PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency
- Thread starter pugachev_diver
- Start date
Live fire exercise in Jinmen postponed.
Hilarious Taiwan media:
Basically PRC is just holding back a Royal Flush, but still needs a face-saving exit
To real news
- Wondering what people's thoughts were on Patriot and other systems on Taiwan after this Iran attack?
- There was a lot of talk in previous times about the effectiveness of mass Shaheed-type drones (assumption being that PRC can crank these out 100's a month), does 100% of them being shot down change opinions on that?
- On the other hand, does this change the perception on the other side (PLA's AD capability)? Taiwan was previously threatening strikes (as unlikely as they would be in AR scenario) on the mainland with cruise missiles, and the effectiveness of US intervention might necessitate such attacks as well. However, PLA has the massive advantage in this case with regards to Air/Space superiority, Early warning, and Naval interceptors.
Basically PRC is just holding back a Royal Flush, but still needs a face-saving exit
To real news
- Wondering what people's thoughts were on Patriot and other systems on Taiwan after this Iran attack?
- There was a lot of talk in previous times about the effectiveness of mass Shaheed-type drones (assumption being that PRC can crank these out 100's a month), does 100% of them being shot down change opinions on that?
- On the other hand, does this change the perception on the other side (PLA's AD capability)? Taiwan was previously threatening strikes (as unlikely as they would be in AR scenario) on the mainland with cruise missiles, and the effectiveness of US intervention might necessitate such attacks as well. However, PLA has the massive advantage in this case with regards to Air/Space superiority, Early warning, and Naval interceptors.
I think you mean thousands per day. How many air defense missiles does ROC have?
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The performance of various platforms is a function of who controls the greater battlespace. In this case, the US held air dominance, naval superiority, and EW supremacy; Iran did not even attempt to contest any of those domains. Intercepting munitions is easy or even trivial under such favorable circumstances, with the only possible stressor being quantity.
However, during a high-intensity conflict everyone should expect all of those domains to be contested furiously. Control over the battlespace will not be a given for anyone, but rather a status which changes constantly at the tactical level. Strike packages and air defences will succeed or fail in proportion to who controls what domain at a given time, and that's extremely difficult to predict in advance.
Plus you also have to consider that Ynet is quoting a former IDF official as saying the Israeli defence cost $1Bn+
That compares to figures quoted for Iran of up to $35Mn.
That's a cost disparity of at least 28x
So yes, it doesn't take long for the defending side to run out of SAMs.
Most Shaheds were shot down by CAP over Iraq. It would be both unrealistic and unwise to have constant Taiwanese CAP over the straits as that is leaving their protective air defense bubble. To get line of sight to a large number of very low flying drones, you need to fly high to maximize radar horizon, but that exposes you to surface radars.
there is also a geography piece. Iranian missiles have to traverse thousands of km of airspace that are under US/Israeli control, with various air based and ground based AD and sensors along the way. in the case of Taiwan, air space beyond the eastern coast of the island are all likely under PLAAF control. PLA rockets also have to travel much shorter distances, from various angles. in fact, geography works against Taiwan offensively too, where it intends to hit any of the larger cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen etc), its missiles also must travel long distances under intense PLA AA fire.