PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency
- Thread starter pugachev_diver
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Even assuming some 100% effective naval blockade, which would be far from realistic, China's wartime resources and needs are all situation on the eurasian mainland...
I don't see why China has any need to sustain it's entire economy at pre war levels.
If Japan joins in an invasion, which is crucial in many ways for US to have a chance to build up, after China repels the US attack, they will counterattack in Japan. Japan is a 5.7 trillion economy, so US can inflict as much shipping damage to primarily non Chinese flagged vessels which will piss off the whole world as they want, while China can sustain its continued mobilization first by land, and then continously grow through conquest.
A scenario where a China creates it's own client state collection by force using the former US controlled states in Asia and the subcontinent, despite whatever piracy US manages to commit in the far seas thousands of miles away from China, is still going to see significant growth for China, as they can now strip the loser countries of anything valuable, if the need arises.
The whole idea that US can avoid direct assault and just vaguely attack Chinese interests from afar while all of Asia lies open is mainly cope from US side, because they know a direct attack has poor chances of success. But if US doesn't directly attack, China will push and someone else has to take the full brunt of it. So this is really just muddying the waters by saying "meh we don't know what will happen" as opposed to sending an armada to invade Taiwan, where even fairly staunch US nationalists suspect that it may become a turkey shoot.
Are there any resources that russia + china would lack in case of war? Last time i've checked, RU + PRC had all the needed resources inside their territories to equip military and maintain the industry. So theoretically no need for imports like germany in WW2.
Here's a photograph from the ROCN FFG-937 frigate Hwai Yang in the opposite direction, looking at the PLAN FFG-530 frigate Xuzhou of the 054A-class. Posted by on Twitter.
My strategy would be to re-supply and bolster Taiwanese forces on Taiwan as much as possible without direct US action against China, almost exactly like NATO with Ukraine. Naval re-supply would have USN escort and air re-supply would have USAF escort. No firing on PLA forces unless US escorts are attacked. No attacks against the Chinese mainland.
With this, minimal/maximal effort, the US could say that it upheld its commitment, technically, while avoiding the gravest of unintended-consequences. This could be spun as a political “win” after the inevitable occurs. “We provided Taiwan with the best equipment the world had to offer; however, despite putting-up a determined, heroic, and honorable resistance, the forces of freedom and democracy could not overcome insurmountable odds. Today is a dark day for all freedom-loving people of the world!”
In a sense, Ukraine might be the model-test for future western ‘interventions‘. All the more reason that they keep pouring-n resources.
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how do they unload when all the ports are on the western side of Taiwan?
As mentioned by another user the ports are on the western coast. Also China can put a NFZ and no ship zone so this wouldn't even help.
Damn, didn’t know that. Is that geographically imposed, or just poor planning?
IIRC the east coast is very prone to extreme earthquakes, so it's light on infrastructure.