Unless I misunderstand something, even H20s would not be able to hit CONUS and return. I do not believe China is even seeking to build conventional capabilities that hold CONUS at risk. Too unrealistic. Only nuclear and cyber.
PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency
- Thread starter pugachev_diver
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I know alot of people are alarmed. I say it is safe to believed that there will be no war for the next 5 years. My prediction is that Biden will win the second presidency. When he is in office, he will not be the person to ordered a war. What he will do is try to shut out many high tech investment and sales going to China as much as possible. He will also forming a IC deterrent barrier against China. That is about it.
The recent U.S politician visits had paved the way for a potential high meeting between Xi and Biden. The news media played out like there will be a conflict short term, but I doubt that will happen.
China will have 5 years to build whatever they needed militarily while U.S will continue to fortify their deterrent barrier.
The recent U.S politician visits had paved the way for a potential high meeting between Xi and Biden. The news media played out like there will be a conflict short term, but I doubt that will happen.
China will have 5 years to build whatever they needed militarily while U.S will continue to fortify their deterrent barrier.
I've already considered gun-based systems previously.
The effective range is like 2km. You're going to need really large numbers to cover the possible targets.
In any case, remember that you would plan on Shaheeds arriving at the same time as an airstrike with accompanying SEAD aircraft. And the gun systems have to reveal themselves when engaging targets.
But let's take a hypothetical engagement.
A SPAAG costs like $15 Mn.
Let's say it is really, really successful and shoots down 40 Shaheed before running out of ammo.
But one of the following Shaheed has an SDB-2 type guidance system which can autonomously identify targets, and destroys the SPAAG. The cost of Shaheed munitions is still 9x less than the cost of the SPAAG.
Again, in an arms race, large numbers of Shaheed beats SPAAG gun systems.
And when you have large salvoes of Shaheed, it is worth mixing in a few different guidance systems for different types of targets.
It is unlikely that China would recognize an American occupation even if it succeeds. You'd probably have a 2014 Crimea situation where half the world recognizes the occupation and half doesn't, with no formal peace treaty between US and China, only a ceasefire.
If Taiwan is occupied, the Chinese government would almost certainly go through a crisis of popular faith. The new government would be much more focused on military power and would have lifting the occupation as one of its main cornerstones.
Furthermore, with the semi-succesful land annexation of a nuclear power against another nuclear power, the psychological barrier of nuclear deterrence would be damaged. Nuclear powers would still not believe they can force unconditional surrender on eachother, but they would now believe that almost anything except unconditional surrender goes.
For example, Russia would now believe that if they acquire the power to take it, all of Eastern Europe would be theirs, without the threat of nuclear war. When China returns to liberate the US annexed areas, they would also not have any psychological barriers towards occupying American land in return, like Australia, Guam, Japan and so on.
This is where I absolutely disagree, if any thing the past 30+ years of observing American foreign policy actions makes that very clear that nothing less would ever stop the US from actively attacking and undermining anybody who refuses to obey their political and economic dominance over the global system, which is why no peace is really possible until that system fails. China is far closer to US 1941 than the US itself is (if anything the US is closer to 1941 Japan), and has the means to carry that out, but in any event as things have played out the way I've initially hypothesized, time will prove my point.
Unconditional victory is impossible due to nukes, but if US tries to take Taiwan, China would feel comfortable to take some stuff of equivalent value without invoking too much escalation, as long as the Chinese public is willing to push for it.
Imo China has already readied it's case regarding the Ryukyus.
In a less escalatory scenario where only US and Japan are involved, China would likely push for Ryukyu, Kyushu and the Naha islands to be given as associated state(s) to China, under similar terms as what US wanted for Taiwan.
Even through China would have capacity to push way more once it's mobilized, it's questionable if the popular will would exist. China would be satisfied with the homeland safe, Japan disarmed and the Ryukyus as a buffer against future US expansionism.
Losing such a war would also lead to imminent crash within US anyways. Very few countries would want to stay in NATO after that.
Yeah, giving a loitering suicide drone a SDB-2 type guidance system isn't going to keep it cheap. That's one way to drastically increase costs.
My overall point is that loitering drones should not be seen as a weapon which is both mass producible at low cost and also highly viable against a modern and prepared enemy that has networked sensors operating alongside low cost interception methods like SPAAG, low cost SAMs, and comprehensive EW.
Yes, loitering drones can help with the overall SEAD/DEAD effort, but you still need to look at the system of system balance of fires and countermeasures, and in the original context it was raised it was implied it would be used to force the defenders to use higher end SAMs against them and my point is that lower cost measures would be part of a layered defense to target the lower cost and kinematically weak weapons like loitering drones.
D
Deleted member 24525
Guest
And where will the 10,000s of very expensive, low-observable, EW resistant, standoff-range missiles needed to do this come from? You don't just have to saturate China's entire coastal air defense system, you also need to then actually get enough fires through on top of that to deal meaningful damage to the entire country's ability to make war. I doubt even China itself has this kind of war production capability.
Even public-facing, highly politicized war games from think tanks with comically optimistic assumptions still have the US depleting its entire standoff supply within two weeks of only targeting PLAN vessels and maybe a handful of coastal airbases if that. The US does not have the capability to impose meaningful attrition on mainland infrastructure and war production through conventional means.
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US would like to target any infrastructure across all of China, but they also need to use what stockpiles they have smartly.
Taiwan and it's immediate defenses would bear the vast majority of the US attacks. It's where they have to focus to support the offensive and where theres less Chinese AD.
Failure to link up with KMT forces would instantly doom any invasion plan, as US could hardly build up enough marines in Asia to land and supply on Taiwan without extensive KMT help. But the KMT starts out encircled well inside China's lines. So for China, it's very predictable how America will move it's assets and fires, because they know that US will defintely try to break through before the encirclement wipes out their KMT allies.
Taiwan and it's immediate defenses would bear the vast majority of the US attacks. It's where they have to focus to support the offensive and where theres less Chinese AD.
Failure to link up with KMT forces would instantly doom any invasion plan, as US could hardly build up enough marines in Asia to land and supply on Taiwan without extensive KMT help. But the KMT starts out encircled well inside China's lines. So for China, it's very predictable how America will move it's assets and fires, because they know that US will defintely try to break through before the encirclement wipes out their KMT allies.
solarz
Brigadier
Regardless of how we view the state of US fortification, my point is that there is only one possibility that could potentially lead to war over Taiwan, and that is a Taiwan declaration of secession. Such a declaration can only happen with inducement or acquiescence from the US.
Therefore, there are only two possibilities: either the US induces TI after fully preparing for war with China, or they induce TI without the necessary war preparation.
In the latter case, it would indicate that the US does not intend to engage China in direct conflict, and therefore China should not launch a preemptive attack.
In the former case, China should simply not launch AR at all, instead blockading the island indefinitely until the US is forced to drawdown.