PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency

FairAndUnbiased

Brigadier
Registered Member
Sorry, I forgot to include their heading
It was "What this simulation does not do"

So I am pointing out that they are NOT simulating any kind of decoys (which is nonsense).



It's no joke really. I don't think American society could easily handle such a shock for something like Taiwan. Especially if this was in response to a PLA blockade that was not a shooting war.

Let's say the price of an iPhone went from $2000 to $4000. Suddenly all these people become targets for robbery/murder because the payoff is so much bigger.



I have to admit, I did not get far. Like you said, there wasn't anything like use of standoff munitions (or drones). Why any PLA force would get hammered by Harpoons and just get casually mopped up by totally intact ROCA beach defenders? These assumptions just fly in the face of reality. I understand they can't really simulate everything, especially not something like morale, or special forces tactics, but even the straightforward aspects didn't seem well thought out.
They basically did not allow the PLA to fight in any other manner than an as rapid as possible yet cold start amphibious invasion.
 

bebops

Junior Member
Registered Member
HQ16FE seems like a legit system. It uses AI intelligence to cut through the BS such as decoys.

For my strategy against Japan, U.S and Taiwan, I will leave all the fighter jets, navy and submarine in the coastline. I will not adventure out just yet. What I will do is to launch swarm of missiles from land, fighter jet, drones, submarine, destroyer from the coastline. destroy all airbase/military base of Japan or Taiwan. I will keep doing this everyday for about 1-2 month. After the enemies missile stockpile is depleted by a great portion, then I will send the fighter jets and navy to blockade Taiwan.

This way I won't lose as much fighter jet or navy ships.

China produce missiles faster than any other countries and it is cheap too.
 

Overbom

Brigadier
Registered Member
HQ16FE seems like a legit system. It uses AI intelligence to cut through the BS such as decoys.

For my strategy against Japan, U.S and Taiwan, I will leave all the fighter jets, navy and submarine in the coastline. I will not adventure out just yet. What I will do is to launch swarm of missiles from land, fighter jet, drones, submarine, destroyer from the coastline. destroy all airbase/military base of Japan or Taiwan. I will keep doing this everyday for about 1-2 month. After the enemies missile stockpile is depleted by a great portion, then I will send the fighter jets and navy to blockade Taiwan.

This way I won't lose as much fighter jet or navy ships.

China produce missiles faster than any other countries and it is cheap too.
Congratulations, your strategy is actually more realistic than that "wargame"
 

FairAndUnbiased

Brigadier
Registered Member
HQ16FE seems like a legit system. It uses AI intelligence to cut through the BS such as decoys.

For my strategy against Japan, U.S and Taiwan, I will leave all the fighter jets, navy and submarine in the coastline. I will not adventure out just yet. What I will do is to launch swarm of missiles from land, fighter jet, drones, submarine, destroyer from the coastline. destroy all airbase/military base of Japan or Taiwan. I will keep doing this everyday for about 1-2 month. After the enemies missile stockpile is depleted by a great portion, then I will send the fighter jets and navy to blockade Taiwan.

This way I won't lose as much fighter jet or navy ships.

China produce missiles faster than any other countries and it is cheap too.
Pretty much this. Attritional strategies work. I'd even say build a Chinese version of the 10000 Iranian flying dishwashers of Allah and use these slow, low flying drones as the first strike on tactical targets and soft infrastructure. We're talking SAMs, ASM trucks, planes and troops in the field, ships at dock, radars, transformers, fabs, oil refineries, water towers, etc. Maximum surprise.

Hold ballistic/cruise missiles for strategic targets, counterbattery fire on SAMs that are hidden and hardened infrastructure shortly after known SAMs and radar are downed. This is OK since they have a speed advantage. This is for disruption of their C4ISR especially in the chaos of a 10k drone first strike.
 

Biscuits

Major
Registered Member
To deal with the separatists alone which are not backed by a numerically massive US attack, the solution can be done using 3 different tiers of strike options.

The lowest and most numerous tier will consist of suicide drones, long range MLRS and PGMs of the air force. These will knock out major dual use infrastructure as well as hit force concentration targets of opportunity.

The second tier of weapons are the guided cruise missiles and ballistic missiles of the rocket force. These would be used to snipe hardened military targets, storehouses, airbases, as well as heavier dual use infrastructures such as dams, bridges and so on.

The final tier will consist of the munitions carried by stealth platforms as well as hypersonic weapons of the rocket force. DF-17 has achieved a cost level similar to American Tomahawk, so fielding en masse isn't gonna be a problem. Hypersonic weapons can freely hit the highest value targets, such as leadership, major radar installations as well as any shipment of NATO "wunderwaffen" the moment it arrives for maximum demoralization. Due to the cost and maturity of the design, we will likely talk numbers of 500+ DF-17 at the lowest being available.

With this sort of approach to fighting, it only becomes a matter of matching targets with the number of munitions. KMT air defenses must activate and make themselves targets if they wish to fight the onslaught of the 1st and 2nd tier attacks, leaving them completely vulnerable to being sniped out by a hypersonic missile or stealth platforms.

If China goes at the KMT immediately and hard, the only rate that limits the matching of aim points with munitions is the speed which PLA can fire these munitions. The initial strikes will aim to leave nothing behind on Taiwan island, not for the separatists to use and not for the Americans to steal if Americans one day should make it on land. And to deliver these strikes will not necessarily take many weeks, more likely it might take days to a week.

I do not agree with waiting around in a blockade once the civil war has already gone hot. A blockade can be used in peacetime to enforce China's control, but if enacted during a shooting war without the PLA shooting back overwhelmingly, a blockade is a signal of weakness that causes unnecessary escalation.

Once firing begins, Beijing should continuously feint landings while the above strategy is used to flatten everything on the island. The goal is to force the KMT forces to retreat into inland strongholds with sheer volume of fire and cede control of the coasts to the PLA. By constantly scouting for places to land, sending unmanned vehicles, sending special forces and so on, China will be able to gauge the exact moment when the only remaining coherent KMT forces are all restricted to trenches and deep bunkers in the forests and mountains.

The sooner ground control has been established, the lower the risk for foreigners using the volatile situation as an excuse to invade. It also reduces the strain on the local civilians.
 

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
Pretty much this. Attritional strategies work. I'd even say build a Chinese version of the 10000 Iranian flying dishwashers of Allah and use these slow, low flying drones as the first strike on tactical targets and soft infrastructure. We're talking SAMs, ASM trucks, planes and troops in the field, ships at dock, radars, transformers, fabs, oil refineries, water towers, etc. Maximum surprise.

It's called the Shaheed-136 loitering munition.
The Iranians have container pods containing 5 of them, launched from trucks

And each munition is roughly the same weight and cost as a 500lb JDAM, plus has a similar guidance system.

---

10K isn't thinking big enough.
I think a figure of more like 100K munitions would be needed to cover both Taiwan and Japan.

Note that the US has 250K JDAMs in stock.
 

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
To deal with the separatists alone which are not backed by a numerically massive US attack, the solution can be done using 3 different tiers of strike options.

The lowest and most numerous tier will consist of suicide drones, long range MLRS and PGMs of the air force. These will knock out major dual use infrastructure as well as hit force concentration targets of opportunity.

The lowest tier is actually Shaheed-136 type loitering munitions, probably costing around $20K

A long-range MLRS is actually a 300km+ theatre ballistic missile. The Koreans charge about $700K for theirs, and the Chinese UAE export price was mooted as $500K. At $500K, it would be 25x more expensive than a Shaheed-136.

And whilst Air Force dropped PGMs can be low cost, the airplanes themselves are actually very expensive.


The second tier of weapons are the guided cruise missiles and ballistic missiles of the rocket force. These would be used to snipe hardened military targets, storehouses, airbases, as well as heavier dual use infrastructures such as dams, bridges and so on.

The final tier will consist of the munitions carried by stealth platforms as well as hypersonic weapons of the rocket force. DF-17 has achieved a cost level similar to American Tomahawk, so fielding en masse isn't gonna be a problem. Hypersonic weapons can freely hit the highest value targets, such as leadership, major radar installations as well as any shipment of NATO "wunderwaffen" the moment it arrives for maximum demoralization. Due to the cost and maturity of the design, we will likely talk numbers of 500+ DF-17 at the lowest being available.

With this sort of approach to fighting, it only becomes a matter of matching targets with the number of munitions. KMT air defenses must activate and make themselves targets if they wish to fight the onslaught of the 1st and 2nd tier attacks, leaving them completely vulnerable to being sniped out by a hypersonic missile or stealth platforms.

As a thought experiment, there looks to be 1500 MLRS trucks in the Chinese Army. If 800 of them were to launch Shaheeds, that is 4000 munitions in a single salvo, then there's the reload truck salvo.


If China goes at the KMT immediately and hard, the only rate that limits the matching of aim points with munitions is the speed which PLA can fire these munitions. The initial strikes will aim to leave nothing behind on Taiwan island, not for the separatists to use and not for the Americans to steal if Americans one day should make it on land. And to deliver these strikes will not necessarily take many weeks, more likely it might take days to a week.

I do not agree with waiting around in a blockade once the civil war has already gone hot. A blockade can be used in peacetime to enforce China's control, but if enacted during a shooting war without the PLA shooting back overwhelmingly, a blockade is a signal of weakness that causes unnecessary escalation.

Once firing begins, Beijing should continuously feint landings while the above strategy is used to flatten everything on the island. The goal is to force the KMT forces to retreat into inland strongholds with sheer volume of fire and cede control of the coasts to the PLA. By constantly scouting for places to land, sending unmanned vehicles, sending special forces and so on, China will be able to gauge the exact moment when the only remaining coherent KMT forces are all restricted to trenches and deep bunkers in the forests and mountains.

The sooner ground control has been established, the lower the risk for foreigners using the volatile situation as an excuse to invade. It also reduces the strain on the local civilians.

Yes, I would agree a Chinese version of Shock and Awe on Taiwan would considerably reduce the risk of US/Japan getting involved.
The implication is that Japan would be on the receiving end of a similar situation, if they get involved.

However, this assumes that the US/Japan didn't get involved from when the first missiles started flying.
 

siegecrossbow

General
Staff member
Super Moderator
I am really glad that CSIS 'experts' and 'analysts' are using Youtube video as a source for the capabilities of naval forces of the principal combatants. Are these guys really being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars (big bucks) to sit and watch youtube? Expertise on display right here!

View attachment 104946

If I am not mistaken this channel is run by someone from SDF?

At least they didn't miswrite it as Eurasia Navel Insight.
 
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