Could be. Idk much about the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute. Are they pro-US ?
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- Thread starter bd popeye
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US itself already knows first strike is impossible. But they're still going to threaten invasion because China is an existential threat to them.
Some random US general saying "aim for the head" to his troops, interpretating that as calling for nuclear suicide pact is as stupid as when US interpretate Chinese officials using expressions to literally mean they will crush the bones of their enemies. Its just... Lol.
The "problem" is that both China and US has something to gain despite they both being MAD capable nuclear powers, so there is hopium on both sides that nukes won't be launched.
US believes it can take Taiwan province. It has begun the irreversible process of claiming the country, similar to when Russia began claiming oblasts in the Donbass.
China meanwhile believes that if an US invasion is repelled, American non core territory and US Co-aggressors in Asia will be up for grabs.
US will become irrelevant and eventually economically ground down by China's bloc if they don't win and capture Chinese territory in an attempt to reverse the current trend of history.
On the flip side, China is blessed with economy, industry and resources, but it is not blessed in terms of having an empire. A blatant US invasion is the perfect justification for China to acquire the final pieces to become undisputed world leader.
Hence China has the no first use decision so they can smash incoming invaders with precision and hypersonic missiles guilt free. And US is very unlikely to use nukes either, in a war where they are the attackers, using nukes and incurring MAD would be extremely politically untenable.
Think about how Putin doesn't use nukes even despite Ukraine being non nuclear.
Now think of the backlash if Americans realize that Biden intends to kill them all tomorrow because of a war America themselves started over some stupid Chinese oblast 10000kms away. You'd see military mutiny and mass lynching.
Good points. Though many anti-China folks, and pacifists will dislike our arguments for a stronger Chinese military, China is a special case. It had experienced the cold hard reality of history. China paid dearly for the mistake of not building a sufficiently powerful military to protect itself. Even today, many of China's neighbours still covet pieces of Chinese territories on land, and at sea. Some even covet entire provinces and regions. The US Empire coming from afar and setting up bases close to China is yet another major threat. China cannot hide behind oceans for defense. Without a strong military, it is a relatively easy nation to invade, and many have invaded China in the past.
I would also add that, unlike the Soviet Union, China did a good job of building a powerful and vibrant civilian industry. Hence, as the Chinese military spending grows, civilian life is not terribly affected. The Soviet Union focused too much into the arms race, neglecting its civilian industry and creating fatal civilian discontent towards its end. The US in recent years is also falling into this trap, but their situation can potentially get much worse. Pakistan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Russia, North Korea, and India are other nations that have invested more into defense at the expense of their civilian economies. So we can see that their civilian lives are not too rosy. China had built up a very strong civilian economy, before building up its military economy. Hence China had avoided a potential pitfall in an arms race. This is why China is in a stronger position than the US in a future arms race.
The most important is how many nukes have platforms to launch them, not the number of warheads.
Both Russia and America have tons of warheads but in actuality, the ready number of US warheads ia about 1600, and for Russia, 1500.
China in 30 years or so ago indicated they have about 300 such ready nukes, by now, anything between 500-2000 is a possible estimate.
antiterror13
Brigadier
I don't think more than 20 people in China even know how many ICBMs are in those tunnels
Tunnels are more expensive than ICBM. Based on the amount of tunnels one can somewhat approximate the amount of nukes, because no one would have a lot of expensive tunnels for no reason.
The problem is, likely no one except the SSF knows how much tunnel there is besides "much".
antiterror13
Brigadier
What is SSF ?
The DPP wouldn't. But what about an unexpected NPP victory?
There's precedence. Mao's declaration of the PRC was not exactly constitutional under the Chinese (ROC) constitution at the time, was it?
The most probable scenario for a Taiwan war is a colour revolution against a KMT president or a similar revolutionary movement. It almost happened before in the "sunflower movement". That's why most of the strategies discussed for such a war are not realistic while people imagine the scenario promoted by the US that China at some point just decides to start a war and attacks without justification.
What China needs is a way to quickly deal with a revolutionary government on Taiwan before it can be recognised by any great power. There may be almost no warning, no preparations to change a forgotten legal document. Countries like Lithuania would rush to be the first country to recognise the new state and try to draw the EU into the fight. The ROC military may support the new government. In such a scenario, bombs will be hitting kinmen on day 1