Posted on 02/20/2024 9:27:11 PM PST by SeekAndFind
One can hardly deny that China has become more bellicose over the last few years. It's also impossible to deny that China still, after all this time, views Taiwan as a breakaway, rogue province and would like nothing more than to take it back and place it under Chinese Communist Party (CCP) rule. But China has some very troubling problems of its own: An economy in trouble, a population that's dropping off a demographic cliff, and a corrupt, totalitarian government.
That doesn't mean that they might not, at some point, try to take Taiwan anyway. On Monday, in the Asia Times, the scribe Gabriel Honrada walks us through some of China's issues.
In estimating China’s possible timeframe for a Taiwan conflict, Timothy Heath and other writers note in a June 2023 RAND analysis that Taiwan is most vulnerable to defeat in the first 90 days of a Chinese invasion.
Heath and others mention that due to Taiwan’s military disadvantages and low durability, a US intervention would be required to repel a Chinese invasion within that timeframe. Without a US intervention, they note that China’s overwhelming military resources would likely allow it to subjugate the self-governing island Beijing considers a renegade province.
There's another way to read that: "If China can't take Taiwan in 90 days, they're in trouble." But can China cross that strait with enough troops to take Taiwan in the first place? And more to the point, can they keep those troops supplied with beans, bullets, and fuel? In military matters, amateurs study tactics, while professionals study logistics; wars are always won or lost because of logistics.
And China might not be able to pull that off.
Asia Times noted in October 2023 that, at the minimum, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) might need to land 300,000 to 400,000 troops in Taiwan to quickly seize the island, following swift and sharp air and missile decapitation strikes that aim to take out Taiwan’s civilian and military leadership.
But should that fail, the PLA may have to send as many as 2 million troops to Taiwan, including police and paramilitary personnel, to ensure a three-to-one or five-to-one numerical superiority against the defender.
A three-to-one advantage is pretty much the minimum numeric advantage for an attacking force taking on a prepared defense. Add to that the difficulty of crossing all of those people, all their equipment, all their vehicles, across the strait and then keeping them supplied.
That's a major challenge, even for a country with China's resources. And China has certainly been watching the ongoing Russia/Ukraine conflict with great interest, as Russia is invading a country with which they share a long land border, and despite a considerable material advantage, has managed at best a stalemate, at most a high-tech war of attrition that will devour lives on both sides like a nightjar gulping down mosquitoes.
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But wait! There's more!
Task and Purpose, in a video this month, notes that as the PLA modernizes its equipment, it will need highly educated, technologically savvy personnel to operate it.
However, it mentions Chinese cultural views of the military as a lowly career, high emigration from China, increasing physical and psychological conditions among potential recruits, corruption in the PLA, the long-term impact of the One Child Policy and the perceived hardships of military life over a lucrative civilian career all contribute to China’s military manpower shortage.
However (there's always a, however, isn't there?) China has been building its navy aggressively for some time. At present, the Chinese People's Liberation Army Navy (that's really what it's called) can't really project power globally, mostly due to the lack of at-sea replenishment, but they certainly can use their frigate navy to support an invasion of Taiwan.
So, yes, China may be able to take Taiwan. It will be costly, horrendously so, to both sides, but they could likely do it. And if I were in Taiwan's government, I would be very concerned about the United States' promises to come to Taiwan's aid, especially under the current feckless, directionless leadership. Taiwan would be well advised to make its defense plans based on standing alone because, in such matters, it's wise to plan for the worst and hope for the best.
But keeping Taiwan? While Taiwan has no Second Amendment and no centuries-old tradition of defiance like the United States, there would still very likely be a resistance movement against the Communist invaders that would go on for generations.
So, can China take Taiwan? Probably, at a considerable cost. Can they keep Taiwan? That's much less clear.
Related:
If China invades they won’t be concerned about deaths or damage...*any* deaths and *any* damage. Wasn’t it Mao Tse Tung himself who wrote “in order to make egg foo young you have to break a few eggs”?
“A three-to-one advantage is pretty much the minimum numeric advantage for an attacking force taking on a prepared defense. Add to that the difficulty of crossing all of those people, all their equipment, all their vehicles, across the strait and then keeping them supplied.”
How do they plan to do this without the world knowing prior? Moving 300,000 troops across the strait undetected, landing them and then resupplying them is a tough nut to crack.
I honestly believe today’s military is incapable of a single armed conflict with an adversary like China. We have the technology to defeat them but we don’t have the leadership mindset or quality of personnel to do so.
It’ll take years to undo the damage Obama, Biden and the leftist institutions have done.
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No never happen. Not the Chinese way. Bluff bluster propagandize their opponents.
They have no experienced military, the PLA moral is low, all foreign ventures have ended in a humiliating failure.
Were they to even attempt it their society would collapse and the CCP would be either drastically altered or eliminated.
Take? Why? Just an air tight blockade for about 6 months will do it.
“Given cultural and familial ties, along with fifth columnists, would Taiwan really resist?”
Given cultural and familial ties, along with fifth columnists, would Ukraine really resist?
Seems to me your question has been asked and answered.
Maybe the fine folks of twan bring out the red stars and shout, better Red than dead and Yankee go home!!
“Wasn’t it Mao Tse Tung himself who wrote “in order to make egg foo young you have to break a few eggs”?”
Meow Say Tongue said, “In order to destroy centuries of Chinese you must kill one hundred million people.”
China is not going to invade. An operation to invade Taiwan would be bigger than the Normandy invasion. That is not happening.
Taiwan IS China. The US recognizes that.
China cannot afford to have the economic sanctions put on them. That country is teetering on economic disaster.
This whole Taiwan crap is election year scare mongering for the simple minded. All we are missing is Obiwan Kenobi waving his hand and saying, “These aren’t the droids we are looking for.”
I agree 100%. Most of the folks on Taiwan have family in China. They visit each other all the time.
China is not going to destroy the infrastructure there just to make a point.
“The war started becuase an incredibly corrupt government took control, and started bombing Russian areas in the Donbas.”
No, the war started because Ruzzia invaded Ukraine in 2014. What happened two years ago was just the second phase of Putin’s war.
Now Ruzzia needs to end their stupid war and withdraw to their pre-2014 borders. Period.
“China is not going to destroy the infrastructure there just to make a point.”
Sure they would. The CCP doesn’t care about Taiwan except for its strategic position in the Pacific.
Where are they going to get the computer chips they need? Destroying that source would set China back years.
The US and Japan’s could shut off China’s oil with, literally, two missile strikes and a destroyer.
China is not going to ruin their economy that way.
This is Austria 1938, not Poland 1939.
“Destroying that source would set China back years.”
The CCP doesn’t care. Their policies are right now gutting the Chinese economy as CCP power is reimposed.
If China had any sense they’d oust Taiwan and force it into independence the same way Malaysia ousted Singapore. They’d resolve the Taiwan question and settle a lot of frayed nerves in the western Pacific.
China could probably take Taiwan eventually, but it would be a long bloody slog. Taiwan has essentially spent the last half century turning themselves into an island fortress purpose build to repel an invasion from China.
As to whether they could hold Taiwan if they did manage to take it. After the massive cost in blood and money it would take to seize it, China couldn't afford NOT to hold it. To lose Taiwan after taking it would be an embarrassment of epic proportions and would probably result in the collapse of the Chinese government.
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