PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency

[Sinnavuuty]

personally i think regular missile attack today ....not enough . specially when use again any place larger than taiwan

russia lob iskander and kh-101 toward ukraine for years ...the result still very limited .

best way to defeat nations with heavy demographic situation , too many old people like japan is ......target the youth population

nothing fucked up a nation more than youth population killed in mass , they are the future , the hope , the last group of being a nation want to spend in war

if they die in mass , whole nation fucked

The targets marked with the 50 km red circle are nuclear power plants, but this image appears to be somewhat old, from around 2010-2013.

 

[Engineer]

For the personnel, you would think that 6 months would be enough for security clearance and also retrain for more specialised welding.

And to convert an existing steel plant to produce naval-grade steel, how many months would it take?

Where did you pull 6 months number from? Why don't you learn regular welding first and see how long it takes to master before throwing out random numbers? Different weldings use different techniques, so having a steady hand is the only transferrable skill, everything else will have to be relearnt. Also, if your plan is to hand out security clearances like confetti, then what's the point of security clearances?

Steel don't go straight from steel mill on to a ship. There are a lot of steps involved, and those steps are the bottle necks. You can produce as much naval steel as you want, but they would just be sitting in the yard because there aren't enough people and machinery to process them.

I expect the bottleneck will be the number of missiles that can be produced, rather than the launch platforms.



So we're 6 months into a war, and it's a stalemate.

The Chinese military can dominate the 1IC and deny the 2IC, but can't reach CONUS.
The US military dominates the areas beyond the 2IC, but can't appreciably penetrate to the 1IC or mainland China.

What happens then?

The only solution for China to win is to build a larger blue-water Navy, which means aircraft carries.

---

If you look back to the Napoleonic Wars, we had the French Republic supreme on land, but the British Empire ruling the seas.

Both sides (and their allies) would fight to exhaustion, then agree to a peace to recover, before resuming warfare again.
This went on for a decade, until the British Empire (and allies) won against the French Republic.
But if the French really had focused on building a larger Navy, they could have defeated the Royal Navy and won.

---

It's finally gotten through that China has a significantly industrial advantage eg. 232x the shipbuilding capacity.

But what could this actually mean in practice in a full-scale wartime mobilisation?

Hence I thought it interesting to put out a scenario (reminiscent of WW2 America) where China builds 15 carriers simultaneously, immediately followed by another 15

It's something for Japan and America to think about, before saying they have the option of going to war with China.

Nepoleonic Wars didn't feature aircraft carriers, so it's totally irrelevant. In fact, bringing up anything pre-2000 would be irrelevant.

Modern warships take years to build. Given dry-docks are fixed and known targets, on top of the precision and range of modern weapons, completing modern naval vessels in a war time situation before they get destroyed would be nearly impossible. In modern naval warfare, you are fighting with what you've got.

 

[AndrewS]

Where did you pull 6 months number from? Why don't you learn regular welding first and see how long it takes to master before throwing out random numbers? Different weldings use different techniques, so having a steady hand is the only transferrable skill, everything else will have to be relearnt. Also, if your plan is to hand out security clearances like confetti, then what's the point of security clearances?

Well, would you actually believe I've actually done a university welding course that covered the different techniques?
So I do think 6 months should be more than enough time to learn a new welding technique.

In a wartime scenario, the security clearance process will have to be massively, massively scaled up. There's no alternative to this. But it helps that most welders already work for a company, so are a known quantity. Plus most people in China haven't been abroad before or even know a foreigner.

Steel don't go straight from steel mill on to a ship. There are a lot of steps involved, and those steps are the bottle necks. You can produce as much naval steel as you want, but they would just be sitting in the yard because there aren't enough people and machinery to process them.


Nepoleonic Wars didn't feature aircraft carriers, so it's totally irrelevant. In fact, bringing up anything pre-2000 would be irrelevant.

Modern warships take years to build. Given dry-docks are fixed and known targets, on top of the precision and range of modern weapons, completing modern naval vessels in a war time situation before they get destroyed would be nearly impossible. In modern naval warfare, you are fighting with what you've got.

As I've said, it is a long process to build up such a Navy.

---

3 years ago, Patchwork enlightened us that the US military was highly unlikely to generate enough fires to penetrate the IADS on mainland China. And since then, the military balance has swung sharply in China's favour, even though the US is trying to pivot.

And recent events have demonstrated that China likely has a chokehold on US military production. Before Trump caved in, look at how Raytheon was just 3 weeks from stopping missile production, as per Gavekal Research.

In comparison, we could expect China to massively ramp up munitions production.

So then you end up with a stalemate, where:

1. China is dominant in the Western Pacific, but can't reach the USA
2. The US is dominant past the Western Pacific, but can't reach China

In such a scenario, shouldn't China aim to build a Navy that can win?
Sure, they might sue for peace. But given that the situation is likely unresolved (like in the Napoleonic Wars), both sides would see a resumption of the war as likely, and build up their navies during this "cold peace"

 

[latenlazy]

Well, would you actually believe I've actually done a university welding course that covered the different techniques?
So I do think 6 months should be more than enough time to learn a new welding technique.

In a wartime scenario, the security clearance process will have to be massively, massively scaled up. There's no alternative to this. But it helps that most welders already work for a company, so are a known quantity. Plus most people in China haven't been abroad before or even know a foreigner.




As I've said, it is a long process to build up such a Navy.

---

3 years ago, Patchwork enlightened us that the US military was highly unlikely to generate enough fires to penetrate the IADS on mainland China. And since then, the military balance has swung sharply in China's favour, even though the US is trying to pivot.

And recent events have demonstrated that China likely has a chokehold on US military production. Before Trump caved in, look at how Raytheon was just 3 weeks from stopping missile production, as per Gavekal Research.

In comparison, we could expect China to massively ramp up munitions production.

So then you end up with a stalemate, where:

1. China is dominant in the Western Pacific, but can't reach the USA
2. The US is dominant past the Western Pacific, but can't reach China

In such a scenario, shouldn't China aim to build a Navy that can win?
Sure, they might sue for peace. But given that the situation is likely unresolved (like in the Napoleonic Wars), both sides would see a resumption of the war as likely, and build up their navies during this "cold peace"

If the US is pushed out of the Western Pacific then China already won.

 

[4Tran]

If the US is pushed out of the Western Pacific then China already won.

Yeah, I can't imagine a case where the US would be enough of a sore loser to keep fighting after they've run out of missiles and ships to the point where they can't contest the Western Pacific any more. The US is simply unable to fight a long war and no amount of trying to talk tough can change this fundamental fact.

 

[Engineer]

Well, would you actually believe I've actually done a university welding course that covered the different techniques?
So I do think 6 months should be more than enough time to learn a new welding technique.

I also said "master", not just "learn". And you realize there is a large gap between what taught in university courses and what practice in reality, right?

In a wartime scenario, the security clearance process will have to be massively, massively scaled up. There's no alternative to this. But it helps that most welders already work for a company, so are a known quantity. Plus most people in China haven't been abroad before or even know a foreigner.

No. In a wartime scenario, security clearance processes will only become more stingent.

As I've said, it is a long process to build up such a Navy.

---

3 years ago, Patchwork enlightened us that the US military was highly unlikely to generate enough fires to penetrate the IADS on mainland China. And since then, the military balance has swung sharply in China's favour, even though the US is trying to pivot.

And recent events have demonstrated that China likely has a chokehold on US military production. Before Trump caved in, look at how Raytheon was just 3 weeks from stopping missile production, as per Gavekal Research.

In comparison, we could expect China to massively ramp up munitions production.

So then you end up with a stalemate, where:

1. China is dominant in the Western Pacific, but can't reach the USA
2. The US is dominant past the Western Pacific, but can't reach China

In such a scenario, shouldn't China aim to build a Navy that can win?
Sure, they might sue for peace. But given that the situation is likely unresolved (like in the Napoleonic Wars), both sides would see a resumption of the war as likely, and build up their navies during this "cold peace"

The flaw in this assumption is that everyone goes back to business as usual after a bunch of people got killed. That's not going to happen. War is like cancer, you want to prevent it rather than get it then treat it.

 

[votran]

Yeah, I can't imagine a case where the US would be enough of a sore loser to keep fighting after they've run out of missiles and ships to the point where they can't contest the Western Pacific any more. The US is simply unable to fight a long war and no amount of trying to talk tough can change this fundamental fact.

US may run out of missile and ship quick but the huge problem is : US shipyard and production facility still perfectly safe back home , no countries include china have balls to put missile on cuba to threaten them
(no some sneaky tiny drones raid from hidden containe aren't gonna cut it and do any significal damage)
meanwhile US have no problem putting missile all over philipines and south korea....putting all china east coast at risk

well i hope when shooting war start china will finally have the will to threaten US mainland

it gonna be fucking hilarious if war start : china ship sunk by US missile , china shipyard hit by tomahawk from philipines , US submarine attack china's cargo around malacca straits

and china's missile still nowhere to be seen on cuba ...or atleast venezuela soil

 

[manqiangrexue]

US may run out of missile and ship quick but the huge problem is : US shipyard and production facility still perfectly safe back home , no countries include china have balls to put missile on cuba to threaten them
(no some sneaky tiny drones raid from hidden containe aren't gonna cut it and do any significal damage)
meanwhile US have no problem putting missile all over philipines and south korea....putting all china east coast at risk

well i hope when shooting war start china will finally have the will to threaten US mainland

it gonna be fucking hilarious if war start : china ship sunk by US missile , china shipyard hit by tomahawk from philipines , US submarine attack china's cargo around malacca straits

and china's missile still nowhere to be seen on cuba ...or atleast venezuela soil

Listen, caveman. With the advent of ICBMs and now hypersonic ICBMs, you don't need to be 40 miles from someone to threaten them with missiles. The Soviets did it and the Soviet Union is dead; too much balls apparently took away blood supply to the brain and they weren't thinking straight on how to fight.

 

[latenlazy]

US may run out of missile and ship quick but the huge problem is : US shipyard and production facility still perfectly safe back home , no countries include china have balls to put missile on cuba to threaten them
(no some sneaky tiny drones raid from hidden containe aren't gonna cut it and do any significal damage)
meanwhile US have no problem putting missile all over philipines and south korea....putting all china east coast at risk

well i hope when shooting war start china will finally have the will to threaten US mainland

it gonna be fucking hilarious if war start : china ship sunk by US missile , china shipyard hit by tomahawk from philipines , US submarine attack china's cargo around malacca straits

and china's missile still nowhere to be seen on cuba ...or atleast venezuela soil

This brag would sound more impressive if the US could actually churn out more than 1 destroyer a year on budget and schedule with those shipyards. Right now the US can’t even restock missiles without Chinese imports. I’m also not sure why you think the Philippines or Japan or South Korea would be able to defend their firing positions from Chinese missile strikes if the USN can’t with an entire fleet of Aegis destroyers. US Submarines btw don’t really have the salvo volumes or geographic presence to stop sea traffic, and if they funnel themselves around geographic chokepoints like Malacca to do high frequency attacks they’re basically surrendering their stealth advantage and making themselves easy to kill. You should learn to do some math and guzzle less Reddit slop.

 

[vincent]

US may run out of missile and ship quick but the huge problem is : US shipyard and production facility still perfectly safe back home , no countries include china have balls to put missile on cuba to threaten them
(no some sneaky tiny drones raid from hidden containe aren't gonna cut it and do any significal damage)
meanwhile US have no problem putting missile all over philipines and south korea....putting all china east coast at risk

well i hope when shooting war start china will finally have the will to threaten US mainland

it gonna be fucking hilarious if war start : china ship sunk by US missile , china shipyard hit by tomahawk from philipines , US submarine attack china's cargo around malacca straits

and china's missile still nowhere to be seen on cuba ...or atleast venezuela soil

Have you considered the possibility Cuba doesn’t want to antagonize the US by hosting Chinese/Russian missiles? Other countries have a vote too,