Quote Originally Posted by UrsaMaior View Post
Wilf
While being conservative in military matters is not only needed but also required, you cannot stop the wheel of time by simply closing you eyes. NK needs deterrence. They cannot do it with their missiles, with their nukes so they resort to IW.
OK, but when has this ever not been blindingly obvious? It is very raison d'etre of Irregular Forces.

No one in the foreseeable future will have the industrial hinterland to match the US conventional strength (CVBGs, air regiments). So they HAVE to resort to IW. In turn in which NATO and other western forces have so to say mixed record. See China's White paper from 1996. You can find it in globalsecurity.org
Again obvious - and it also side steps the very debatable idea that the US and NATO are competent against any regular military force that are not complete clowns. You do not need much in the way of military capability, intelligently employed to challenge NATO.
IMO, there is no IW. Only irregular Forces. How is an ambush, a suicide bomber or an IED something "irregular"?

And on the top of that there is the media which unlike the other state powers is neither controlled, nor limited by borders. A classic case for that is the demand by the USMC in Fallujah march 2004 to remove the Al-Jazeera reporters from the town as part of the ceasefire agreement.
Modern War flows from modern politics. Nothing changes. All media is political, and therefore actors in the conflict. This has never not been the case, as long as media has existed.