PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency

Staedler

Staedler

Junior Member
Registered Member
Santamaria said:
Thank you very much for your explanations, I see the difference between the conflicts now.

Maybe can I ask why NATO ISR will not be applicable in Taiwan?
Cant AEW planes just fly in the ocean helped by tankers as they are doing currently in Poland and Romania?

Or it is assumed than in case of conflict China would shot them?
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1. Russia does not want to open direct conflict with NATO. Firing at NATO ISR risks bringing NATO directly in the conflict and Russia is likely to draw at best and lose at worst. This is not true for China; it will win at best and draw at worse.

Chinese industrial production and military capabilities far outstrip Russia; they're not even close. For example, prior to the war, Russia basically had no PGM usage or training. That's why we had that comment from a Chinese pilot a while back after Sino-Russia joint training that the Chinese airforce expends more PGMs in a single training than the entire Russian airforce for that year.

Hence the relative cost for shooting down NATO ISR is much higher for Russia than China.


2. That there's no scenario where reunification starts and the US can sit out without consequences. If the US sits out, they risk losing control over every vassal in Asia. that means Japan, Korea, Philippines, Australia, etc. That's why any battle over Taiwan will always boil down to a US-China war. This is because of the sheer level of military dominance China has in Asia. Vassals are kept inline because of the idea that the US will commit fully. If the US shows its not going to commit in Asia, then the vassals will break ranks*. This isn't the case with Ukraine. Ukraine wasn't an ally/vassal, and Russia isn't that dominate in Europe. The China-Taiwan military balance is much closer to NATO vs Yugoslavia than Russia vs Ukraine. In fact a China-Japan war is still not quite at the proportional level of Russia vs Ukraine.

Hence US (NATO) is not going to be able to sit back and just let China fight Taiwan.


3. Ukraine is a huge continental country connected by border to NATO. Military resupply is easy and there is plenty of strategic depth to hide launchers. Taiwan is a tiny import-dependent island. There is no strategic depth and resupply is difficult if not impossible.

It is very difficult for Russia to strike the entirety of Ukraine (even with cruise missiles!) and deny resupply. Trucks are cheap, plentiful, and easy to hide. It is very easy for China to strike the entirety of Taiwan (even with just truck-mounted rocket artillery) and deny resupply. Ships are expensive, few in numbers, and easy to find (it's a single object against basically nothing in the background - like getting radar scanned in a totally flat plain with no trees).


The only strategic similarity between the two is they are both countries dependent on America which has been pushed forward to poke at America's adversaries. Media counts on strategic illiteracy to push forth the Taiwan = Ukraine nonsense. Even a cursory look at their strategic situations will inform you how vastly different they are.


* This is equivalent to if the USSR, at the height of its power, decided to invade Germany and the US response was to pull back and not defend Germany.
 
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FairAndUnbiased

FairAndUnbiased

Brigadier
Registered Member
Staedler said:
1. Russia does not want to open direct conflict with NATO. Firing at NATO ISR risks bringing NATO directly in the conflict and Russia is likely to draw at best and lose at worst. This is not true for China; it will win at best and draw at worse.

Chinese industrial production and military capabilities far outstrip Russia; they're not even close. For example, prior to the war, Russia basically had no PGM usage or training. That's why we had that comment from a Chinese pilot a while back after Sino-Russia joint training that the Chinese airforce expends more PGMs in a single training than the entire Russian airforce for that year.

Hence the relative cost for shooting down NATO ISR is much higher for Russia than China.


2. That there's no scenario where reunification starts and the US can sit out without consequences. If the US sits out, they risk losing control over every vassal in Asia. that means Japan, Korea, Philippines, Australia, etc. That's why any battle over Taiwan will always boil down to a US-China war. This is because of the sheer level of military dominance China has in Asia. Vassals are kept inline because of the idea that the US will commit fully. If the US shows its not going to commit in Asia, then the vassals will break ranks*. This isn't the case with Ukraine. Ukraine wasn't an ally/vassal, and Russia isn't that dominate in Europe. The China-Taiwan military balance is much closer to NATO vs Yugoslavia than Russia vs Ukraine. In fact a China-Japan war is still not quite at the proportional level of Russia vs Ukraine.

Hence US (NATO) is not going to be able to sit back and just let China fight Taiwan.


3. Ukraine is a huge continental country connected by border to NATO. Military resupply is easy and there is plenty of strategic depth to hide launchers. Taiwan is a tiny import-dependent island. There is no strategic depth and resupply is difficult if not impossible.

It is very difficult for Russia to strike the entirety of Ukraine (even with cruise missiles!) and deny resupply. Trucks are cheap, plentiful, and easy to hide. It is very easy for China to strike the entirety of Taiwan (even with just truck-mounted rocket artillery) and deny resupply. Ships are expensive, few in numbers, and easy to find (it's a single object against basically nothing in the background - like getting radar scanned in a totally flat plain with no trees).


The only strategic similarity between the two is they are both countries dependent on America which has been pushed forward to poke at America's adversaries. Media counts on strategic illiteracy to push forth the Taiwan = Ukraine nonsense. Even a cursory look at their strategic situations will inform you how vastly different they are.


* This is equivalent to if the USSR, at the height of its power, decided to invade Germany and the US response was to pull back and not defend Germany.
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1 more thing is that almost all Taiwanese ports are on the side facing China while Ukraine has well developed road and rail links going west.
 
manqiangrexue

manqiangrexue

Brigadier
TK3600 said:
It is a significant gain but I don't think it is type of answer people look for. I am not asking for killing innocents, but the murderer should be held accountable. They can either be pressured into release the perpetrator for trial, or all patrols can be detained, not just blocked. They can then be traded with real perpetrator. The blocking of patrol can of course, stay.
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That's probably significantly further than what the CCP will do. The point of salami slicing is that it's a slow curtailing of the other side's assets and operations. At most, if we know which one of their coast guard ships did it, we might do a one-off elaborate plan to trap and capture it but there's no guarantee that the crew the the same and you can't throw a boat in jail. They're not gonna hand the perp over; they probably won't even identify him for his safety because to do anything of the sort is acknowledging Chinese legal control over the area that the perp was patrolling according to ROC law. If they do that, they're not too far from reunification talks. Seizing all their coast guard ships that enter the area as standard procedure is lopping off a pretty big salami chunk and could trigger alarm across Taiwan and the US such that the US coast guard may be brought in. If the US intervenes, it becomes much more of an all-or-nothing fight. If you use force against them, you're pretty much ready to kick it off to war. So, I think it's going to wisely stay with aggressive patrols of the area while expelling their patrols from the area.
 
TK3600

TK3600

Major
Registered Member
Staedler said:
1. Russia does not want to open direct conflict with NATO. Firing at NATO ISR risks bringing NATO directly in the conflict and Russia is likely to draw at best and lose at worst. This is not true for China; it will win at best and draw at worse.

Chinese industrial production and military capabilities far outstrip Russia; they're not even close. For example, prior to the war, Russia basically had no PGM usage or training. That's why we had that comment from a Chinese pilot a while back after Sino-Russia joint training that the Chinese airforce expends more PGMs in a single training than the entire Russian airforce for that year.

Hence the relative cost for shooting down NATO ISR is much higher for Russia than China.


2. That there's no scenario where reunification starts and the US can sit out without consequences. If the US sits out, they risk losing control over every vassal in Asia. that means Japan, Korea, Philippines, Australia, etc. That's why any battle over Taiwan will always boil down to a US-China war. This is because of the sheer level of military dominance China has in Asia. Vassals are kept inline because of the idea that the US will commit fully. If the US shows its not going to commit in Asia, then the vassals will break ranks*. This isn't the case with Ukraine. Ukraine wasn't an ally/vassal, and Russia isn't that dominate in Europe. The China-Taiwan military balance is much closer to NATO vs Yugoslavia than Russia vs Ukraine. In fact a China-Japan war is still not quite at the proportional level of Russia vs Ukraine.

Hence US (NATO) is not going to be able to sit back and just let China fight Taiwan.


3. Ukraine is a huge continental country connected by border to NATO. Military resupply is easy and there is plenty of strategic depth to hide launchers. Taiwan is a tiny import-dependent island. There is no strategic depth and resupply is difficult if not impossible.

It is very difficult for Russia to strike the entirety of Ukraine (even with cruise missiles!) and deny resupply. Trucks are cheap, plentiful, and easy to hide. It is very easy for China to strike the entirety of Taiwan (even with just truck-mounted rocket artillery) and deny resupply. Ships are expensive, few in numbers, and easy to find (it's a single object against basically nothing in the background - like getting radar scanned in a totally flat plain with no trees).


The only strategic similarity between the two is they are both countries dependent on America which has been pushed forward to poke at America's adversaries. Media counts on strategic illiteracy to push forth the Taiwan = Ukraine nonsense. Even a cursory look at their strategic situations will inform you how vastly different they are.


* This is equivalent to if the USSR, at the height of its power, decided to invade Germany and the US response was to pull back and not defend Germany.
Click to expand...

manqiangrexue said:
That's probably significantly further than what the CCP will do. The point of salami slicing is that it's a slow curtailing of the other side's assets and operations. At most, if we know which one of their coast guard ships did it, we might do a one-off elaborate plan to trap and capture it but there's no guarantee that the crew the the same and you can't throw a boat in jail. They're not gonna hand the perp over; they probably won't even identify him for his safety because to do anything of the sort is acknowledging Chinese legal control over the area that the perp was patrolling according to ROC law. If they do that, they're not too far from reunification talks. Seizing all their coast guard ships that enter the area as standard procedure is lopping off a pretty big salami chunk and could trigger alarm across Taiwan and the US such that the US coast guard may be brought in. If the US intervenes, it becomes much more of an all-or-nothing fight. If you use force against them, you're pretty much ready to kick it off to war. So, I think it's going to wisely stay with aggressive patrols of the area while expelling their patrols from the area.
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I think while it is a big chunk to slice, it is reasonable reciprocation. Normalizing law enforcement murdering foriegn civilians is a major provocation even US would hesitate to do. I think retaliating by arresting couple Taiwan law enforcements around Kinmen is reasonable. This is not unlike arresting 2 Michaels for Mengwanzhou.
 
manqiangrexue

manqiangrexue

Brigadier
TK3600 said:
I think while it is a big chunk to slice, it is reasonable reciprocation. Normalizing law enforcement murdering foriegn civilians is a major provocation even US would hesitate to do. I think retaliating by arresting couple Taiwan law enforcements around Kinmen is reasonable.
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No, it's completely not like that. Nobody outside of China thinks this is intentional murder; I don't think it is as well. The US and Taiwan think the ROC Coast Guard acted within his duty but things got out of hand and their deaths were an accident. I'm fairly certain they were dumbfounded that 2 people died and they would have let it go if they had a do-over.

Arresting the ROC Coast Guard also depends on how/what they do. If you attempt to expel them and they refuse and continue into the territory, then obviously if you don't escalate by nabbing them then you're not really defending your patrol territory. They ROC Coast Guard isn't doing that; they issued some bullshit words like using lethal force to sound tough, then they backed down and are waiting for China to vent off steam. If you chase or hunt them down to arrest them even as they hang out on the border or leave, that's a significant escalation.

It would be fairly clear to the US that China was growing its control and Taiwan is helpless to stop it. If they didn't step up and just let this happen, they would lose a lot of credibility. Furthermore, they probably understand that if the US coast guard were to intervene, they would look like heros to the Taiwanese because China wouldn't board or seize Americans ships unless they were ready to escalate to war and if they could even make China treat them significantly differently than we treat intruding ROC Coast Guard ships, they could interpret that as a victory in showing the world that Chinese laws can be bent with American power.

The CCP's current position, which is to fortify the area against intrusion, is best. ROC Coast Guard is basically not resisting because they want to de-escalate so they're being sliced successfully and if the US Coast Guard shows up, we can definitely block them too.
TK3600 said:
This is not unlike arresting 2 Michaels for Mengwanzhou.
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This is not like that at all. This is if China started hunting for more and more Michaels to arrest out in disputed waters. The US Coast guard would respond with FONOPS and their own patrols.
 
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TK3600

TK3600

Major
Registered Member
manqiangrexue said:
No, it's completely not like that. Nobody outside of China thinks this is intentional murder; I don't think it is as well. The US and Taiwan think the ROC Coast Guard acted within his duty but things got out of hand. I'm fairly certain they were dumbfounded that 2 people died and they would have let it go if they had a do-over.

Arresting the ROC Coast Guard also depends on how/what they do. If you attempt to expel them and they refuse and continue into the territory, then obviously if you don't escalate by nabbing them then you're not really defending your patrol territory. But if you chase or hunt them down to arrest them even as they leave, that's a significant escalation.

It would be fairly clear to the US that China was growing its control and Taiwan is helpless to stop it. If they didn't step up and just let this happen, they would lose a lot of credibility. Furthermore, they probably understand that if the US coast guard were to intervene, they would look like heros to the Taiwanese because China wouldn't board or seize Americans ships unless they were ready to escalate to war and treating them significantly differently than we treated intruding ROC Coast Guard ships signals a sort of fear that they would interpret as their victory.

The CCP's current position, which is to fortify the area against intrusion, is best. ROC Coast Guard is basically not resisting because they want to de-escalate so they're being sliced successfully and if the US Coast Guard shows up, we can definitely block them too.

This is not like that at all. This is if China started hunting for more and more Michaels to arrest out in disputed waters. The US Coast guard would respond with FONOPS and their own patrols.
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There is absolutely nothing American can do to help. American ships will not be seized, but they cannot stop Taiwanese patrol being seized. What are they going to do? Shooting at Chinese Coast Guard? Furthermore, American ships could be intercepted way before arriving at Kinmen which is like Chinese door step. American have been intercepted at places like South China Sea which is like front yard. They need to go pass the front yard to even arrive at door step. Lastly, seizing law enforcement in the region is just one way of legally obtaining leverage. The goal is to both salami slice and give people a good answer to their concern. If both goals are met, the particular method do not matter. China holds all escalation dominance, nothing will escalate beyond what China starts at unless China intent to.
 
manqiangrexue

manqiangrexue

Brigadier
TK3600 said:
There is absolutely nothing American can do to help. American ships will not be seized,
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That in itself will show that Chinese law treats you differently depending on your power and that's a bad look for China.
TK3600 said:
but they cannot stop Taiwanese patrol being seized.
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They actually can if they escort those ships.
TK3600 said:
What are they going to do? Shooting at Chinese Coast Guard?
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They can block and ram too. They can do what we do.
TK3600 said:
Furthermore, American ships could be intercepted way before arriving at Kinmen which is like Chinese door step. American have been intercepted at places like South China Sea which is like front yard. They need to go pass the front yard to even arrive at door step.
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They're not intercepted and prevented from continuing as that is a very dangerous and risky move. They're usually shadowed and warned when they engage in FONOPS. As of now, when American destroyers transit the Taiwan Strait, China's options are to let it be, shadow it with constant warnings, or fire on it starting war. Intercepting ships at sea is no common day maneuver, especially amongst professional forces.
TK3600 said:
Lastly, seizing law enforcement in the region is just one way of legally obtaining leverage.
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That depends on why you seized them. Justification is very important when you do things.
TK3600 said:
The goal is to both salami slice and give people a good answer to their concern. If both goals are met, the particular method do not matter.
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That would be ideal but the important strategic part is salami slicing and answering any concerns is a side-bonus. And the methods absolutely matter because they determine whether you can be successful and the downstream events your actions trigger.
TK3600 said:
China holds all escalation dominance, nothing will escalate beyond what China starts at unless China intent to.
Click to expand...
Simply not true. If this ends up in the US Coast Guard setting up shop in Taiwan it will not be a good development of events for us in a maritime setting.
 
manqiangrexue

manqiangrexue

Brigadier
This video shows the collision. All of the young people and women interviewed in Taiwan said that they crossed the line and should back down, bow their heads to China for their fault in the deaths. They said that their government hid the collision and that Chinese rightfully only wanted the truth. They said money to compensate the families is unlikely to quell the fury because this was just too terrible that 2 people died. I'm so relieved to see Taiwanese culture so similar to China's and dissimilar to the US. Americans don't care whom or how many died; they just want to determine professional fault. I'm kinda guilty because I grew up in this society but Chinese people are really sentimental; Taiwanese too it seems. When I see things like this, I'm reminded why the CCP strongly prefers peaceful reunion, even if it takes decades longer and Chinese people have to swallow our pride for that time. Only 2 old farts wanted to play the game of hardball, Wanwanese testicles against Chinese bowling balls.
 
TK3600

TK3600

Major
Registered Member
manqiangrexue said:
That in itself will show that Chinese law treats you differently depending on your power and that's a bad look for China.

They actually can if they escort those ships.

They can block and ram too. They can do what we do.
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I suppose US coast guard can attack Chinese coast guard the same way I can attack a tank with rock. It just will not be effective.
manqiangrexue said:
They're not intercepted and prevented from continuing as that is a very dangerous and risky move. They're usually shadowed and warned when they engage in FONOPS. As of now, when American destroyers transit the Taiwan Strait, China's options are to let it be, shadow it with constant warnings, or fire on it starting war. Intercepting ships at sea is no common day maneuver, especially amongst professional forces.
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That is true. I doubt we will ever get into the interception stage in the first place. But in rare chance that they do, see 2016.
manqiangrexue said:
That depends on why you seized them. Justification is very important when you do things.
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That is very true, which is exactly why I propose using murder of Chinese civilian to justify arresting relevant organisation responsible for it inside Chinese territorial water. The latter of course includes Taiwan and Kinmen itself.
manqiangrexue said:
That would be ideal but the important strategic part is salami slicing and answering any concerns is a side-bonus. And the methods absolutely matter because they determine whether you can be successful and the downstream events your actions trigger.
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We can agree to disagree here. Salami slicing helps smoothing the eventual military operation. If China is strong Taiwan will be taken either way. Domestic opinion believe it or not does matter a lot to the party. See the Pelosi visit event. The revoking mid line is a nice salami slice, but the party did have to extend the naval exercise well beyond needed for the slice to ease domestic opinion.
manqiangrexue said:
Simply not true. If this ends up in the US Coast Guard setting up shop in Taiwan it will not be a good development of events for us in a maritime setting.
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It will not happen. If US want it to happen it can deploy either way, like it does with military instructors, not that it would help at all.
 
M

Moonscape

Junior Member
Registered Member
This incident is actually a perfect casus belli to gradually ramp up to a forced reunification: paramilitary forces under the DPP administration acting with recklessness (at a minimum) causing the death of mainland citizens. Clearly this is a threat that needs to be stopped, and the mainland would be justified in taking actions to stop it.

So this can be an Archduke Ferdinand moment if China wants it to be. Better than Pelosi or whatever, because here, Taiwanese paramilitary forces committed homicide against mainland civilians, and it's almost impossible to justify what the Taiwanese coast guard did. So all the mainland has to do is escalate slowly and steadily and not back down at any point.

However, this is still not the best timing for reunification. That won't be until closer to 2030. It's not terrible timing though, given how distracted the US is. Just gotta see how far the Chinese leadership wants to go this time.
 
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