Posted on 12/22/2003 7:30:21 AM PST by Theodore R.
The bone in Beijing's throat
Posted: December 22, 2003 1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2003 Creators Syndicate, Inc.
During the early Cold War, Nikita Khrushchev referred to West Berlin, the free city of 2 million surrounded by the Red Army and East Germany, as "a bone in our throat." That bone helped kill the Soviet Empire. Now, the bone in Beijing's throat is Taiwan.
Though the island was ruled by the mainland for only four years of the 20th century, Beijing claims Taiwan as a lost province.
Before 1945, Taiwan was a colony of Japan, which had seized it in the Sino-Japanese war of 1894-1895. In 1945, the Americans turned Taiwan over to the Chinese Nationalists of Chiang Kai-shek, 2 million of whom fled there when defeated by Mao's hordes in 1949.
Chiang ruled Taiwan until his death, and was succeeded by his son
Since 1949, under American protection, Taiwan has developed into a democratic, prosperous land of more than 20 million, most of whom are ethnic Taiwanese. But to Beijing, Taiwan belongs to China. Its rulers have been clear: Any declaration of independence means war.
What is the position of the United States? It is ambiguous, and it is often due to a lack of clarity that wars come.
In 1972, Richard Nixon made his historic journey to Beijing. In the Shanghai Communique negotiated by Henry Kissinger, the United States said it did not dispute the claim by Chinese on both sides of the strait that Taiwan was part of China. Yet, Nixon maintained an embassy in Taipei and the U.S. mutual security treaty with Chiang's Republic on Taiwan.
In 1978, Jimmy Carter ordered both diplomatic relations and the security treaty terminated. He recognized the People's Republic of China as the legitimate government of China. A firestorm ensued. Congress then passed a Taiwan Relations Act, declaring a U.S. interest that there be no forcible seizure of the island by the successors of Mao.
In 1996, when Beijing fired test rockets toward Taiwan, Bill Clinton sent two carrier battle groups to show American resolve. In 2001, George W. Bush declared he would do whatever necessary to defend Taiwan from forcible seizure by Beijing.
Now the Taiwan Strait is heating up, and the aggressor in this confrontation is Beijing. For years, it has steadily built up a force now numbering 496 missiles opposite the island. For their part, Taiwanese leaders have begun to talk of independence.
Up for re-election in March and trailing, President Chen Shui-bian has cleverly scheduled a referendum the same day, in which the people of Taiwan can vote to demand that Beijing remove the missile threat.
While this non-binding referendum is hardly a mortal threat to Beijing, President Bush, during the visit of Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, excoriated Taiwan's elected president for a provocation in even holding the referendum. Bush made no mention of the near 500 rockets targeted against Taiwan.
The title of a Washington Post editorial, "Mr. Bush's Kowtow," got it exactly right.
A gloating Wen thanked Bush for dissing America's old friend and went home. China has since conducted a campaign of propaganda and intimidation, threatening war on Taiwan if it dares declare independence.
What is going on here?
George W. Bush is in a box of his own making.
With his axis-of-evil speech threatening Iran, Iraq and North Korea with war if they did not abandon all efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction, Bush jolted Kim Jong-Il. Pyongyang quickly broke out of the nuclear nonproliferation treaty and began to ratchet up its program to build nuclear weapons.
Then Bush, true to his Bush Doctrine, invaded Iraq and effected the regime change some of his advisers have said is in store for North Korea.
Pyongyang's response has been to throw off all constraints on its nuclear programs and demand a unilateral U.S. guarantee that we will not do to North Korea what we just did to Iraq. Else, Pyongyang threatens, it will go nuclear.
If Bush wishes to avoid having his Bush Doctrine challenged by North Korean testing and deployment of nuclear weapons, he needs some political, diplomatic and economic cards to play against Kim Jong Il. He has almost none.
But China does have leverage with North Korea. Thus, Bush needs Beijing's help, and thus Bush provides political support for Beijing by trashing our friends on Taiwan for their outrage in holding a non-binding referendum telling China to take down the missiles aimed at their island. Still, China has yet to use that leverage on North Korea.
America needs to review its China policy. We buy 10 percent of her GDP every year. We annually transfer factories, technology, jobs. We give her unrestricted access to our $11 trillion market. What are we getting in return, besides cheap consumer goods?
Compare this situation to that faced by the French in 1940 after the panzers broke through. The French still had the ability to resist, but their political leadership thought they were broken and an accomodationist/defeatist faction came to the fore.
People mistakenly analogize Taiwan to Israel when it comes to their qualitative military superiority. The fact of the matter is, a lot of their hardware is rather old and they have a real problem upgrading it. China, on the other hand, not only has a massive quantitative superiority, but also access to excellent Russian equipment of recent vintage. Furthermore, Taiwan's young people are creatures of modern culture. The garrison state mentality that existed in the early years is gone. If China were to move on Taiwan, there would be some in the public and the government who would advocate taking a HK deal. It's a question of will, that's the true center of gravity.
Figures for the DF-15 (the workhorse
It's obvious that your knowledge of the Chinese military is at least 5 years out of date - you've shown that with your comments on their ICBMs, submarines, fighter jets, & now their theater ballistic missiles.
A lot has NOT happened in 5 years. The Song class of SSKs turned out to be duds--so the ChiComs have to buy more Kilos. The Type 093 is still "under construction," and will be about as good as a late-build Permit-class boat. Their ICBM forces are, to put it mildly, stagnant.
The DF-15 has a CEP ~50 meters using GPS or Glonass.
Uh-huh. GPS is subject to "selective availability." Glonass simply doesn't work that well--you'd get 300 meter CEP at best.
Only a complete idiot relies on a guidance system controlled by one's enemy.
And, of course, this assumes that nobody in the loop for building the DF-15s walked off with the money and ripped off the PLA--despite fraud and corruption being rampant in the ChiCom military...
Many of them are terminally guided.
Facts and figures, please. What sort of terminal guidance? When was it tested? Did it actually work?
Same with the medium-range DF-21s.
In that case, the DF-21 threat's already been killed--just deceive their GPS systems, and watch the warheads land WAY off target.
Problem is, China now has long-range artillery that can reach Taiwan as well. And while a CEP of 50m is still too high to target individual aircraft it can probably cause big problems for large stationary facilities like hangars or fuel dumps.
And, of course, the ROC AF isn't smart enough to put in underground infrastructure, unlike their wily inscrutable counterparts on the other side of the Taiwan Strait.
BTW, there is an issue with long range artillery--if they are as accurate as their US counterparts, your miss distance will be about 500 meters long or short of target, and 200-300 meters left/right.
You don't have to destroy warplanes to render them unfit for combat.
True. But you have to destroy real targets.
And, even then, you have to follow through with boots on the ground--and unless the ChiComs get Louis Farrakhan to organize a "Million Man Swim," that 80+ miles of Taiwan Strait is going to stop them dead until 2015--by which point, they're going to have some more pressing issues to deal with.
Absent nukes, they don't do enough. They are a particularly expensive means of delivering HE to Taiwan.
And they don't put boots on the ground.
As for their accuracy, no one is entirely sure what off the shelf upgrades have been made with Russian and/or Loral/Clintonian assistance.
No one is sure that those "proving ground" figures will be anything matching reality, either.
Also, nobody is sure the damn things will work as advertised. In testing, where the missiles are extensively checked out and any problems fixed by factory technicians before launch, these things have a 75% reliability rate.
Absent such intense prelaunch workup, what's the reliability figure going to be?
In any event, quanatity has a quality all its own.
True. But without nuclear warheads, the "quantity" of missiles required would be in the tens of thousands.
Between their missiles, sleepers/SF, and their attack aircraft (yes, they're mostly elderly), they can disrupt Taiwan's response. Cause chaos. Sow confusion. Degrade capabilities.
Yes. But friction works both ways. And covert warfare has very finite limits on its ability to influence events. To take down an entire free society solely by blowing some stuff up and causing some chaos? Hell, if you get even slightly unlucky, you're liable to blow away the "accomodationists" you're relying on.
Compare this situation to that faced by the French in 1940 after the panzers broke through. The French still had the ability to resist, but their political leadership thought they were broken and an accomodationist/defeatist faction came to the fore.
After an attack that generated very large numbers of civilian casualties, "accomodationists" would be wise to keep their heads down and call for the destruction of the mainland heathen.
People mistakenly analogize Taiwan to Israel when it comes to their qualitative military superiority. The fact of the matter is, a lot of their hardware is rather old and they have a real problem upgrading it.
A lot of their hardware isn't old. They get a lot of time to practice with their equipment. And, unless they are dumber than a box of rocks, Taiwan has a sizable nuclear arsenal.
China, on the other hand, not only has a massive quantitative superiority, but also access to excellent Russian equipment of recent vintage.
And they get very little training time with it.
Furthermore, Taiwan's young people are creatures of modern culture. The garrison state mentality that existed in the early years is gone. If China were to move on Taiwan, there would be some in the public and the government who would advocate taking a HK deal.
Ah, the standard "the youth are weak and decadent" line favored by all totalitarians.
After a massive attack, anyone advocating taking a HK deal would be tried and found guilty by the Honorable Judge Lynch Mob.
It's a question of will, that's the true center of gravity.
If Taiwan's will holds 48 hours, then the ChiCom government is likely to collapse from a military coup.
And when someone randomly drops 950,000 pounds of high explosive across your island, apparently in an attempt to kill many civilians, the likely result is fanatic resistance.
Your whole theory of war is straight out of Giulio Douhet--and history shows that bombing civilians doesn't inspire them to surrender. It convinces them that their survival is bound up in winning the war. This explains the failures of the 1940 German air campaign against England, as well as the subsequent failure of the Combined Bomber Offensive against Germany.
No, I'm not advocating what a Douhet-style obliteration of Taiwan. It would be counterproductive and would tilt world sympathy to Taiwan -- and if you think the Euros were on our backs about Iraq, wait until they have to choose between a democracy and the "China market." The PRC would try to ape US doctrine and take out C4I targets. And from what's out there in the public domain, they seem to be focusing on cyber-war capabilities as well. They wouldn't have to be anywhere near 100% effective to gain an advantage during the first few days.
And just because they would be wise to have a nuclear arsenal, doesn't mean they do. I would, but hey, who knows?
Initiative is an ephemeral thing, easily lost when things go wrong.
No, I'm not advocating what a Douhet-style obliteration of Taiwan. It would be counterproductive and would tilt world sympathy to Taiwan -- and if you think the Euros were on our backs about Iraq, wait until they have to choose between a democracy and the "China market." The PRC would try to ape US doctrine and take out C4I targets.
Then you're back to using nukes. The miss distances and likely reliability figures on those missiles mean that you HAVE to use nukes to be reasonably sure of a kill.
And from what's out there in the public domain, they seem to be focusing on cyber-war capabilities as well.
Cyberwar is one of those overhyped notions from RAND that promises, at most, mutual assured annoyance. Read The Crypt for a more realistic notion of "cyberwar."
They wouldn't have to be anywhere near 100% effective to gain an advantage during the first few days.
Actually, they would. You're talking about very high-risk operations in return for a relatively modest gain. If ANYTHING goes wrong early on, they're hosed.
And just because they would be wise to have a nuclear arsenal, doesn't mean they do. I would, but hey, who knows?
Never assume that people are dumber than you are just to make your wargame scenario work.
Why do they NEED to?
Also, China has indicated that they may very well use nuclear weapons. That would be the only response they COULD muster.
Instead Taiwan continues to act as if they utterly need our protection, while our own leaders act as if the supposedly obsolete PLA can actually do some real damage. You tell me what's going on here.
For the former: if you can get someone to pay your defense bills for you, that saves you a ton of money. As for the latter, China can do real damage, IF they are willing to pay the political price tag.
The first Type 093 is undergoing sea trial, the Song has now entered serial production,
The first two boats were unsatisfactory in the extreme--that's why China wants more Kilos. As for the Type 093--as I said, it's a late-build Permit. In other words, they busted their butts, and made it all the way into the 1960s. Whoop-de-do.
the DF-31 has been deployed in small numbers
OK, they can nuke Evergreen College of Rachel Corrie fame. What's the downside?
the PLAN's new 052C DDGs are superior to the Russian Sovremennys.
They're still ADCAP bait.
They're obviously not moving quickly but to keep things in perspective, how quickly is Taiwan moving in acquiring the weapons they signed for nearly 3 years ago?
On schedule, except for the subs, but that was expected from the get-go.
Assuming a surprise attack, the first wave of Chinese missiles can indeed use GPS guidance, as 5 minutes is too short for our government to determine how exactly to intervene.
Space Command most likely has standing orders to engage "selective availability" on the outbreak of ANY major regional conflict. They may get one free shot--but that's it.
Thereafter China will still have its own regional navigation satellites (the 3-satellite Beidou constellation destined to be 8), plus 8 electro-optical & radar satellites soon to be launched.
Whoop-de-do. Look up White Sands, New Mexico.
As for long-range artillery, sheer numbers will be a problem for Taiwan.
You still have to explain how the ChiComs get boots on the ground. And lobbing artillery at Taipei still doesn't endear the good folk of Taiwan to the ChiComs. It makes a "settlement" LESS likely.
The biggest threat lies in electronic warfare: Taiwan's C4I infrastructure remains relatively unprotected from EMP/radio-frequency attacks, & China will have plenty of anti-radiation missiles to throw at them.
If you're going to throw technobabble around, learn what the technobabble means.
"EMP/radio-frequency attacks" are massively hyped as opposed to actually used. It would be cheaper to attack the target with a high-explosive warhead--unless you're lobbing a nuke, the radius of effect for an EMP warhead or RF weapon is comparable to that of a 500-pound bomb.
Taiwan can't be invaded successfully, for obvious reasons, but in a few years the PLA can severely impair its defenses & pressure it into an unfavorable political settlement, especially if US remains preoccupied with war on terror.
Ah, yes. You assume that the Taiwanese will do EXACTLY as you describe, and not do anything "crazy" under extreme stress.
My bet's on the "crazy" stuff. People facing the destruction of all they've worked for tend to go with that option.
Please supply the quote in which Bush aimed any warning or caution at the Mainland Reds. Maybe you read or heard something I didn't, but all the reports I saw had him lecturing only Taiwan. IF you know different - - - as your post implies you do -- please supply the evidence.
And we have a weakling president who lectures Taiwan instead of China. Pitiful.
In other words, if you didn't read it in the left-wing press, which seeks to damage Bush at all costs, it didn't happen.
No, in other words, I want to see the quote. If it did happen, then there's evidence. But I haven't seen any evidence that he had any words of reproof, warning or caution for the mainland Chinese. If there were such words, what were they? Where can I find them? If you can't supply them, then you're treating wishes like horses.
Sorry, but Bush is president - and it was Bush who dissed the Taiwanese recently. I don't like Carter as much as the next fellow, but I expected more from Bush - - but apparently we're not getting it. Shameful.
The status quo is de facto independence for Taiwan, and stalemate for the PRC. By opposing a statement from Taiwan, we can oppose an invasion from the mainland. See how that works?
When he told Taiwan to cool it, it was to help us keep our 'neutrality' on the issue. 'Neutrality' keeps the status quo. Taiwan mouthing off inconclusively does not.
This is like saying, Israel is stirring up the nationalistic feelings in the Arab World, which may be forced to act in order to save face. You wouldn't apply that standard to Israel - telling them not to assert their right to exist, lest it offend the Arabs. So why should Taiwan be dissed and the bullies that threaten her, appeased? Maybe it's because Bush isn't all that consistent, or all that strong.
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