Lessons for China to learn from Ukraine conflict for Taiwan scenario

Biscuits said:

To some extent, but to ignore that there would be a morale mismatch would also be ignoring part of the basic reality on the ground.

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Not handwaving away the difficulties facing motivation of war for the US/Taiwan side, I just really dislike the notion that masculinity has anything to do with the effectiveness of a fighting force, the Americans and NATO armies in general rarely boast about masculinity or martial prowess in their propaganda pieces, but rather the hardware pieces that will actually decide the fight.

Ultimately AR is a fight that will be decided not on Taiwan itself, but whether China can provide sufficient area denial past first island chain such that an intervention from the US side will be extremely costly without a high likelihood of success. Therefore the quality or even quantity of soldiers on Taiwan itself makes little difference in the outcome.

As for area denial, whether China can successfully intercept B-21s loaded with stealthy cruise missiles is a key deciding factor here, otherwise the US will be able to exact a bloody toil on PLAN assets. H-20s will also perform a similar role but for the Chinese side.

Going right into blockade mode is skipping over sanctions
Taiwan imports more 20% of all value of goods from mainland and exports 40%
The tourism industry in Taiwan has been suffering even before COVID thanks to DPP "tough talk"

They have also banned fish, pineapples, other food products. At the moment, it is small stuff because no one wants to rock the boat so hard. However, if the situation deteriorates to the point where military action is about to happen, you would likely set off the economic bombs first.

tankphobia said:

Not handwaving away the difficulties facing motivation of war for the US/Taiwan side, I just really dislike the notion that masculinity has anything to do with the effectiveness of a fighting force, the Americans and NATO armies in general rarely boast about masculinity or martial prowess in their propaganda pieces, but rather the hardware pieces that will actually decide the fight.

Ultimately AR is a fight that will be decided not on Taiwan itself, but whether China can provide sufficient area denial past first island chain such that an intervention from the US side will be extremely costly without a high likelihood of success. Therefore the quality or even quantity of soldiers on Taiwan itself makes little difference in the outcome.

As for area denial, whether China can successfully intercept B-21s loaded with stealthy cruise missiles is a key deciding factor here, otherwise the US will be able to exact a bloody toil on PLAN assets. H-20s will also perform a similar role but for the Chinese side.

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well you don't see PLA talking about this pretty much ever, in fact there is a campaign to recruit more female soldiers. However I don't either think its hardware as much as doctrine that will win in the end of the day.

Whichever side is more prepared with the realities of such large scale operations will have a fundamental advantage. Think how US fully equipped formations got rolled by Chinese light mechanized troops in Korea and how French army got whipped by Germans using crappy pz2 tanks and horse logistics in WW2. I think there's always a tendency during peacetime to overestimate individual weapon platforms, when war is usually a battle of innovation, communication and organizational effectiveness rather than contest of platforms going head to head.

Still, the number of stealth fighters will heavily affect the air war. Having numerical advantage will let China play more hard and fast vs having to use J-20s smart if there's less of them. Hence its needed to have more J-20 lines. Although, due to US pushing into China, China has the unique to straight up remove a lot of US planes while they're on the ground/ensure they don't have any bases to return to.

tankphobia said:

Not handwaving away the difficulties facing motivation of war for the US/Taiwan side, I just really dislike the notion that masculinity has anything to do with the effectiveness of a fighting force, the Americans and NATO armies in general rarely boast about masculinity or martial prowess in their propaganda pieces, but rather the hardware pieces that will actually decide the fight.

Ultimately AR is a fight that will be decided not on Taiwan itself, but whether China can provide sufficient area denial past first island chain such that an intervention from the US side will be extremely costly without a high likelihood of success. Therefore the quality or even quantity of soldiers on Taiwan itself makes little difference in the outcome.

As for area denial, whether China can successfully intercept B-21s loaded with stealthy cruise missiles is a key deciding factor here, otherwise the US will be able to exact a bloody toil on PLAN assets. H-20s will also perform a similar role but for the Chinese side.

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It's "masculinity" in regards to how Taiwanese or Japanese people seem to be nearly incapable to fight wars right now. We could see this with Japan literally being so pacifist now that it doesn't think it needs any military and the Taiwanese massively avoiding any kind of military activities despite having such a large "threat" across them. We are not talking about their predecessor 100 years ago, but what are they like now. You would think that they would be like Israel now, regarding the "treat", but they are in fact like Switzerland or worse.

Regarding the US, it is not so much about "masculinity", but about motivation. Most of their forces are Hispanics, blacks, and Filipinos, who are there only for the money, and don't have anything in common with their 250 years old county. They join the US military because its easy money and you don't need a high amount of intelligence to get there unlike other jobs They don't feel any other connection to that country outside of money. Compare that to the Chinese level of patriotism and 5000 years' worth of real history.

And motivation and mindset of soldiers aren't everything but are also one factor. And you can't compare brute East Slavs like Ukrainians with Taiwanese and Japanese (nearly asexual population). It just proves my point. Slavs like Ukrainians are beasts in mentality to Taiwanese. I don't know if you met a Ukrainian in person, but it's like comparing a tiger to a rabbit by comparing them to Taiwanese people.

The US keeps talking only about the supposed "quality" of its weapons, and "its technological dominance" only because they have nothing else left to talk about.

They don't have an industrial capacity for a war right now, they don't have the larger navy anymore, they don't have a motivated military, and they don't have motivated citizens for that kind of war that their elites dream of, no, in fact, their citizens don't even know where Taiwan is on the map, and it's documented on many different statistics.

What are they then left to talk about if not for their "quality", and "technology", what does that even mean, to be honest? How can we measure that?

And even if they had it all, what use was it if there erupts a civil war inside of their own borders due to the hyperinflation US intervention led on Taiwan would bring?

Serb said:

they don't have the larger navy anymore, they don't have a motivated military, and they don't have motivated citizens for that kind of war that their elites dream of, no, in fact, their citizens don't even know where Taiwan is on the map, and it's documented on many different statistics.

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Don't get confused by American propaganda. US still has a much larger navy than China. Americans included 80 something tiny missile boats (type 022) in the Chinese ships count and China has far fewer aircraft carriers

Serb said:

The US keeps talking only about the supposed "quality" of its weapons, and "its technological dominance" only because they have nothing else left to talk about.

They don't have an industrial capacity for a war right now, they don't have the larger navy anymore, they don't have a motivated military, and they don't have motivated citizens for that kind of war that their elites dream of, no, in fact, their citizens don't even know where Taiwan is on the map, and it's documented on many different statistics.

What are they then left to talk about if not for their "quality", and "technology", what does that even mean, to be honest? How can we measure that?

And even if they had it all, what use was it if there erupts a civil war inside of their own borders due to the hyperinflation US intervention led on Taiwan would bring?

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I mean that's like a fundamental fact of the current world order. The US has superiority in technology in terms of military equipment with the PLA rapidly closing, I don't think that is a controversial statement. The US has the tonnage in ships, higher number of submarines and larger fleet of aircraft.

But technology does not make up for distance which China has just based on geography, I'm not even sure if the US will come out on top right now if the conflict was purely military.

But the line of thinking that the US will just fold over and give up it's hegemony due to being risk adverse is not only unrealistic, but also completely against any historical examples of hegemonic empires. Just 40 odd years ago the USSR and US almost ended the world over this very issue, why would you think some mild suffering of the civilian population will deter US foreign policy? It has never did and it never will.

A successful AR would completely upend the current world order and I dare say the most significant geopolitical event since WW2.

tankphobia said:

But the line of thinking that the US will just fold over and give up it's hegemony due to being risk adverse is not only unrealistic, but also completely against any historical examples of hegemonic empires. Just 40 odd years ago the USSR and US almost ended the world over this very issue, why would you think some mild suffering of the civilian population will deter US foreign policy? It has never did and it never will.

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Nah, it's not so unrealistic so as to not being worth not entertaining.

But, it's definitely not something that should be assumed to be the case, and if anything the top leadership in China (political and military) definitely needs to both prepare and think about actual hot conflict with the US (which they definitely are doing).

tankphobia said:

A successful AR would completely upend the current world order and I dare say the most significant geopolitical event since WW2.

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Yep, the years only 2030 is basically gonna be very turmoil/risky.

tankphobia said:

I mean that's like a fundamental fact of the current world order. The US has superiority in technology in terms of military equipment with the PLA rapidly closing, I don't think that is a controversial statement. The US has the tonnage in ships, higher number of submarines and larger fleet of aircraft.

But technology does not make up for distance which China has just based on geography, I'm not even sure if the US will come out on top right now if the conflict was purely military.

But the line of thinking that the US will just fold over and give up it's hegemony due to being risk adverse is not only unrealistic, but also completely against any historical examples of hegemonic empires. Just 40 odd years ago the USSR and US almost ended the world over this very issue, why would you think some mild suffering of the civilian population will deter US foreign policy? It has never did and it never will.

A successful AR would completely upend the current world order and I dare say the most significant geopolitical event since WW2.

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You are right. But by watching America's internal situation, I don't hold any more respect for that country.

They are like a joke because of all that division. That's why I laugh when they threaten other countries,

When it looks like their citizens are about to tear each other apart with their bare teeth.

They always forget to include how weak-willed they are in comparison to Chinese people for example.

I can imagine their GDP tanks by 10% or their inflation hits 30%, they would kill each other on the street.

Serb said:

I can imagine their GDP tanks by 10% or their inflation hits 30%, they would kill each other on the street.

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Eh, that has 'kind of happened' in like 2019-2022 period.
Although, I guess you can very much say that people in US are getting killed on streets, whether by gun violence or not.

So it's kind of not incorrect lol.

Anyways, I think it's a very real possibility that we might see civil unrest/war in US within like, the next 20 years. In which case, a collapse, probably even worse than that of the USSR coudl very likely happen.