Enh, I’m sure they have been doing all those things for a long time. What Taiwan needs to do is what Ukraine was only able a few times, attack the mainland.
When there are no safe places, considerations change.
Attack? With what? What would you need to be a credible threat to a country as populous as Mainland China? Cruise missile attack on the Three Gorges Dam a la The Dam Busters(1955)?? WMDs?
How about container ports? Bridges, especially the ones across estuaries, also make good bottlenecks. In both cases, there would be some civilian deaths, of unfortunates at the wrong place at the wrong time, but not in the numbers some of the other destructive suggestions out there would have. Worse that mass fatalities, that would cause long-term non-fatal economic disruptions and a lot of people would see the destruction from their lockdowned city as it happened, bypassing state-controlled media saying everything is going just great.
Then again, the Chinese Communist Party seems willing to inflict great disruptions on their own economy without blowing anything up, which is actually kinda scary.
For thousands of years the rulers of China have shown a great willingness to slaughter their own people. Expecting them to *Blink* if a freight terminal or two is blown up? They would only ratchet up the violence in response.
I recommend Robert S. Pape’s “Bombing To Win: Air Power and Coercion In War(1996)”. It discusses how some regimes just can not be coerced. Once the bombs start falling their is a Very strong tendency for belligerents to just keep to their policies.
I wouldn’t expect any “blinking”. But it would mean that commerce will come to a halt, and a worthwhile goal is to make any attempt at conquest as expensive as possible. No jobs, and no exports and you could get civil unrest. Maybe even lose “the mandate of heaven.”
Which is what is making the current “lockdowns” in places like Shanghai so scary. As disease prevention, it’s a massive over-reaction. On the other hand, maybe it’s the Chinese Communist Party testing out procedures to be used to keep their own subjects in line when the shooting finally starts.
“Attack? With what?”
First with their brains. People are framing this as defending Taiwan or fighting off China. They don’t need plans to defend Taiwan. They need plans on how to win a war. (Obviously defense is a part of this) Starting with the mindset of defeat isn’t the way to plot a successful strategy. Reframe the problem and then work on the solutions. The goal isn’t to defend Taiwan. The goal is to win a war with China.
I’d use China’s strategy against them. It is always easier to buy/build more missiles than it is to create more human soldiers. The article talked about the various ways they are already able to defend but they need more strike back capabilities. The targets should be both tactical and symbolic.
Something like 40 million people, including the city of Wuhan, are located downstream of the Three Gorges Dam. Just sayin’ …
Somewhere in tunnels, deep in the mountains of Taiwan (most of it), some interestingly shaped pieces of a heavy metal are being inserted into some carefully engineered devices…..
I suspect the thing which now frightens the PRC the most, in the wake of Russia’s luckless invasion of Ukraine, is the severity and extent of the sanctions imposed on Russia and the speed with which they were imposed.
“I suspect the thing which now frightens the PRC the most, in the wake of Russia’s luckless invasion of Ukraine, is the severity and extent of the sanctions imposed on Russia and the speed with which they were imposed.”
I think the Chinese are astounded at how the US has convinced Europe to go along with the US sanctions and commit economic suicide, followed not long after by the US’s economic suicide.
Perhaps you would be so good as to explain exactly how this “economic suicide” thing is supposed to work? I’d say it’s pretty much the Russians who have committed economic suicide. The PRC attempting to take Taiwan would be a similar disaster, just an order of magnitude larger. The PRC depends on the outside world for food, energy and money. Cut all those off, even if imperfectly, and the PRC starves – quickly.
Enh, I’m sure they have been doing all those things for a long time. What Taiwan needs to do is what Ukraine was only able a few times, attack the mainland.
When there are no safe places, considerations change.
Attack? With what? What would you need to be a credible threat to a country as populous as Mainland China? Cruise missile attack on the Three Gorges Dam a la The Dam Busters(1955)?? WMDs?
How about container ports? Bridges, especially the ones across estuaries, also make good bottlenecks. In both cases, there would be some civilian deaths, of unfortunates at the wrong place at the wrong time, but not in the numbers some of the other destructive suggestions out there would have. Worse that mass fatalities, that would cause long-term non-fatal economic disruptions and a lot of people would see the destruction from their lockdowned city as it happened, bypassing state-controlled media saying everything is going just great.
Then again, the Chinese Communist Party seems willing to inflict great disruptions on their own economy without blowing anything up, which is actually kinda scary.
For thousands of years the rulers of China have shown a great willingness to slaughter their own people. Expecting them to *Blink* if a freight terminal or two is blown up? They would only ratchet up the violence in response.
I recommend Robert S. Pape’s “Bombing To Win: Air Power and Coercion In War(1996)”. It discusses how some regimes just can not be coerced. Once the bombs start falling their is a Very strong tendency for belligerents to just keep to their policies.
I wouldn’t expect any “blinking”. But it would mean that commerce will come to a halt, and a worthwhile goal is to make any attempt at conquest as expensive as possible. No jobs, and no exports and you could get civil unrest. Maybe even lose “the mandate of heaven.”
Which is what is making the current “lockdowns” in places like Shanghai so scary. As disease prevention, it’s a massive over-reaction. On the other hand, maybe it’s the Chinese Communist Party testing out procedures to be used to keep their own subjects in line when the shooting finally starts.
“Attack? With what?”
First with their brains. People are framing this as defending Taiwan or fighting off China. They don’t need plans to defend Taiwan. They need plans on how to win a war. (Obviously defense is a part of this) Starting with the mindset of defeat isn’t the way to plot a successful strategy. Reframe the problem and then work on the solutions. The goal isn’t to defend Taiwan. The goal is to win a war with China.
I’d use China’s strategy against them. It is always easier to buy/build more missiles than it is to create more human soldiers. The article talked about the various ways they are already able to defend but they need more strike back capabilities. The targets should be both tactical and symbolic.
Something like 40 million people, including the city of Wuhan, are located downstream of the Three Gorges Dam. Just sayin’ …
Somewhere in tunnels, deep in the mountains of Taiwan (most of it), some interestingly shaped pieces of a heavy metal are being inserted into some carefully engineered devices…..
I suspect the thing which now frightens the PRC the most, in the wake of Russia’s luckless invasion of Ukraine, is the severity and extent of the sanctions imposed on Russia and the speed with which they were imposed.
“I suspect the thing which now frightens the PRC the most, in the wake of Russia’s luckless invasion of Ukraine, is the severity and extent of the sanctions imposed on Russia and the speed with which they were imposed.”
I think the Chinese are astounded at how the US has convinced Europe to go along with the US sanctions and commit economic suicide, followed not long after by the US’s economic suicide.
Perhaps you would be so good as to explain exactly how this “economic suicide” thing is supposed to work? I’d say it’s pretty much the Russians who have committed economic suicide. The PRC attempting to take Taiwan would be a similar disaster, just an order of magnitude larger. The PRC depends on the outside world for food, energy and money. Cut all those off, even if imperfectly, and the PRC starves – quickly.