Debate: Would North Korea win in a war against USA
Side: North Korea

While China has been playing the good Samaritan in relations with the United States in dealing with NK and has supported certain measures, China will never be in support of Western aggressive actions in the Pacific so close to home. The kind of US (NATO) presence a war with North Korea would bring would be entirely unacceptable to the Chinese.China cannot afford to let the US invade NK because it is a Chinese recognised buffer zone between them and the large US contingent in SK. This is one possible reason why the Chinese are amassing soldiers with heavy weaponry direct on the NK border.The US have exercised war-gaming plans in the event of a NK downfall that includes invading to secure the reactors and any nukes. A US General has indicated that it will require at least 200k US troops on the ground to do this. If the NK Government does fall you have masses of Chinese soldiers rushing in to take over. This is a fight the Americans cannot afford because of their limited supply lines but the Chinese can afford because China borders with NK with short supply lines and half a billion possible soldiers to conscript.Let's just look at a possible scenario:NK strikes Seoul. There is a limited military exchange between NK and SK. During the exchange the Americans step in and do a "Bagdad" firing a barrage of cruise missiles destroying the NK capital and surrounding areas They then broaden the pattern to reach possible nclear bunkers and heavy artillery.The NK Government wobbles and the Chinese, not wanting to let the Americans take over NK detroying their buffer zone, march in with guns blazing.The Americans mistake the Chinese Army influx as a massive NK heavy troop movement and douse it with a barrage of cruise missile and artillery from naval vessels.China rataliates from it's mainland with a barrage of heavy artillery that would amount to a wall of metal againt the US Navy vessels that fired the missiles. US Aircaft carrier so damaged that it is not possiblr to use as a take-off-landing strip.The US rataliates against the Chinese mainland batteries and missile complexes. The US lannches it's heavy bombers in order to be ready for any eventuality. The US prepares it's nuclear forces. Some European countries deny access to their airspace making heavy bomber flights even longer.Escalation provokes Chiness patience. The Chinese dump their $1trilion reserve in $US notes all at once onto the open exchange market causing the $ to implode. Petrol prices go so high that you can no longer afford it, supply lines transport in the US begin to dwindle/stop. Air transport is gone out of the reach of all but the richest. The US initiates martial law and locks it's broders tight.The Chinese seeing an advantage launch several tactical low-yield nukes against the US Navy while putting their own bombers into the air. Several US bombers move over Chinese territory to threaten Chinese military buildup on the borders and target the launch sites.The US launches it's own tactical nukes and hit NK and China in retaliation.China launches ICBMs to hit major US civilian population centres. Newy York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston and others - all gone, along with 20-30 million lives.The US retailiates and hits Guangzhou, Shanghai, Beijing with a loss of 50-80 million lives. China still has a population of 1.5 billion which are all being mobilised.Due to imminent nuclear threats from the UK and Frence Governments, China retaliates against US allies targetting military bases and capital cities. France, UK, Italy, Spain, Japan are all hit very hard and lay in tatters. The nuclear exchange last 2-3 hours followed by single launches over the next 7-10 days.One month from initiation the total death toll on all sides, 600 million to 1.5 billion. This does not take into account decades/years of nuclear winter, radiological effects and those of the breakdown of civilised society.God forbid that one of the US ICBMs drops off into Russia by accident, they might see this as a US first strike.In the end their is a risk that chemical and biological weapons come into play, the death toll could then rise to over 2 billion over the coming months. Having all this happen or just letting some looney rant, I know which I would prefer. Even letting NK attack SK and not retaliating would in no way produce the absolute carnage caused by a nuclear, biological and chemical war should they spiral out of control.Some facts:The largest nuclear weapons ever built by the US was the B41 (Mk41), with a max yield of 25mt. It weighed 10650lbs and was 12 feet long. These have not been produced since the 1960's. The highest yield missile warhead ever deployed by the US was the W53 warhead with a 9mt yield. The last high yield bomb produced by the US was the B53-Y2. After it's retirement in 1965 the highest yield US weapon is the variable yield B83, with a maximum yield of 1.2 mt.The largest nuclear weapon ever developed by any nuclear power was the Soviet RDS-220, also called the Tsar Bomb. In a test explosion using lead as a damper instead of uranium, it had a yield of 58mt, in the full version (without lead) 150mt. All standard and current Russian weapons including NGB, SLBMs and ICBMs have yields of between 5 and 50mt.Particularly the SS-18 (Satan R-36M2) is current and nasty. The single warhead variant has the 15F175 warhead providing a 20mt yield. The MIRV'd version provides 20-36 550kt warheads. The single-warhead R-36M2 is the highest yield nuclear weapon currently deployed by any nation. Add all this to the fact that most of Russian nukes are very mobile targets. Not easy to keep track of while the fireworks are going off.The standard warhead on all Chinese ICBMs is currently 5mt with a range of 13000km. The Chinese rockets are mostly based in a wide ranging collection of hardened tunnels.