Operation "Enduring Peace" (Wonsan, 2021) How to undo urban hell (part 1):In November 2020, the decision to deploy a contingent of the International Mission for the Security of the Korean Peninsula (IMSKP) to the short-lived capital of Greater Korea's democratic commune is finally taken by the UN Secretary-General and the Director of UNAMI: It's now more than 6 months since U.S. U-2 flights resumed over North Korea, almost two years since the North Korean armed forces used a tactical nuclear weapon to halt the hordes of infected advancing on Pyongyang.
What emerges from the reconnaissance flights doesn't exactly reassure the South Korean authorities, who are still struggling to recover from the loss of the country's major cities in 2018: Seoul now fears that a handful of nuclear and chemical warheads may have fallen into the wrong hands and risk being used on the Korean peninsula.
But the problem obviously lies in the nature of SIGINT: it's hard to know who and how North Korea is being run at the moment, but it's very difficult, if not impossible, to mount an operation, even a clandestine one into North Korea to find out what's going on.
The risks of domestic political fallout are massive for the South Korean interim government, and even greater for UNAMI, then involved in the difficult (and failed) Operation Heartbreak in Iran.
UNAMI is something new, not necessarily suited to the renewed conflicts/warfare between humans: we can already imagine its dissolution or at least its neutralization in the form of a vague advisory group in New York.
UNAMI's main military representative, General Petr Pavel, knows that time is running out for the international organization, so he must present it in a new light, with the minimum of casualties, to justify the relevance of an anti-dead military force in a world where there are (fortunately) no more dead to kill.
It's a risky and daring political calculation, but one that requires finding the right field of engagement.
In Iran, UNAMI had to contend with a wide variety of armed groups (from Baluchi to ex-Revolutionary Guard units), often hidden among the very civilians that the international forces were supposed to help. We could also mention the non-existence of the Iranian "transition" regime and the refusal of most neighbouring countries to take part in the operation, too happy to weaken their Persian neighbor after years of geopolitical tension.
Pavel is perfectly aware of this, and knows that his margin of sympathy with international governments is very slim and getting worse, so a rapid solution is needed.
That solution is Korean....
In September 2021, the North Korean dictator's former general of staff appears on Yeonpyeong Island with a small group of "political dissidents".
He will offer a deal: political asylum in exchange for intelligence on the current state of North Korea, it's an easy decision for Seoul to make, which can thus bypass Langley's "additional" help and present itself as an independent power in Asia.
The problem is that Ri Yong-gil's information is clearly even worse than expected: North Korea has broken up into dozens of fighting factions, thus hindering the elimination of the infected by the North Korean army (Ri Yong-gil's faction) who otherwise find themselves cornered, in a position of weakness, in particular against the so-called "Wonsan" faction led by former energy minister Kim Man-Su.
Yong-gil presents the Wonsan faction as extremist and determined to obtain, if it has not already done so, the depots and the keys to North Korean atomic weapons
It is not a big deal that it was learned much later that Ri Yong-gil had largely failed to mention that the depots and the means of producing nuclear weapons had either been destroyed during the Yongbyon nuclear accident, or seriously damaged during the fights against the infected.
In short, it is a dream opportunity for UNAMI, which can thus present itself in a new light: Pavel has very good contacts with NATO and particularly the Pentagon, his proposal is simple: disarm the "Wonsan" bomb , control Ri Yong Gil and cleanse North Korea of any infected that may still be there.
Washington, which fears, since the end of the 2018 pandemic, a massive dispersion of the nuclear and chemical arsenal across the world, is entirely ready to grant a second chance to UNAMI, especially if it does not risk its men.
Seoul will provide the bulk of the contingent composed largely of elements of the First Marine Division (3rd Marine Brigade "King Kong", 7th Marine Brigade "Warthog" and finally a group formed of armored vehicles from the 1st tank battalion ) supported by Taiwan which is sending a large amphibious group there, in the desire to strengthen its ties with South Korea (and to encourage it to take a greater part in its “activities” in mainland China)
Washington will initially remain in support before changing its mind and deploying a small group from the 1st Marine Division.
In short, everyone expects a repeat of the amphibious operations of November 1950 which saw the city being quickly occupied by forces under UN mandate, except that operations rarely tend to be repeated throughout History ....