Inside a Top Secret U.S. Military Bunker as Tensions With North Korea Rise | WSJ

We're deep in a

secret

mountain

bunker

where the US

military

is simulating a North Korean attack across the border. Kim Jong-un has dramatically stepped up weapons testing after abandoning the goal of soulful peaceful reunification. Kim says he will annihilate South Korea and the If we are provoked as

tensions

rise

on the Korean Peninsula, there is growing concern that the Kim regime could launch a surp

rise

attack from the

north

at any time. The US

military

is taking us to a top

secret

bunker

on the outskirts of Soul, which is built underneath. a mountain, this site would serve as a command control center both for the exercises that are being carried out now with South Korea's allies and in the event of a conflict with North Korea, the location is a closely guarded secret and not we are allowed to film.

Anything that might reveal his whereabouts the Tango command post is one of the most secure US military installations on the Kore Peninsula, built deep underground. The bunker can reportedly survive a tactical nuclear attack from its maze of corridors. Paul J. Lamra commands all US forces on the Korean Peninsula. In the event of an armed conflict with North Korea, this room would become the main command and control center for us and South Korean forces. This is where the fight is synchronized. Pretty phenomenal capacity. Here we will keep it that way. It is from here that. US troops simulate a response in case of a surprise attack from Pongyang.

Much of what happens in this room is too secret to film, but we're told the exercises reflect a wide range of rapidly changing threats from the

north

. The fighting here on the peninsula has It has changed, it has changed with the weapons systems that our adversaries have that really create the 360 ​​Dees threat in multiple domains, you know, under the sea, in the sea, in the air, and in space and cyberspace, many military strategists would be a little surprised if the way Ukraine and Gaza have developed in recent years could be adapted and integrated to ensure that South Korea, the United States and their allies are prepared.

Deception is real, so we need to pay attention to that. we have an adversary that has capabilities, those capabilities are growing with the help of others and that forces us to think about it and think differently than your point about Ukraine and Gaza, uh, I have challenged our people, we cannot have a lack imagination it's that simple there is evidence that kim jong-un's forces are preparing to stretch the imagination of military planners recent activity along the demilitarized zone has raised fears that kim may be planning an attack on South Korean territory in March, photos were released of Kim supervising an attack on a simulated South Korean outpost and surveillance images released by the South Korean military show North Korean troops building new guard posts along the country's shared border in recent months to counter Kim's military.

South Korea has expanded the scale of military drills and defense drills in the capital designed to prepare the population for a major surprise attack. North Korea has concentrated much of its recent saber rattling near a group of South Korean islands in the Yellow Sea. The concern is that Pongyang could carry out a military assault contained here to put pressure on the South Korean government. The islands are a major flashpoint and lie along a hotly contested maritime border between North and South Korea. As the northern boundary line Pyang says the line was drawn illegally and has unilaterally declared its own line that extends into South Korean territory and Yum Pong Island is right in the middle of the dispute, people who live here understand that An attack from the north can happen without warning and that's because it happened here not long ago, in 2010, North Korea launched a surprise artillery attack. on the island, killing four people and damaging dozens of homes in the same year, a South Korean warship sailing in the nearby sea was sunk by a torpedo that killed 46 sailors.

The incidents brought the two countries to the brink of war as a result, the islands are some of the most militarized parts of South Korea with permanent fortifications to stop a North Korean attack. Kim Jung B is one of the yum pong village chiefs. For him and hundreds of others, that threat became real recently when North Korea fired artillery toward the island, forcing residents to flee to bunkers. He knows that an attack could occur at any time so prepare. The South Korean military is practiced in deploying forces to the islands in case of an unexpected assault and the government in Soul has promised a quick response to any attack by the South Korean military.

He is aware that the true extent of the threat from the north cannot be known; The fear is that what may appear on the horizon could be enough to drive the peninsula back into a state of war.