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The Prospects for War with China

chrisblattman.com

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Re: The Prospects for War with China

#31

Post by UltraViolence »

notaresearcher wrote: post #15
UltraViolence wrote: post #9

Your analysis is flawed. The U.S. will not risk a nuclear war over an island it doesn't even recognize as an independent state and has no security treaties with. What Biden says about intervening is just bluff. And China knows this. And then there's the prospect of the Taiwanese not even WANTING to fight their own brethren. Sure, they want to remain independent if they can, but if China decides to invade their armed…

This is 100% your own opinion, and no one has said anything about 'nuclear' war. Of course no one wants to fight, if it came down to it, many, including me, would have to defend ourselves.

From what I've seen I've come to the conclusion the Taiwanese will not fight.

You talk about defending yourself, but you can just keep still and do nothing. As I expect you will.

A nuclear war is a certainty when there's a confrontation between nuclear armed powers. If we lose, we use nukes. If they lose, they'll use nukes. Ergo: it's inevitable there will be an all-out nuclear exchange.

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#32

Post by UltraViolence »

CogitoCogito wrote: post #13
UltraViolence wrote: post #9

Your analysis is flawed. The U.S. will not risk a nuclear war over an island it doesn't even recognize as an independent state and has no security treaties with. What Biden says about intervening is just bluff. And China knows this. And then there's the prospect of the Taiwanese not even WANTING to fight their own brethren. Sure, they want to remain independent if they can, but if China decides to invade their armed…

> What Biden says about intervening is just bluff. And China knows this. … > And then there's the prospect of the Taiwanese not even WANTING to fight their own brethren. You make a lot of confident assumptions here which you cannot know for sure.

Biden knows what I know: that it's too costly for the U.S. to disengage economically from China.

He's trying to do something about it at least, but Apple has already signaled that only 25% of iPhones will be made outside of China by 2025. That will leave the company completely vulnerable if were to be cut-off from its Chinese suppliers. I predict the company will simply go bankrupt if that were to happen.

So he's bluffing to prevent China from invading, that's only logical. If push comes to shove, however, he'll pull back from the brink. Taiwan simply isn't worth fighting over, even if it would mean losing influence in Asia.

And I've become convinced the Taiwanese will not fight their own kind, no matter how much they hate the Communists.

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#33

Post by UltraViolence »

Apocryphon wrote: post #14
CogitoCogito wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What Biden says about intervening is just bluff. And China knows this. … > And then there's the prospect of the Taiwanese not even WANTING to fight their own brethren. You make a lot of confident assumptions here which you cannot know for sure.

On the flip side for the second point, it can just as easily go into the reverse. It’s all very well for the mainland government to declare the island to be a rogue province in revolt, but that just means a war between the two would entail bloodshed between countrymen. That might give at least some Chinese pause, not unlike the contemporary antiwar protests in Russia. Not to mention given that China has been at peace…

You seem to forget that ordinary Chinese citizens have no say in all this. They've just given their leader dictatorial powers for life. Basically everything that happens in China is dependent on the mental constitution of one single man.

And Xi has sworn to unite Taiwan with the mainland at whatever the cost. We have to decide whether it's worth fighting a nuclear war over because the invasion is going to happen between now and 2027.

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#34

Post by thoughtstheseus »

I expect a permanent blockade of Taiwan to prevent inbound sensors and shooters and outbound advanced tech within one year. Today Taiwan and U.S. military are not integrated the way the U.S. is with other Allies and partners: Korea, Japan, NATO, etc. Ukraine is case and point how valuable that integration can be.

The PRC will be adamant that Taiwan not receive AI (battlefield mgmt. software, communications, sensors) aid similar to Ukraine.

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#35

Post by Apocryphon »

UltraViolence wrote: post #33
Apocryphon wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the flip side for the second point, it can just as easily go into the reverse. It’s all very well for the mainland government to declare the island to be a rogue province in revolt, but that just means a war between the two would entail bloodshed between countrymen. That might give at least some Chinese pause, not unlike the contemporary antiwar protests in Russia. Not to mention given that China has been at peace…

You seem to forget that ordinary Chinese citizens have no say in all this. They've just given their leader dictatorial powers for life. Basically everything that happens in China is dependent on the mental constitution of one single man. And Xi has sworn to unite Taiwan with the mainland at whatever the cost. We have to decide whether it's worth fighting a nuclear war over because the invasion is going to happen betw…

Any war will require at least some popular mandate no matter how dictatorial the regime, not to mention the consent of the actual fighting forces involved.

> And Xi has sworn to unite Taiwan with the mainland at whatever the cost.

In that, he is no different from every single Chinese leader since 1949.

2027 is a red herring borne out of inaccurate intel and failed understanding:

https://twitter.com/MikeBlack114/status/1571401031539367939

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#36

Post by stale2002 »

rsj_hn wrote: post #20
CogitoCogito wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel like most of the escalation is coming from the West though. They're the ones tossing around sanctions and national-security noise on speculation-- China might invade Taiwan. China is free to anytime declare their intention of never invading Taiwan. China is free to anytime officially recognize the fact that the PRC and the ROC are two separate governments of two separate countries. China is free to anytime c…

counterpoint: The US is free at any time to stop invading other countries, trying to overthrow other countries, and enter into conflicts thousands of miles from their borders. But really, it doesn't seem that they do. The US has invaded or attacked over 120 countries since 1991[1]. Absolutely none of them were a threat to the United States. How many countries has China invaded in the same period? How many has it bomb…

US invasions have nothing to do with the fact that China is publicly saying that they want to invade the independent country of Taiwan.

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#37

Post by UltraViolence »

DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #29
CogitoCogito wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel like most of the escalation is coming from the West though. They're the ones tossing around sanctions and national-security noise on speculation-- China might invade Taiwan. China is free to anytime declare their intention of never invading Taiwan. China is free to anytime officially recognize the fact that the PRC and the ROC are two separate governments of two separate countries. China is free to anytime c…

Easier said than done. Preservation of national sovereignty is one of the touchiest issues in modern Chinese politics. This has to do with Chinese history. For China, the modern era essentially began when British gunboats arrived in 1840 and forced the Qing dynasty to open up its ports to the opium trade. There followed a series of conflicts in which China was progressively humiliated and ever more dominated by forei…

Taiwan was never Chinese to begin with and never has been. Just because the Nationalists fled there doesn't give them the right to invade or lay claim to the island.

They could, for all I care, invade Taiwan and relocate all the Chinese to China and leave Taiwan well alone.

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#38

Post by stale2002 »

thoughtstheseus wrote: post #34

I expect a permanent blockade of Taiwan to prevent inbound sensors and shooters and outbound advanced tech within one year. Today Taiwan and U.S. military are not integrated the way the U.S. is with other Allies and partners: Korea, Japan, NATO, etc. Ukraine is case and point how valuable that integration can be. The PRC will be adamant that Taiwan not receive AI (battlefield mgmt. software, communications, sensors)…

I don't think so.

China would have to fire on US military ships to enforce any such blockage.

They aren't going to start a war with the US.

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#39

Post by dirtyid »

xg15 wrote: post #8

The article rests on the assumption that Taiwan really is the center of the conflict and the West only defends it out of the goodness of their hearts (or to defend some local economic/strategic advantages such as access to TSMC or an open South China Sea). Following that assumption, the conflict could be instantly defused if some compromise about Taiwan's status on the unification/independence scale could be reached…

>scale of the conflict right

Would not go that far, but I agree that more PRC narrows military gap with US, the more TW becomes a stretch goal to the greater strategic aim of eroding/pushing out US presence in Asia and more broadly US primacy in general. At end of the day cross strait drama is one sustained by US power post WW2, which sufficiently deterred or destroyed would open up many options for reuninfication.

Ultimately the prospect for war is real, but timing is differs.

On paper, US wants war sooner (before 2030) to take out pacing competitor as force balance is shifting towards PRC favour every year while PRC's nuclear deterrence still not sufficient. It explains much of recent US behaviours, which is not to say admin is actively engineering war, but actors are not actively constraining policies that could lead to one.

For PRC even taking TW doesn't dramatically improve PRC geostrategic posture - Yonaguni is basically where TW is and can be militarized with US hardware, as well as other regional fence sitters that want to hedge against PRC containment but only after TW damocles is off the table. But not if PRC substantially dismantles US military presence in Asia and make examples of US partners that participate in broader campaign which will also include destorying military infra in the region (i.e. Pinegap). The worst thing US can do is try to defend (non security guarantee) TW and fail, the next worst is succeeds pyrrhicly but lose so much hardware that honoring other defense commitments becomes impossible to hide. For PRC, this is like a 2030+ effort. Which is not to say PRC would not prefer a relatively isolated TW campaign with minimal US intervention, but they're war planning assumes US intervention and if that comes to pass, IMO PRC won't be content with just stopping immediate US intervention goals, but their abliity to intervene in Asia going forward.

Re: The Prospects for War with China

#40

Post by Apocryphon »

UltraViolence wrote: post #37
DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easier said than done. Preservation of national sovereignty is one of the touchiest issues in modern Chinese politics. This has to do with Chinese history. For China, the modern era essentially began when British gunboats arrived in 1840 and forced the Qing dynasty to open up its ports to the opium trade. There followed a series of conflicts in which China was progressively humiliated and ever more dominated by forei…

Taiwan was never Chinese to begin with and never has been. Just because the Nationalists fled there doesn't give them the right to invade or lay claim to the island. They could, for all I care, invade Taiwan and relocate all the Chinese to China and leave Taiwan well alone.

Taiwanese indigenous peoples are 2% of the island's population. Many of the pre-1949 Chinese settlers have some aboriginal ancestry, however. I don't suppose you know the difference between benshengren and waishengren, nor care to know.
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