There is no artillery that can hit Taiwan from China.
China does not have the ability to project force across the strait if even one big navy joins Taiwan...whether the US or Japan.
US fighters can reach Taiwan from carriers, Okinawa and the PI. Our heavy bombers could saturate the skies with anti-ship missiles.
Remember, our weapon systems work...first time, every time.
So it would be an air-sea battle and no way China prevails. No need to strike the mainland.
Of course Taiwan may be a smoldering ruin afterward.
**Of course Taiwan may be a smoldering ruin afterward.**
Presumably so would Beijing.
Um, no, our systems don’t work first time every time. The vaunted anti-torpedo torpedo systems that were being put on carriers have been removed because they don’t work.
The Chinese have H/PJ-38 130mm, Type 76, and Type 210 ship mounted artillery to augment the massive first strike of missiles that would slam into Taiwan’s defenses and bases in the first hours. Expect Chinese military personnel to appear out of the woodwork on the island to sabotage any infrastructure they don’t want to wipe out with weapons systems and aid in the landing of additional troops.
They’d have thousands of boots on the ground ready to go before the first shot was fired and they’d have tens of thousands on the ground within hours. And China’s been churning out an interdiction fleet for well over a decade that our admirals have been desperately trying to warn Congress about, yet still their funding hasn’t been sufficient to maintain the level of dominance we expect. If we start shooting at Chinese military assets, we WILL lose ships. And not just a few.
Frankly, Taiwan isn’t worth it for us. Why should we lose trillions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of troops when - by your own admission - the end result would be a smoldering wasteland devoid of life? We cannot protect Taiwan. If we wanted to do that, we’d have the island occupied, fully decked out with US military hardware operated by US troops, and completely surrounded and monitored 24/7 with enforced no-fly and no-sail zones. But we don’t have all that.