming a total strength of twenty army divisions and two marine divisions on active or National Guard duty. The Army had 2 armored, 1 cavalry, 2 airborne and 15 infantry divisions under this structure.
http://www.history.army.mil/books/linea ... apter9.htm

So what if the CIA develops a mind control serum that only works on Americans, or something similar happens, and the US becomes gung ho enough on the war to send almost all of those forces to Korea. We’ll say just 2 divisions are in Europe and 2 garrison Japan. That leaves 18 divisions for fighting the Chinese hoards. New formations will be raised but not deployed to rebalance world wide army deployment.

The objective is driving China completely out of Korea, and invading Manchuria if necessary, prior to the 5th anniversary of the war. Conventional Strategic bombing of Manchuria is allowed but not greater China because this is still merely a police action! Can it be done with this force level, or something reasonably similar? Would the Russians still hold off open intervention, while of course still supplying hoards of MiG-15 pilots?

[Temujin]

I think with a dedicated push by US and allied forces, and all the firepower they could bring to bear, they could definitely push the Chinese out and back into Manchuria. Massive strategic bombing of supply lines in North Korea and Manchuria ala WWII would probably reduce Chinese supplies and reinforcements to a trickle.

Regarding the Russians, I don't think continuing to supply MIGs would make much difference. Wasn't the kill ratio already at least 10-1 in favor of Allied forces. I'd be more concerned about the Russians sending in forces both in Asia and more importantly Europe, and the war escalating into WWIII.

[General Mung Beans]

What if the United States decided to undergo World War II levels of mobilization again to destroy Communism once and for all? Considering most World War II veterans are still quite young (late twenties or early thirties) and a lot of war equipment is lying around it will be less difficult than the original World War II mobilization. America (except Alaska) can't be invaded though American troops can't hope to occupy the USSR and China.

[Samuel]

What if the United States decided to undergo World War II levels of mobilization again to destroy Communism once and for all? Considering most World War II veterans are still quite young (late twenties or early thirties) and a lot of war equipment is lying around it will be less difficult than the original World War II mobilization. America (except Alaska) can't be invaded though American troops can't hope to occupy the USSR and China.

The USSR has nukes at this time. I don't think that would be a good idea.

[Lord of the Abyss]

What if the United States decided to undergo World War II levels of mobilization again to destroy Communism once and for all? Considering most World War II veterans are still quite young (late twenties or early thirties) and a lot of war equipment is lying around it will be less difficult than the original World War II mobilization. America (except Alaska) can't be invaded though American troops can't hope to occupy the USSR and China.

Um, nuclear war? And unlike WWII we wouldn't have the significant allies we had in WWII. Such as the very Soviets we are trying to destroy in your scenario.

[General Mung Beans]

What if the United States decided to undergo World War II levels of mobilization again to destroy Communism once and for all? Considering most World War II veterans are still quite young (late twenties or early thirties) and a lot of war equipment is lying around it will be less difficult than the original World War II mobilization. America (except Alaska) can't be invaded though American troops can't hope to occupy the USSR and China.

The USSR has nukes at this time. I don't think that would be a good idea.

Yes there were nukes but not enough to decimate the world (or even just one of the superpowers) and as there were no ICBMs it was unlikely the home territories of the superpowers (except Alaska and parts of Siberia) would be nuked so the US could try.

[Simon_Jester]

...Umm, hello? Intercontinental bombers?

The US in particular had bombers perfectly capable of hitting any point in Russia, and that the Russians would be extremely hard-pressed to intercept. The Russians were in a somewhat worse position, but still enough so that Europe would likely have been devastated in a third world war. Or rather, more thoroughly devastated; they weren't done rebuilding from the last round.

[Sea Skimmer]

I think with a dedicated push by US and allied forces, and all the firepower they could bring to bear, they could definitely push the Chinese out and back into Manchuria. Massive strategic bombing of supply lines in North Korea and Manchuria ala WWII would probably reduce Chinese supplies and reinforcements to a trickle.

That was very hard, in real life while we didn't bomb outside North Korea we did have long periods of going all out to bomb the railroads. We went so far as to just bomb random pieces of track, besides the bridges and rail yards to try to keep traffic halted. It didn't work. The Chinese and North Koreans formed while divisions of railway repair gangs and stationed them every few miles along the entire length of the system.

Now of course, larger Chinese forces fighting larger US forces in Korea will need more total supplies. That will hurt them for sure.

Regarding the Russians, I don't think continuing to supply MIGs would make much difference. Wasn't the kill ratio already at least 10-1 in favor of Allied forces. I'd be more concerned about the Russians sending in forces both in Asia and more importantly Europe, and the war escalating into WWIII.

The USAF claimed 10:1, 4-6:1 is more likely. But this was in large part because the Soviets had a policy of rotating fighter regiments ever month, so that everyone in the Soviet air force could get some experience, rather then leaving pilots in the fight. So the US got to shoot down noobs endlessly. If the US pushes harder, the Soviets are likely to change this policy and keep units fighting. They might also give the Chinese bombers, in real life some indication exists that they did form a Chinese bomber force but decided using it was too much escalation. So the air situation will become harder for the US.

Also the further north you go in Korea, the further away the US gets from its well established airfields in Japan. More has to be flown off freshly built Korean airfields. So this is another complication.

What if the United States decided to undergo World War II levels of mobilization again to destroy Communism once and for all? Considering most World War II veterans are still quite young (late twenties or early thirties) and a lot of war equipment is lying around it will be less difficult than the original World War II mobilization. America (except Alaska) can't be invaded though American troops can't hope to occupy the USSR and China.

The US could reach Beijing with a full scale mobilization. I don't think its a question that the US could at the least replicate the conquests of Japan 1937-1945. But that's why I figured I'd scale the mobilization down to simply using all the men the US mobilized in real life. This makes the question more interesting.

[Sea Skimmer]

...Umm, hello? Intercontinental bombers?

The US in particular had bombers perfectly capable of hitting any point in Russia, and that the Russians would be extremely hard-pressed to intercept. The Russians were in a somewhat worse position, but still enough so that Europe would likely have been devastated in a third world war. Or rather, more thoroughly devastated; they weren't done rebuilding from the last round.

Yeah, the threat of aerial atomic bombing ought to be a pretty good deterrent. As long as the US doesn't fully mobilize the Soviets can't seriously thinking the US is planning to invade them. But on the other hand, US forces in Manchuria is not very acceptable either.

Maybe Russian ground troops would deploy, but only in Manchuria to preemptively block a US thrust across the Yaul? We might then see major CCF attacks continue back across the river then? You'd basically have the US and ROK demanded a ceasefire on the Yaul as a minimal condition, while China wants a buffer zone in Korea as a minimal condition. The Yaul is a very windy river so its not a good defense line for either side really. But the land north of it in Manchuria gets flatter.

[adam_grif]

1951-2, what was the relative size of the US and Soviet atomic arsenals? If it came to atomic war, wouldn't the US have a comfortable advantage given to them by the massive headstart on their arsenal, as well as the bomber advantage?

[K. A. Pital]

1951-2, what was the relative size of the US and Soviet atomic arsenals? If it came to atomic war, wouldn't the US have a comfortable advantage given to them by the massive headstart on their arsenal, as well as the bomber advantage?

Russian arsenal was nigh zero. US had several gigatons' worth of nukes already, IIRC.

[Sea Skimmer]

Soviet nukes were in the dozens in 1950, enough that they can't be discounted though also enough that they won't be used on the battlefield. Strategic only. The US had little in the way of effective air defense (in reality we barely even had radar stations) at the time and the mighty Tu-4 can bomb North America on a one way mission, entirely reasonable for a nuclear strike. So the US can't act like the communist bomb doesn't exist. Numbers increased rapidly over the course of the historical war.

The US had about 300 nukes in 1950, but the number rose enormously to over 800 by the end of 1952. Keep in mind a large portion of this increase stemmed from the US taking apart old inefficient nukes, and using the fissile material to make more numerous more efficient devices. It wasn’t all new fissile material. Most US nukes in 1950 time would be Mk III and Mk4 devices, max 49kt and 31kt respectively depending on variant. Nukes produced during Korea had yields in the range of 100-160kt. The US could not have had even one gigaton of firepower in the early part of the war, but 100+ megatons is possible. By 1955 and the end of the time frame I specified the US would be heading into the gigaton range. I have no real idea on the evolution of Soviet nuke stockpiles 1950-55 but the arsenal was certainly picking up major speed by the end.

Neither side can destroy each other with nuclear firepower out of hand in 1951-52 when my scenario calls for the US expanding the war, particularly since the US must target China as well as the USSR, but the US could have nuked and conventionally carpet bombed its way to victory within a few years at the very worst. I would tend to imagine the communists would have surrendered earlier. However the key thing is.... neither side has good strategic intelligence in this period before the U-2 or spy satellites. So US planners can't say 'hey the commies only have 30 nukes, we can risk eating that and nuke first'. They'd have to assume any Soviet counter attack would cause massive damage to the US.

[Iosef Cross]

What if the United States decided to undergo World War II levels of mobilization again to destroy Communism once and for all? Considering most World War II veterans are still quite young (late twenties or early thirties) and a lot of war equipment is lying around it will be less difficult than the original World War II mobilization. America (except Alaska) can't be invaded though American troops can't hope to occupy the USSR and China.

The US probably never had the capability of defeating and occupying the USSR in her own ground (Eurasia) using conventional forces. There would be severe logistical problems involved in the mobilization of an American army capable of engaging the Red Army in Eurasia in the 50's.

The USSR in the early 50's was significantly stronger than in 1941 when the Germans invaded and had a much better organized army. Also, the US didn't have the advantage that Germany had on being in the border of the USSR, and hence would have the problem of crossing thousands of kilometers to fight the Red Army.

Historically, the USSR mobilized an army 2 to 2.5 times bigger than the American army during WW2 (the USSR had a 11.5 million army while the US had a 5.7 million army (army personnel discounting the personnel for the airforce), while the size of the operational forces were respectively 6.7 million for the USSR in 560 divisions and 2.5 million for the US, in 89 divisions). The USSR had the logistical advantage of being near the enemy, as result a greater proportion of their manpower could be deployed on the front.

If the US enter in a war with the USSR in the early 1950's, the Soviet forces will certainly outnumber the American. Since the population of the USSR was ca 200 million while the US had ca 160 million, I would expect the respective armed forces sizes to be 18 million for the USSR and 15 million for the US. While 90% of the USSR personnel would be in the army a smaller proportion would be in the army out of the US armed forces, perhaps 50-60%, like in WW2. Since a smaller proportion would be in the operational forces in the front, I would expect a 10 million USSR ground force opposing an 3.5 million American army. American forces would probably get torn to shreds if they tried to crush communist by conventional means without significant support for western Europe.

Of course, the use of nukes could shift the balance, but the US wouldn't risk a massive Soviet nuclear counter attack, since they didn't know the actual size of the USSR's nuclear stock. Also there is the fact that no significant number of American civilians could get killed if the war stays conventional.