Lessons for China to learn from Ukraine conflict for Taiwan scenario

tankphobia said:

I mean, why not? unless China puts AA assets all along the coast what's stopping the US from lobbing cruise missiles using strategic bombers day in day out? After JASSM runs out, they still have older LO cruise missiles. You'll have b-52 parked mid way between Pearl harbor and japan lobbing cruise missiles all day every day, the barrier to US military missile procurement is political, not by inability. I doubt China has such a stockpile of AA missiles that they can intercept every single one of them, nor do I think that those AA assets are not better spent elsewhere. Like I'm not trying to disparage China here, they have a formidable military, but the US has 40 years of cold war spending to throw at a China sized problem and it's going to take some time for it to equalize.

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Aren't you contradicting yourself?
First, you say JASSM can evade the air defenses deployed
Second, you say (more?) air defenses will need to be deployed
If the US is striking mainland China, what "elsewhere" is there to put these AD systems?
Russia has already exhausted a lot of NATO's stock of ATGMs, so why do you think China wouldn't be prepared to deal with US long range fire even with 40 years of stocks?

tankphobia said:

Lets be real here, China can be largely self sufficient except for energy and they can amend most of the disruption through a large dose of the big green rock in the next 10-15 years. A land invasion of China is impossible so there's no real way China can 'lose' here. Blockade and sanctioned, yes, crippled domestic and global economy, also yes! An insane amount of needless human suffering? A definite yes. Status quo don't look so bad now does it?

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Yes, the status quo regarding Taiwan suits China fine.

It is the US which is pushing to change this.

tankphobia said:

If the Chinese side has access to hypersonics, what makes the US unable to procure them? They've just recently completed 2 successful test so having b-2 launched hypersonics is not out of the question. If hypersonics are at play and they are extremely difficult to intercept, it's not a stretch that the US will priorities hitting critical chip making infrastructure over the long term seeing as those hi-tech factories are extremely fragile. Over the long term they don't need to beat China in the first Island chain, just make it so that China will seriously struggle to push past, which they will through targeting those critical supply chains. They could also technically target nuclear powerplants, but that's a road that leads to MAD, so it's kind pointless to speculate.

We've seen that volume of fire alone is not enough to win wars from the Korean war to Vietnam, so what makes you think that local fire superiority will allow China to completely suppress Korea/Japan war making capabilities? If invading Taiwan required an operation greater than D-day how will China ever manage to stop Japan from lobbing missiles back?

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US hypersonic weapons costs (20x higher) and development timescales (5x slower) below.
This is likely an extreme example, but you get the idea

Chilled_k6 said:

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Pulled the parts I thought were most relevant to the PLA with some big claims made by this American Air Force officer.

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The Air Force officer responsible for all aspects of contracting for the service has issued a stark warning about China’s rapid gains in defense acquisition, with the result that its military is now getting its hands on new equipment “five to six times” faster than the United States.

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As well as the sheer speed with which Beijing is able to acquire new weapons, Holt contends, the Chinese are also operating far more efficiently. “In purchasing power parity, they spend about one dollar to our 20 dollars to get to the same capability,” he told his audience. “We are going to lose if we can’t figure out how to drop the cost and increase the speed in our defense supply chains,” Holt added.

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supersnoop said:

Aren't you contradicting yourself?
First, you say JASSM can evade the air defenses deployed
Second, you say (more?) air defenses will need to be deployed
If the US is striking mainland China, what "elsewhere" is there to put these AD systems?
Russia has already exhausted a lot of NATO's stock of ATGMs, so why do you think China wouldn't be prepared to deal with US long range fire even with 40 years of stocks?

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In the previous post, it was mentioned that the possibility of JASSM making it through was low, so I purported that even if JASSM runs out there are still older stocks to throw at the problem. AD can also be provided by naval assets to create a larger umbrella past the mainland.

The current stock of ATGMs exacted (and is continuing to) an absolute bloody toll on Russian armored forces did they not? Yes they can deal with it, but it will be taking critical resources needed elsewhere to achieve their military goals. Even then as amateur watchers we will never be sure what the true capabilities of each side are.

Wonderful, the thread's been hijacked by the Great Value Patchwork_Chimera.

tankphobia said:

It's unlikely that China can overcome the allied japan/korean/US navy all at once, at least currently. Since Chinese chip manufacturing is pretty concentrated along coastal cities, the US can destroy those capabilities through long range fire, while China can't do the same to Intel chip fabs located in mainland US. This will degrade Chinese ability to replenish it's stock of PGMs long term while a western world that is united and in a war economy can be a terrifying force to deal with.

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Chinese fabs are also in Xi'an but the reality is this: if they have the spare cruise missiles to strike civilian economic targets it means they already won militarily inside the first island chain. If they haven't won already in the first island chain they won't even have the opportunity to launch.

China also doesn't need to confront the South Korean Navy. The South Korean Navy would be the one running to the Sea of Japan like Iraqi planes running away to Iran during Desert Storm.

tankphobia said:

In the previous post, it was mentioned that the possibility of JASSM making it through was low, so I purported that even if JASSM runs out there are still older stocks to throw at the problem. AD can also be provided by naval assets to create a larger umbrella past the mainland.

The current stock of ATGMs exacted (and is continuing to) an absolute bloody toll on Russian armored forces did they not? Yes they can deal with it, but it will be taking critical resources needed elsewhere to achieve their military goals. Even then as amateur watchers we will never be sure what the true capabilities of each side are.

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Yes, but it seems your thinking is that the US seems to be able to strike with impunity on the mainland with long range fires (the point about striking chips factories)
It doesn't really make sense. The whole AD system including Naval assets is pretty much geared towards stopping this.

It's not like these assets are needed against Taiwan forces in quantity. Taiwan strike assets are so small in quantity, and too close to the mainland, even the newest generation of PLA rocket artillery can hit the island.

If there is a war over Taiwan, it would be a war of national survival, of course there would be a price to be paid (regardless of the instigator)

One retired ROC national security adviser to a formal ROC President once had a conversion with a just stepped down US aircraft carrier captain over a causal dinner party.
He asked in case of resumption of civil war, would US send aircraft carriers near Taiwan to help ROC defend herself. The American paused for a long time, didn't answer the question directly, he said there are over 5000 sailors and aircrews on a US super carrier which roughly equal to both the attack on Pearl Harbor and 9-11 in New York casualties combine. And that's just with one carrier.

In another words, US unlikely to get directly involved unless it's being attacked first. Since in case of PRC invade Taiwan, it would be considered an internal matter by international law.
So it's entirely depends on who fires the first shot, if US fires the first shot, then American public may not tolerant that kind of casualty could occur, however, if PRC fires the first shot at US, then the American public may support to go to war with China.

As long as China has a clear objective, regardless what reddit strategists wish could happen, Japan would not attack China unless US did it first, and US probably wish Japan would grow a pair and to take on China first. Economics sanctions ? Sure. Attack PRC invasion fleet openly by Japan or SK, highly unlikely, unless Japanese wish their home islands glow at 10,000 degrees for the next 1000 years.

ZeEa5KPul said:

Wonderful, the thread's been hijacked by the Great Value Patchwork_Chimera.

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Nowadays, I think it's easier to redirect people to read some of patchworks posts, to actually get a good idea/grasp of the PLA as well as the strength of the US military against the PLA.

What's more, if people read quite a bit of what he writes, it should be clear that patchwork is an analysis on US' side and actually knows/research his stuff, which should help convince people that their perceived idea/view of the PLA is just wrong (since I usually gives links to people who really don't have any idea of what the PLA vs the US armed forces entails).

Patchwork_Chimera said:

wish.com is getting out of hand

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I mean, saves me from writing stuff myself.

As good as @Patchwork_Chimera's analysis is, the most brilliant thing he wrote is calling Ian Easton an oxygen thief.