Game of the Week, August 17-23

From August 17 through August 23, this week’s Game of the Week is Modern Campaigns: Korea ’85, featured at 25% off. Set in the same “Cold War gone hot” universe as Fulda Gap ’85, North German Plain ’85, and Danube Front ’85, the game shifts the crisis from divided Germany to the Korean Peninsula, where Pyongyang sees America’s struggle in Europe as the chance to settle the division of Korea by force. 

Korea ’85 offers no settled history to follow: from the first barrage, both commanders are racing a clock whose pace is set as much in Europe as in Korea. Can the North rupture the DMZ, isolate Seoul, and seize the reinforcement ports before American power arrives—or can the ROK–US alliance keep its army intact, trade ground for time, and turn an apparently irresistible invasion into a trap? The campaign invites you to discover whether audacity can outrun logistics—and whether surviving the opening days is enough to reverse a war.

The Second Korean War That Never Was

The armistice of July 1953 ended the fighting in Korea without producing a peace treaty. The peninsula remained divided by the Demilitarised Zone, with two governments each claiming to represent the Korean nation. The United States retained forces in the South and formalized its commitment through the Mutual Defense Treaty, while North Korea rebuilt with Soviet and Chinese assistance. What had begun as a civil war had become one of the Cold War’s most heavily armed confrontations.

“The greatest national task confronting the Korean people is to drive the U.S. imperialist aggressors out of south Korea [sic!], accomplish the national-liberation revolution and realize the reunification of the country.”

— Kim Il Sung, Answers to the Questions Raised by the Iraqi Journalists’ Delegation, Pyongyang, 1971.

The frontier was never truly quiet. In the late 1960s, North Korean infiltrations and ambushes along the DMZ produced a conflict sometimes called the “Second Korean War.” The seizure of the USS Pueblo in 1968, the shooting down of a US reconnaissance aircraft in 1969, and the axe murders at Panmunjom in 1976 showed how quickly a local incident could become an international crisis. Yet deterrence held. Both Koreas expanded their armed forces, and every new fortification, artillery position, and exercise prepared for a war neither side could be sure it could control.

By 1985 the geography made the danger acute. Seoul, the political and economic center of South Korea, lay less than thirty miles from the DMZ. Much of the peninsula was mountainous, channeling mechanized movement onto a limited network of valleys, roads, and river crossings. The Republic of Korea Army deployed most of its regular formations forward because surrendering depth meant exposing the capital. The US 2nd Infantry Division guarded the approaches north of Seoul, while American air, naval, and ground reinforcements in Japan and the United States formed the deeper strength behind the alliance.

North Korea possessed the advantages of preparation, concentration, and a large force close to the frontier. Its doctrine emphasized a violent opening blow, heavy artillery, rapid penetration, and special operations against the enemy rear. The problem was time. A northern attack had to rupture the forward defenses, disrupt mobilization, and prevent American reinforcement before losses and logistics consumed its initial superiority. Pyongyang could not assume that the Soviet Union or China would rescue a failed offensive.

Korea ’85 places that military balance inside a fictional global crisis. In the game’s alternate history, the Warsaw Pact opens Operation RHINEGATE against NATO in Germany on June 10, 1985. The attack is not coordinated with Pyongyang, but North Korean intelligence has detected enough Soviet preparation for Kim Il Sung to recognize an opportunity. With American attention and reserves drawn toward Europe, he approves Operation CHUCHE. On June 15, North Korean artillery opens fire and the first echelon attacks across the DMZ.

The plan is more ambitious than a direct assault on Seoul. Engineers open infiltration tunnels behind allied positions; airborne troops descend west of the capital; and amphibious forces strike at Inchon. While infantry and artillery batter the ROK corps along the frontier, armored and light infantry formations are to pass through the breaches. Seoul will be screened and isolated rather than allowed to absorb the invading army in an urban battle. The mobile columns will instead drive south, seize ports and airfields, trap much of the allied army around the capital, and force a ceasefire before American power can arrive in strength. Destroying the US 2nd Infantry Division is central to the plan, both to open the roads and to inflict a shock.

The opening days appear to vindicate the gamble. North Korean troops force the defenders from much of the DMZ and reach the outskirts of Seoul by June 19. The capital is increasingly isolated as spearheads push around it toward the lower Han and, in the west, as far as the Kum River. Yet the decisive destruction does not occur. ROK formations withdraw through the rough central terrain, reform, and continue fighting. Allied artillery remains effective, while the North Korean advance carries its guns and supplies farther from prepared positions. Roads become congested, air attack punishes columns, and the forces masking Seoul consume strength needed at the spearheads.

“This Nation is fully determined to maintain its commitment to the Republic of Korea.”

— President Jimmy Carter, statement on the withdrawal of U.S. ground combat forces from Korea, April 21, 1978.

By late June the relationship between the two theaters changes again. NATO’s position in Europe improves after June 22, releasing more American support for Korea just as the northern offensive approaches its limit. The US 3rd Marine Division lands near Changhang on June 28, while the 9th and 25th Infantry Divisions join a counteroffensive beginning the next morning near Ch’ungju. Allied forces break the encirclement of Seoul on July 1. With fuel and ammunition failing, air superiority lost, and much of its western striking force threatened with isolation, the North Korean army falls back; the game’s narrative brings the conflict to a ceasefire on July 8.

This imagined campaign is therefore a contest between operational speed and strategic endurance. The northern commander must open routes, choose where to commit the second echelon, contain Seoul without becoming trapped by it, and reach the southern ports before the allied build-up becomes overwhelming. The ROK–US commander must preserve formations through the first shock, use mountains and rivers to slow the advance, protect reinforcement routes, and judge when survival can give way to counterattack. Decisions made on the roads south of Seoul are inseparable from events thousands of miles away in Germany.

What's in the Game

• Korea ’85 includes 73 Scenarios – covering all sizes and situations, including a solo tutorial scenario plus specialized versions for both head-to-head play and vs the computer AI.
• The master map (56,210 hexes) includes Yonan in the north, Taegu in the south, and Sokch'o in the east.
• The order of battle file covers the North Korean, Chinese, South Korean and United Nations forces that would have participated in the campaign, with other formations added in for hypothetical situations.
• Order-of-Battle, Parameter Data and Scenario Editors, which allow players to customize the game.
• The Sub-map feature allows the main map to be subdivided into smaller segments for custom scenario creation.
• Design notes which cover the production of the game, campaign notes and a bibliography that includes the sources used by the designer team to produce this simulation game.
• Korea '85 provides multiple play options including play against the computer AI, Play by E-mail (PBEM), LAN & Internet "live" play as well as two-player hot seat.

Book and Video Recommendations

Mitzer, Stijn, and Joost Oliemans. 2020. The Armed Forces of North Korea: On the Path of Songun. Warwick: Helion & Company.

Oberdorfer, Don, and Robert Carlin. 2013. The Two Koreas: A Contemporary History. Rev. and updated 3rd ed. New York: Basic Books.

Roehrig, Terence. 2006. From Deterrence to Engagement: The U.S. Defense Commitment to South Korea. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.

Bloomfield, Gary L. 2019. The Devil’s Playground: Inside America’s Defense of the Deadly Korean DMZ. Guilford, CT: Lyons Press.

Screenshots

We hope you enjoy this week’s Game of the Week: Modern Campaigns: Korea ’85. Like all WDS titles, it provides countless hours of rich historical gameplay at a very attractive price.