PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency

Changing topics.

Which countries would likely be involved in a Taiwan Contingency that imply navy clashes besides China and the US?

Would Japan and South Korea be forced to participate? And in that case could they affect the outcome?

Of course Japan would participate in anyway since it would be used by American troops, but they would also send their ships and so on?

And, in the case of Japan and South Korea participating, can China count on North Korea and Russia participating to oppose those 2 countries?
Specially taking into consideration how bad relation between Russia and Japan has become, Russia could put pressure the island of Hokkaido

The danger of this reasoning is of course that if carriers start to sink the probability of nuclear exchange become enormous, but simply the possibility of Russia and North Korea reaction could deter South Korea and Japan.

Santamaria said:

Changing topics.

Which countries would likely be involved in a Taiwan Contingency that imply navy clashes besides China and the US?

Would Japan and South Korea be forced to participate? And in that case could they affect the outcome?

Of course Japan would participate in anyway since it would be used by American troops, but they would also send their ships and so on?

And, in the case of Japan and South Korea participating, can China count on North Korea and Russia participating to oppose those 2 countries?
Specially taking into consideration how bad relation between Russia and Japan has become, Russia could put pressure the island of Hokkaido

The danger of this reasoning is of course that if carriers start to sink the probability of nuclear exchange become enormous, but simply the possibility of Russia and North Korea reaction could deter South Korea and Japan.

Click to expand...

Here is my opinion on the matter:

1. Any country that lets the U.S use as a forward attacking (talking about the 1st island chain) would be directly involved, and may or may not include navy clashes, or China lobbing some cruise missiles from a destroyer yonder there.

2. Although the current Japanese and South Korean government are like bees to honey to America, they do have their own autonomy. Generally speaking the Japanese population is relatively pacifist, and I'd like to believe the Japanese government isn't so dense as to actually involve themselves directly in a conflict that will provide more harm than good to their country. More like Americans using bases as forward operating stations. As for South Korea, I don't think it's realistic that S.K would actually involve themselves militarily directly as well, but at most would fulfill the role that the Americans have planned out for them.

Of course this answer is hypothetically based on the scenario that America would directly intervene. It's been known that Americans don't actually care about Taiwan, with Ukraine as an example. In the beginning of the war everyone in America cheered on Zelenskyy, but 2 years on and they're already having trouble with sending more aid due to the stagnation of the conflict, and slow collapse of the Ukrainian lines. The fact of the matter is, America's interest is to destabilize China for it's own benefit. Most certainly can we expect them to aid Taiwan with military aid, but if they wage war against China, it destabilizes America. Thus concluding that it's a very low chance any countries would get involved directly.

(Although if Sleepy Joe gets re-elected, his cognitive decline coupled on with him being senile, we may be viewing an entirely different situation)

3. Kind of answers Question 2

4. China can absolutely count on the both of them for diplomatic support. If South Korea gets involved, you'd bet the North Koreans would get involved militarily, ever since 2022 they've been practically salivating to get back at the South. Russia? Not so much. I don't see how Russia becoming a participant of the war would actually favour anyone, for example it's a geographical and logistical nightmare to start a Japanese front for the Russians.

I hope my amateur answer has brought you at least some microscopic insight into it.
My answer is also completely my opinion, and I'd definitely be willing to hear other sides.

Santamaria said:

Changing topics.

Which countries would likely be involved in a Taiwan Contingency that imply navy clashes besides China and the US?

Would Japan and South Korea be forced to participate? And in that case could they affect the outcome?

Of course Japan would participate in anyway since it would be used by American troops, but they would also send their ships and so on?

And, in the case of Japan and South Korea participating, can China count on North Korea and Russia participating to oppose those 2 countries?
Specially taking into consideration how bad relation between Russia and Japan has become, Russia could put pressure the island of Hokkaido

The danger of this reasoning is of course that if carriers start to sink the probability of nuclear exchange become enormous, but simply the possibility of Russia and North Korea reaction could deter South Korea and Japan.

Click to expand...

North Korea can help by bombing South Korean airports, military logistic centres, ports, fuel depots and power generation stations so China can concentrate on Japan.

Santamaria said:

Changing topics.

Which countries would likely be involved in a Taiwan Contingency that imply navy clashes besides China and the US?

Would Japan and South Korea be forced to participate? And in that case could they affect the outcome?

Of course Japan would participate in anyway since it would be used by American troops, but they would also send their ships and so on?

And, in the case of Japan and South Korea participating, can China count on North Korea and Russia participating to oppose those 2 countries?
Specially taking into consideration how bad relation between Russia and Japan has become, Russia could put pressure the island of Hokkaido

The danger of this reasoning is of course that if carriers start to sink the probability of nuclear exchange become enormous, but simply the possibility of Russia and North Korea reaction could deter South Korea and Japan.

Click to expand...

Okay, I think it's better to answer some serious questions before going to bed.
JFSS invited many government officials, retired generals, and retired leaders to conduct emergency decision-making simulations.


From the list, it can be seen that these participants are not ordinary people.
Due to the main purpose of simulation being to assist decision-making during crisis periods, military is not the focus.
Their actions in 2023 are more conservative compared to 2022. They want to intervene in a possible war, but are afraid of direct confrontation.
Their strategy is to hide behind the Americans for "support" and send troops to attempt "evacuation of nationals".
But due to political correctness, their enemies naturally failed.
Japan is currently exploring ways to overcome a series of legal and procedural issues, but you can see that they have a relatively clear tendency to intervene: provided that the Americans are ahead and the situation is favorable.

According to the interpretation of the simulation results in 2021 and 2022, Japan was deeply affected by the Ukrainian war in 2022. They adopted an extremely aggressive intervention strategy. Including the abolition of the Sino Japanese Peace and Friendship Treaty signed in 1978. In addition, they also demanded that the United States deploy nuclear weapons in Japan.

It is obvious that they were stimulated by the war in Ukraine, but they have finally regained some rationality in 2023, but not much.

zhangjim said:

Okay, I think it's better to answer some serious questions before going to bed.
JFSS invited many government officials, retired generals, and retired leaders to conduct emergency decision-making simulations.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

View attachment 125544
From the list, it can be seen that these participants are not ordinary people.
Due to the main purpose of simulation being to assist decision-making during crisis periods, military is not the focus.
Their actions in 2023 are more conservative compared to 2022. They want to intervene in a possible war, but are afraid of direct confrontation.
Their strategy is to hide behind the Americans for "support" and send troops to attempt "evacuation of nationals".
But due to political correctness, their enemies naturally failed.
Japan is currently exploring ways to overcome a series of legal and procedural issues, but you can see that they have a relatively clear tendency to intervene: provided that the Americans are ahead and the situation is favorable.

Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!

According to the interpretation of the simulation results in 2021 and 2022, Japan was deeply affected by the Ukrainian war in 2022. They adopted an extremely aggressive intervention strategy. Including the abolition of the Sino Japanese Peace and Friendship Treaty signed in 1978. In addition, they also demanded that the United States deploy nuclear weapons in Japan.

It is obvious that they were stimulated by the war in Ukraine, but they have finally regained some rationality in 2023, but not much.

Click to expand...

I've watched this. Its funny to see how they are blindly copying Ukraine and the west.

Now that Ukraine is losing ground with high casualties, they suddenly changed their minds.

It means that they don't have any ability to analyze the facts independently. They think China = Russia without any critical thinking from themselves.

They have no rational self reflection. They put themselves in Ukrainian position without thinking whether their position is actually equivalent to Ukraine.

They neither understand themselves or the conflict.

知己知彼，百战不殆；不知彼而知己，一胜一负；不知彼，不知己，每战必殆。

FairAndUnbiased said:

One thing is that Prof Shen Yi is not wrong. I read Taiwanese news and the consensus in the DPP coalition is that China is a joke, China can't touch Taiwan, everything (and I mean everything) in China is attacked as low quality regardless of actual quality, if its indisputably high quality then they say its foreign and even a screw will be talked up as an irreplaceable foreign screw worth 99% of product value, if its indisputably high quality and domestic they say its a strategic dead end of no value being propped up by the government.

They really think that China is begging them and that is actually how they are behaving. The rational response to a war you think will be existentially threatening is to deescalate. The irrational response would be to escalate- but if you think you can win at low cost and just want a casus belli then escalation is OK. Look at what Taiwan is actually doing - escalating.

They believe that China giving them trade deals for peace is actually China offering tribute.

Of course this is due to their inability to even comprehend the gulf in power, not due to actually strong conviction. But it is a view that is common and we must understand it.

That means Shen Yi is correct. Trying to appease Taiwanese economically is not a useful strategy because it is not viewed by Taiwan as an offer of peace, but as deserved tribute from a weaker power. Thus the strategy is changing.

Click to expand...

I have never advocated for appeasing Taiwan economically or giving them anything that could strengthen them against us; I said to peacefully build our might until we are certain, then move with unopposable conviction. The floundering around with fishing boats acting like mice gets nothing done except embarrass us.

Secondly, from what you say, the Taiwanese news is irrational. If they are irrational, then why try to give them rational reasons to respect us? Although they are official news, the things they say are ridiculous, so the people don't take it seriously. It is seen in the polls that the majority of Taiwanese will refuse to fight in the event of a PLA military action to reclaim the island with many saying that they'd like to give up immediately. Most say they don't believe the US would dare intervene either. This shows that they have a serious fear of China and understand the power difference.

Santamaria said:

Changing topics.

Which countries would likely be involved in a Taiwan Contingency that imply navy clashes besides China and the US?

Would Japan and South Korea be forced to participate? And in that case could they affect the outcome?

Of course Japan would participate in anyway since it would be used by American troops, but they would also send their ships and so on?

And, in the case of Japan and South Korea participating, can China count on North Korea and Russia participating to oppose those 2 countries?
Specially taking into consideration how bad relation between Russia and Japan has become, Russia could put pressure the island of Hokkaido

The danger of this reasoning is of course that if carriers start to sink the probability of nuclear exchange become enormous, but simply the possibility of Russia and North Korea reaction could deter South Korea and Japan.

Click to expand...

You're missing Philippines and India, they've dialed up military contact with Taiwan lately.

manqiangrexue said:

I have never advocated for appeasing Taiwan economically or giving them anything that could strengthen them against us; I said to peacefully build our might until we are certain, then move with unopposable conviction. The floundering around with fishing boats acting like mice gets nothing done except embarrass us.

Secondly, from what you say, the Taiwanese news is irrational. If they are irrational, then why try to give them rational reasons to respect us? Although they are official news, the things they say are ridiculous, so the people don't take it seriously. It is seen in the polls that the majority of Taiwanese will refuse to fight in the event of a PLA military action to reclaim the island with many saying that they'd like to give up immediately. Most say they don't believe the US would dare intervene either. This shows that they have a serious fear of China and understand the power difference.

Click to expand...

Taiwanese polling for military has never been high. But polls are just polls.

It's not giving them a reason to respect us. It means their good will is unnecessary and if coercion is necessary so be it. This is a big mentality change within China itself.

FairAndUnbiased said:

I've watched this. Its funny to see how they are blindly copying Ukraine and the west.

Now that Ukraine is losing ground with high casualties, they suddenly changed their minds.

It means that they don't have any ability to analyze the facts independently. They think China = Russia without any critical thinking from themselves.

They have no rational self reflection. They put themselves in Ukrainian position without thinking whether their position is actually equivalent to Ukraine.

They neither understand themselves or the conflict.

知己知彼，百战不殆；不知彼而知己，一胜一负；不知彼，不知己，每战必殆。

Click to expand...

Japan thinks they are EU, Taiwan is Ukraine. But the reality is Taiwan is Crimea, Japan is Ukraine, US is EU.

FairAndUnbiased said:

Taiwanese polling for military has never been high. But polls are just polls.

It's not giving them a reason to respect us. It means their good will is unnecessary and if coercion is necessary so be it. This is a big mentality change within China itself.

Click to expand...

I wouldn't put any credence into these polls. When the war starts, people's wishes and desires become irrelevant anyway. As an interesting comparison, here are the results of a survey which was conducted in Ukraine at the end of 2021. Back then, only 1/3 of Ukrainians said they would put up an armed resistance if Russia invaded.