PLA Strategy in a Taiwan Contingency

vincent

vincent

Grumpy Old Man
Staff member
Moderator - World Affairs
HardBall said:
If you actually read my original post, the primary scenario I was describing was along the Indonesian straits (Malacca, Sunda, Lombok, etc), and lanes further out, either in northern Indian ocean, or central/western pacific such as near Wake, Micronesia, Palau, etc. For those choke points close to the continent, such as Batanes, Tsushima, Miyako, etc, I already said they will be contested, and explicitly NOT what I was referring to as the primary vulnerability.
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Who cares about choke points? Choking China’s trade equals to choking world trade. China doesn’t require much materials if she doesn’t have to produce things for the rest of the world.

Please think of this scenario: China produces hundreds of thousands of piston-base precision missiles and destroys all infrastructures (fuel depots, power stations, transformer stations, refineries, airports, sea ports, etc.) on the First Island Chain (Japan, South Korea, Taiwan Island, and the Philippines). Where can the American forces base out of to man those choke points?

if Americans refuses to get close, PLAN can send out a large task force to attack places American must defend, like Guam, to force engagement.
 
plawolf

plawolf

Lieutenant General
HardBall said:
China's biggest vulnerability would be its trade routes and sea lanes. If you look at it from a purely objective POV. I don't think it takes a rocket scientist to guess where the US and its allies would choose to focus their efforts in a prolonged conflict.

It currently does not have the same capacity to do sustained deployment of large CSG away from its continental shelf. It also has very sparse over seas bases and resupply depots. Its refueling assets for the PLAAF is also a small fraction of that of the US, and cannot have large fleet of strike platforms too much beyond the first island chain. The US is also beefing up its marine expeditionary units to do air and sea control around island groups.

Given this, places like the strait of Malacca, and too lesser extent Lombok and Sunda, would be major choke points that adversaries can use to choke off trade and especially energy. Some amount of increase in over land routes could mitigate some of the issues, but at a much higher cost, and possibly some delays. Other straits like Tsushima, Batanes, and Miyako would also be choked off to some extent, although those locations would be highly contested. The Indian Ocean is another area that would even be more difficult for China to do any commerce protection and the like.

Just looking at this dispassionate way, the current platforms and force structure of China would not allow much possibility of countering those types of moves.
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Except that the vast majority of those sea based trade today is for meeting European and American consumer needs.

In a total war scenario, the overwhelming majority of that trade will disappear without any need for military action.

A total war scenario will also turbocharged Chinese transition away from fossil fuels to green renewables for transportation and power generation. Which will further reduce the need for sea based imports of oil and gas.

The biggest losers from western interdiction of sea transport will be African and ME countries. But to be frank, the west doing such interdiction would actually be doing China a massive diplomatic and political favour. Because one of the main difficulties China will have in a total war scenario would be how to balance trade with RoW against the inevitable industrial scale smuggling to Europe and America to help prop up their social order and military industrial base. But for China to just unilaterally stop exports to those countries would risk pushing them into the American camp as their leaders and population will blame China for all the hardships they are facing. Domestically such decisions will also be unpopular with Chinese industrialists and workers. But if America closes the sea lanes, it’s all on America.

For Chinese war needs, domestic production and Russia imports alone would be more than sufficient.
 
Sinnavuuty

Sinnavuuty

Senior Member
Registered Member
plawolf said:
Except that the vast majority of those sea based trade today is for meeting European and American consumer needs.

In a total war scenario, the overwhelming majority of that trade will disappear without any need for military action.

A total war scenario will also turbocharged Chinese transition away from fossil fuels to green renewables for transportation and power generation. Which will further reduce the need for sea based imports of oil and gas.

The biggest losers from western interdiction of sea transport will be African and ME countries. But to be frank, the west doing such interdiction would actually be doing China a massive diplomatic and political favour. Because one of the main difficulties China will have in a total war scenario would be how to balance trade with RoW against the inevitable industrial scale smuggling to Europe and America to help prop up their social order and military industrial base. But for China to just unilaterally stop exports to those countries would risk pushing them into the American camp as their leaders and population will blame China for all the hardships they are facing. Domestically such decisions will also be unpopular with Chinese industrialists and workers. But if America closes the sea lanes, it’s all on America.

For Chinese war needs, domestic production and Russia imports alone would be more than sufficient.
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Wouldn't China react in this way to a possible naval blockade?

Are the islands in the SCS useless?

China, instead of reacting by imposing sanctions against these countries, could also carry out a naval blockade through these islands in the SCS, since you yourself said that "maritime trade today is to meet the needs of European and American consumers", it would be a reaction totally appropriate and I am sure that the Chinese transition to green energy and being supplied by countries that share land borders, would be in the position to exercise this blockade.
 
A

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
plawolf said:
For Chinese war needs, domestic production and Russia imports alone would be more than sufficient.
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Yes. Both myself and TPHuang previously looked at Chinese oil demand in a blockade scenario, and came to the conclusion that domestic production plus overland imports should be sufficient.

That would further accelerate the electrification of the entire Chinese economy around solar, wind, batteries and electric transport - which are the technologies of the future.
 
A

AndrewS

Brigadier
Registered Member
vincent said:
Who cares about choke points? Choking China’s trade equals to choking world trade. China doesn’t require much materials if she doesn’t have to produce things for the rest of the world.

Please think of this scenario: China produces hundreds of thousands of piston-base precision missiles and destroys all infrastructures (fuel depots, power stations, transformer stations, refineries, airports, sea ports, etc.) on the First Island Chain (Japan, South Korea, Taiwan Island, and the Philippines). Where can the American forces base out of to man those choke points?

if Americans refuses to get close, PLAN can send out a large task force to attack places American must defend, like Guam, to force engagement.
Click to expand...


If China can blockade the 1st Island Chain, then the US has no choice but to send in ships and try to resupply Japan, Korea,Taiwan and the Philippines.

These are all small, but densely populated island(s) with no natural resources and rely on food imports. They would face collapse from lack of fuel and food. In comparison, China is the same size as the continental USA and can rely on overland imports, so can be broadly self sufficient.

If the US doesn't even try to resupply the 1st Island Chain, then what use is an alliance with the US?

The US can neither provide military security nor economic prosperity.

We would see the breakdown of the US alliance structure in the Western Pacific as countries abandon the US and choose China instead.

===

As a baseline scenario, I think we can start with the CCTV newsreel mini-documentary where up to 1000 cruise missile components can be produced per day, presumably in the the CJ-10 category given the pictures.

This would definitely saturate the air defences by themselves.

And given that these are normally like $1 Mn?, they can be complemented by even larger numbers of cheaper piston engine cruise missiles.

My guess is 3-8 weeks to ramp up production, given what we saw happening with Chinese factories pivoting during COVID
 
T

tygyg1111

Captain
Registered Member
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