PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency

druid84 said:

Personally I hope taiwan never becomes part of china but this is getting alittle off topic.

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Taiwan is a part of China; China is always a part of Taiwan's history!

That was great reading.

Taiwan's role for the Chinese mainland:
Perhaps people should be reminded that Taiwan was an independent island the longest time it existed next to China and it had quite a reputation as one of the islands housing Chinese exiles (like Japan). The indigenious Taiwanese tradition does exist and it can be a source for separate identity, not dissimilar to Singapore. That's really a question that bothers me. Why is there so much fuzz about Taiwan and none about Singapore or the Russian Far East?
Looking at the ethnic composition Singapore or Taiwan, both can similarly qualify as Chinese.
Looking at the territorial concept of Ming China extent, well, the Russian Far East is the place to really invade again (the last attempt was rather half-hearted).
So in my opinion mainland Chinese policy is not consistent with their official claims.
I would therefore search for the reason of the Taiwanese question in the civil war. Mao was able to recover in a tiny province from a devastating loss and long march. Theoretically, Taiwan is just that for his enemy faction and because of that it's a constant systemic challenge to the victors on the Chinese mainland. The new democrats there make things even more complicated because they want to show that democracy can work well for the Han-Chinese.
Good news is that as long as the Chinese government keeps the economy going well, this systemic challenge can be neglected because people support the current government. Still, you have to keep the government of this island on a short leash so that this conflict remains an inner Chinese affair without UN conventions on aggression and without them joining formally any local defensive alliance.

Military invasion scenario (plays out as a loss-loss situation):
Basicly both sides, the mainland and Taiwan can go nasty at each other and deploy naval mines with staggering economic loss repercussions for each other by sea lines of communication interdiction, including a resilent defense against any quick military invasions other than by fixed wing aircraft airlift (not mainland China's chocolate side).
Considering supersonic fixed wing aircrafts, the most invested into modern military asset, the Taiwanese could opt for lighter and cheaper aircrafts in accordance with their defensive role (and they do just that) while the mainland has to invest much more into heavier multirole-fighter (with more bombload). Next problem is concentrating troops on the offense against an enemy in the defense. The defense is superior, even with fewer numbers and mainland China needs locally a supremacy while still manning other parts of her country. In essence ROC military can very effectively resist any attempts by a superior force from the mainland. What both, the mainland and the ROC will be unable to do is to keep their respective sea lanes open. This means that Taiwan will be under siege in a conflict. To use this image, Taiwan is from a military perspectice a sea-fortress that is hard to take and that would have to be besieged into submission. Such a siege would give all interested parties in this conflict the option to decide on whom to favour by deploying mine countermeasure capabilities and interdicting blue water shipping for one side or another. If ever such a CIVIL WAR happens in China, the US will at leisure decide on a blue water blockade of the mainland and try to run crucial supplies to the island by whatever means possible. This doesn't mean that the US will get its hand dirty in such a civil war, because it remains an open question whether the fortress or the besiegers will hold out longer. But both would pay heavily and in the end China will lose a lot. So a military invasion is among the worst ideas possible. Even more worse is only nuking Taiwan (don't walk on the grass, smoke it).

Slow integration:
The Chinese are clever people. Intertwining the economies of both Chinas serves to strengthen the economically stronger partner with a hold on the weaker partner, while opening the islanders fantastic conditions to profit, just like the people who stayed in Hong Kong and Macao (anybody wants a concubine?). Thus the financial elite of Taiwan is going to mix with the elite on the mainland. Bet they will finance the PR for a solution that serves their relationship well? Part of Chinese interests on Taiwan is the immense know-how treasure of this island. For this reason mainland China needs the people on this island alive and cooperating.

My guess what will happen:
In my opinion China is on a transitory path towards a more egoistic outlook on the world with a strong Han-national identity. The issue between Taiwan and the mainland gets more and more solved while there's been enough pressure for even the US to not support a declaration of independence. I perceive that there will be no significant future conflict between both Chinas and that rather the Chinese stances on the Arctic and South and East Chinese Sea resources will be a cause of conflict because of the egoistic legal somersault in mainland China's view on her rights. However, the reunification idea can be good incentive for uniting the population for more far reaching goals that also help achieve this more obvious goal. Any military confrontation in the seas around China requires sea control at least as far as East Africa. Otherwise mainland China could win all battles locally on her coasts, but would collapse because it lost the war in the blue sea beyond. In this sense the "String of Pearls" is more important for military pressure on Taiwan than the missiles, tanks and fighter aircrafts opposite their coast. But this global aim will affect Chinas stance on a global scale, the only scale where it can solve its existing inner and border conflicts.

Kurt said:

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I do have to point out that Taiwan was under Qing control for 150 years before the Japanese came, so it is a misconception to assume that being separate was longer than control from Beijing was, plus claiming that the Ming conceived of control of the area of the Russian Far East is also a historical misconception as well (Yuan dynastic control being the farthest territorial conception), and the mere mention of nukes on Taiwan demonstrates an amateurish analysis of sociopolitical strategy here, as others have already argued why.

In any case I would say there's a lot of layers that can be played around with.

Geographer said:

Good points. It's not that Chinese "hate freedom" or are "jealous about democracy" (I don't know where you're getting those ideas), but that China is not yet unified. The unification of China has been a centuries-long process for Chinese rulers since the Qing dynasty. Why do think China celebrated the return of Hong Kong? Because it was a righting of an old imperial wrong, the much-maligned "unequal treaties" that led embarrassed China throughout the 19th century. I think many Chinese see the RoC's encampment in Taiwan as an extension of Western imperialism because they were backed, and remain backed, so fervently by the West. It's like if the American South had seceded and the fought the North to a standstill: would the North be happy to let the status quo go on, or seek to settle the argument once and for all?

Besides, there are tangible strategic benefits to gaining control over Taiwan, like all its fortified ports and airfields, all the Western technology sold to the ROC military, the ability to tax an additional 23 million people, the ability to leverage an even larger economy in trade negotiations to extract more favorable concessions, fishing waters, the Taiwanese base on Itu Aba which is the largest island in the Spratly Islands, and better access to the Diaoyu Islands from which to push Japanese patrols away.

The Chinese military and used to be more closely alligned. They used to have huge business and economic interests until the CCP forced them to divest their interests in that and focus on being a military. They are a huge bureaucracy, and even with the watchful eyes of the CCP and integration of top leadership into the Poliburo, there are some organization tendencies that will always be there. Young officers are hungry to prove themselves in combat. Young solders are gung-ho to kill the enemy. Weapons designers yearn to see how their years of hard work stacks up against the enemy.

Here's the thing: practice creates a demand for the real thing. It's just human psychology. It's why football players are raring to go at the start of the season because they want that challenge, they want to scrimmage against someone else besides their teammates. It's PC but disingenuous for a weapons scientist to say "We worked really hard on the new J-20, spent years fine-tuning it, running it through all kinds of scenarios, but we hope we will never see it used in combat."

The American, British, and French militaries have no such problem because they are constantly engaged in combat somewhere in the world. They are like the guys who get work out and go to Fight Club every week to let off steam. The Chinese, on the other hand, are the guys who work out, learn martial arts, practice constantly, but swear up and down they hope they never have to use their skills.

Yeah, right.

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That's a very interesting POV. You would have to check it, but I think China moved on to being a huge supplier of troops for the UN. So while not actually fighting, their professional force sees a taste of other people's combat and exotic countries. In the Congo there are some reports about problems with Chinese soldiers and prostitution (but that seems always the case in Africa with prostitues being often quite young becomes of AIDS fear and other natives not happy about that).
Another report was about Chinese and other elite soldiers partaking in the Mexican drug wars. There's an inflationary use of self-described elite soldiers, but China reduced personnel and the pay is good, so some people with a reasonable military background might have ended up with the Zetas and their enemies in trade.
China is the closest ally of North Korea. North Korea is the country to get trainers for your rag-tag military force in Africa and elsewhere (with the biggest "special forces" departement in the world). So actually Chinese officers might be very well informed about trying some new ideas in combat (and don't discount African soldiers as inferior, they may lack shiny equipment but after a lifetime of war many will know their trade).
Another source of information are very likely the wars NATO waged. Ever wondered why Chinese were astonished and well, informed about these? A step further, any country can use such a warzone to run weapon trials against enemy hardware (but needs to avoid being caught in the act).
I once read a report about a strange projectile punching a hole through a US MBT during the early stages of the Occupation of Iraq without injuring anyone. Well, it improved ventilation and led to lots of speculation what the hell could do that.

So I would agree that there's a strange tendency of soldiers who don't know war to fashion this beast and the Chinese mainland is one of the countries with a strong military personnel lobby. But maybe some UN-led war can convince the hotheads not to cause real damage at home. What about invading Somali pirate heavens? All this amphibious warfare capabilities could be tried out in a place even the Americans left as a hopeless cause.

montyp165 said:

I do have to point out that Taiwan was under Qing control for 150 years before the Japanese came, so it is a misconception to assume that being separate was longer than control from Beijing was, plus claiming that the Ming conceived of control of the area of the Russian Far East is also a historical misconception as well (Yuan dynastic control being the farthest territorial conception), and the mere mention of nukes on Taiwan demonstrates an amateurish analysis of sociopolitical strategy here, as others have already argued why.

In any case I would say there's a lot of layers that can be played around with.

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That's a misunderstanding, Taiwan-China relations go further back than some claimed Ming control of former Dutch and Spanish naval and trade bases. Taiwan as such, unlike mainland South China, didn't have her former non-Chinese settlers intermixing or moving south for independence like the Thai and Vietnamese.
Taiwan has some indigenious tribes with a nice head hunting tradition. Actually during most of Chinese history the Chinese seem to have stayed away from this malaria invested island until the Dutch used labour (and lots of casualties) to make it more inhabitable without so much swamps around. One problem is that the Chinese on this island under Dutch control were a very special branch of China's many Chinese nationalities. Afterwards there come other migrant groups, mostly Han Chinese, but in essence there's a possible identity many could relate of being different by ancestry and choice. This was nicely explained concerning the English in Britain and elsewhere.

Kurt said:

That's a misunderstanding, Taiwan-China relations go further back than some claimed Ming control of former Dutch and Spanish naval and trade bases. Taiwan as such, unlike mainland South China, didn't have her former non-Chinese settlers intermixing or moving south for independence like the Thai and Vietnamese.
Taiwan has some indigenious tribes with a nice head hunting tradition. Actually during most of Chinese history the Chinese seem to have stayed away from this malaria invested island until the Dutch used labour (and lots of casualties) to make it more inhabitable without so much swamps around. One problem is that the Chinese on this island under Dutch control were a very special branch of China's many Chinese nationalities. Afterwards there come other migrant groups, mostly Han Chinese, but in essence there's a possible identity many could relate of being different by ancestry and choice. This was nicely explained concerning the English in Britain and elsewhere.

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Mein Freund Kurt

I don't know where you learn your history about Taiwan. But every Chinese know that there were always Chinese settlement since the Han dynasty. But large scale immigration didn't start until Chen Zhenggong(aka Koxinga) a Ming loyalist arrive in Taiwan and defeat the Dutch and start settling Taiwan with remnant of his defeated army(mostly from southern fFujian province) . So until this day the descendant of this people still speak the same dialect of Minnanhua called Hoklo in Taiwan and Hokkien in Singapore, Malaysia,

He founded a kingdom Tungnin center on Tainan but he was betray by his own general named Shilang who pledge loyalty to the Qing Dynasty and after defeating Koxinga son he become the Qing Governor

This Kok Seng Ya(Dutch misprononciation Koxinga) is my childhood hero though he did bad thing to the defeated Dutch. China should named Ex Varyag as Chen Zhenggong

Interesting guy. He was born in Hirado from a Japanese mother the daughter of minor Daimyo of Tagawa Clan and Zheng Zilong a pirate chief (well smuggler actually). at the age of 7 he return to China to be educated in Chinese but His father latter tempted by the promise of governorship of Fujian and Guangdong, submit himself to Qing dynasty.

But Koxinga refused to surrender to Qing army and raised an army to fight the Qing . With his superb navy, they fight all the way and lay siege to Nanjing. One of the few of Chinese naval battle. The Manchu launch counter attack and and storm zheng home in Anping. His mother refused to surrender rather than fall to the manchu hand she commit harakiri to save her honour.

It would make a great opera plot. Kok Seng Ya. He died young . If he didn't died Phillipine will become Chinese province. He was furious at the Spanish treatment of Chinese immigrant in Phillipine and vow revenge and make preparation to attack Phillipine. His death cause the cancellation of the invasion.

He was well known in Japan too because Chikamatsu Monzaemon created a Kabuki play Kokusenya Kassen based on his life. and known as Fukumatsu

The remnant of his army spread all over South East Asia . he was revered in Mainland China as the man who bring over the control of Taiwan to China .

There no question of Chinese control over Taiwan but some revisionist Historian try to deny this
But they completely disregard the treaty of Shimonosheki where China ceded the control over Taiwan to Japan. But the treaty of San Francisco revoked that unequal treaty and return Taiwan to China But through the chicanery of US they didn't spell out exactly which China as China was in the middle of civil war

This is his image as he was preparing to attack Taiwan and give the battle speech to his troop


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Koxinga on Taiwan
Image in Koxinga Temple in Tainan
Extent of territory held by Koxinga

In 1661, Koxinga led his troops on a landing at Lu'ermen to attack the Dutch colonists in Taiwan. On 1 February 1662, the Dutch Governor of Taiwan, Frederik Coyett, surrendered Fort Zeelandia to Koxinga. During the siege, Koxinga's life was saved by a certain Hans Jurgen Radis of Stockaert, a Dutch defector who strongly advised him against visiting the overrun ramparts, which he knew would be blown up by the retreating Dutch forces.[23] In the peace treaty, Koxinga was styled "Lord Teibingh Tsiante Teysiancon Koxin" [4]. This effectively ended 38 years of Dutch rule on Taiwan. Koxinga then devoted himself to transforming Taiwan into a military base for loyalists who wanted to restore the Ming Dynasty.

Dear Hendrik 2000

I think that best summarizes my position:
Mainland China wants you to believe that it is a no-brainer that Taiwan legally belongs to their China and the issue is an ongoing civil war affair. I doubt that and consider it possible to mount an argumentation that according to international law Taiwan can be considered an ancient independent island with little Chinese impact until the Japanese occupation and the later Kuomintang refugee that really sinicized the island. So in my opinion, a claim for independence does have a legal foundation, but might makes right. I also agree that there is a narrative for the claim that this island legally belongs and belonged to China. In the end, I do favour the independence claim because I consider the historical imperial Chinese foothold on this island as grossly overstated.
That's no position on how the current conflict between the mainland and this island has to be solved. I don't object to a unification according to realistic modern politics, but the "ancient claim" is for me rather a fictional construct than a proven reality.

Dear Hendrik 2000

I think that best summarizes my position:
Mainland China wants you to believe that it is a no-brainer that Taiwan legally belongs to their China and the issue is an ongoing civil war affair. I doubt that and consider it possible to mount an argumentation that according to international law Taiwan can be considered an ancient independent island with little Chinese impact until the Japanese occupation and the later Kuomintang refugee that really sinicized the island. So in my opinion, a claim for independence does have a legal foundation, but might makes right. I also agree that there is a narrative for the claim that this island legally belongs and belonged to China. In the end, I do favour the independence claim because I consider the historical imperial Chinese foothold on this island as grossly overstated.
That's no position on how the current conflict between the mainland and this island has to be solved. I don't object to a unification according to realistic modern politics, but the "ancient claim" is for me rather a fictional construct than a proven reality.

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I am really flabbergasted by the double standard and ignorance of some people in the West.
By the same argument they should also Champion the return of Whole continent of America and Canada to the Indian. Which is originally owned and settled by native Indian. So Kurt why don't you start petitioning UN for independence of North America, Hawaii. Malvinas..The moral of the story is too late to turn back the clock of History

Out of ignorance and paranoia , they can easily sway and believe the superficial similarity/ between Anchluss and China's Claim on Taiwan.

Austria and Sudetenland are like Singapore to China so there is no claim here,

You get completely mixed up(verwirt) race and nationality. Earlier you mention Singapore and China . Singapore was never been part of China though Singapore is populated by ethnic Chinese. China never claimed Singapore as part of China.

But Taiwan is part and parcel of Chinese sovereign territory. There is constant Chinese political present for 150 years as I prove it to you

The Japanese assist and abetted by the west forced China to cede Taiwan under the now illegal treaty of Shimonoseki.

That treaty was revoked. So Japan renounce their claim on Taiwan, Panghu, Diao Yutai Island. But US was loathed to return it to China as China was likely to go communist. And decide not to invite both warring parties in China to San Francisco treaty

It is the same analogy of someone robbed your house and you go to police and court to reclaim your jewelry.

The police and court caught the thieve and punish the thief. Now your jewelry is in the court custodian. But because you and your wife is in the mid of divorce.they decide not to return it to both of you. doesn't make sense in the real world.

Another things is the west preoccupation with selective self determination which is recent phenomena in the western country Before they guard their sovereignty with tooth and nail resulting in 2 world wars. Invoking the convention of Westphalia which basically said the in violation of sovereign Territory. They abandoned it out of guilt to the brutal colonization of Africa, Asia,

So which law are you talking here Kurt . There is no law only convention that was changed constantly according to the western perception

Could you refrain from personal attacks on me being "verwirrt"? Things are logical, plain and simple.
This island was not sinicized nor significantly under non-native jurisdiction during the earlier Chinese claim on it. Sinicization happened during the Japanese occupation and to a major extent during the Kuomintang flight from the mainland. That's why this group of very recent immigrants is such a large portion of the population on the island. The Kuomintang took lots of wealth with them to the island and were in turn able to build up an economy and become the richest political party on earth, at least until recently.
So the claim of previous Chinese control of the island is grossly overstated in order to invade the refugee of people displaced by the Chinese civil war.
The point is that now the natives as such are no more the largest group on this island, but for the time the Chinese pledge earlier authority it simply did not exist to a meaningful extent because the island was almost universally ruled by native tribes outside the jurisdiction of the Chinese emperor.
So the claim that this island was Chinese for hundreds of years is refuteable. There's no problem to see that this island has been sinicized (and japanized), but that didn't happen during the claimed Chinese control that mostly existed in theory only. So the island is a civil war refugee with correspondingly changed ethnicity. Claims on the status as a former Chinese province are from a legal perspective very open to challenge. But the whole reunification idea has this claimed ancient control as its official rational and not the idea of following the civil war losers to their last retreat or uniting all Chinamen.

You went rather into a gross mispresentation by saying the lands in America have to be returned to some natives. I never said the island belongs to any natives. I only stated that it belonged (past tense) to the natives and not to the Chinese during the time the Chinese pledge of previous control. So this previous control is a myth. If you took such Chinese "previous control" seriously, well, Singapore, Sumatra and Sri Lanka would have to also watch their shores for new military "treasure" fleet invasions.

There is no native kingdom or population after Koxinga arrives in Taiwan. Most of them are killed or forced to accept sinization either to conversion or intermarriage. No different than Indian in North America.

Now you say there is no legal claim of China toward Taiwan. Why would Japan need to forced Shimoniseki treaty on China . It that were true than Japan can take Taiwan right away without any need of treaty. The fact that Japan forced China to sign the treaty is acknowledgement of Chinese sovereignty of Taiwan that is now transferred to Japan. Just like the deed on the house both parties seller and buyer have to sign the contract

You talk about law but you have no grasp whatsoever of the principle of law!
You can post your opinion on the forum . But if if untrue , you will be challenged
Westerner concocted this revisionist history of no Chinese sovereign on Taiwan in order to support their agenda of separate and independent Taiwan as a bulwark against China

Anyway you can nowadays count the natives by thousand most of them are mixed blood anyway there are no more pure blood native in Taiwan

You are co