A Chinese invasion of Taiwan would likely fail if the US helps defend the nation — but at a debilitating cost to the US military itself, a US think tank said on Monday.
Military experts brought together by the Center for Strategic and International Studies to war-game the conflict said every likely direct participant in a war — the US, China, Taiwan and Japan — would experience “enormous” losses.
Chinese missiles would likely destroy US air bases in Japan and as far as Guam, and sink two US aircraft carriers and between 10 and 20 destroyers and cruisers as the invasion opened.
Photo: Reuters
However, the Chinese invading force itself would be heavily destroyed before it ever occupied any significant part of Taiwan.
Ultimately, it would be prevented from its goal of capturing Taipei, according to most scenarios tested.
That, as well as damage incurred on Chinese targets from Taiwanese counterattacks, could destabilize Chinese Communist Party rule, the report says.
“We reached two conclusions,” said Eric Heginbotham, a security expert at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “First, under most circumstances, China is unlikely to succeed in its operational objectives, or to occupy Taipei. Second, the cost of war would be high for all involved, certainly to include the United States.”
The war-gaming tested 24 different scenarios focused on China attempting to seize Taiwan by invasion in 2026.
Crucial was the US — without its help, Taiwan would be conquered by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) in three months or less.
The war game assumed the invasion would begin with an opening bombardment by China that destroys most of Taiwan’s navy and air force in a few hours.
The Chinese navy would encircle Taiwan and begin ferrying a landing force of thousands of PLA troops and their equipment across the Taiwan Strait.
In what the war-gamers called the most likely scenario, Taiwan’s army would bog the invaders down on the coast.
“Meanwhile US submarines, bombers, and fighter/attack aircraft, often reinforced by Japan Self-Defense Forces, rapidly cripple the Chinese amphibious fleet,” the report said. “China’s strikes on Japanese bases and US surface ships cannot change the result: Taiwan remains autonomous.”
Matthew Cancian of the US Naval War College said there were crucial variables on which that success depends.
First, Taiwan itself must be determined to fight back, he said. Second, Japan must give its permission for the US to launch counterattacks from its bases on Japanese territory.
Without that “then the US intervention would not be enough to continue Taiwan’s autonomy,” Cancian said.
In such cases the human losses would be high, about 10,000 in the first weeks of the war.
The war game raised important unknowns, such as whether the US would risk nuclear war by attacking China directly.
It also asked if the US and Japanese public would be prepared to accept the losses that came with defending Taiwan.
It said US losses could damage Washington’s ability to project global power for a very long time.
“The United States might win a Pyrrhic victory, suffering more in the long run than the ‘defeated’ Chinese,” the report said.
The report said both Taiwan and the US military need to build up forces, focusing on the most survivable and effective weapons, to create more deterrence to a Chinese invasion.
“Despite rhetoric about adopting a ‘porcupine strategy,’ Taiwan still spends most of its defense budget on expensive ships and aircraft that China will quickly destroy,” it said.
A Ministry of Foreign Affairs official yesterday said that a delegation that visited China for an APEC meeting did not receive any kind of treatment that downgraded Taiwan’s sovereignty. Department of International Organizations Director-General Jonathan Sun (孫儉元) said that he and a group of ministry officials visited Shenzhen, China, to attend the APEC Informal Senior Officials’ Meeting last month. The trip went “smoothly and safely” for all Taiwanese delegates, as the Chinese side arranged the trip in accordance with long-standing practices, Sun said at the ministry’s weekly briefing. The Taiwanese group did not encounter any political suppression, he said. Sun made the remarks when
The Taiwanese passport ranked 33rd in a global listing of passports by convenience this month, rising three places from last month’s ranking, but matching its position in January last year. The Henley Passport Index, an international ranking of passports by the number of designations its holder can travel to without a visa, showed that the Taiwan passport enables holders to travel to 139 countries and territories without a visa. Singapore’s passport was ranked the most powerful with visa-free access to 192 destinations out of 227, according to the index published on Tuesday by UK-based migration investment consultancy firm Henley and Partners. Japan’s and
BROAD AGREEMENT: The two are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff to 15% and a commitment for TSMC to build five more fabs, a ‘New York Times’ report said Taiwan and the US have reached a broad consensus on a trade deal, the Executive Yuan’s Office of Trade Negotiations said yesterday, after a report said that Washington is set to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent. The New York Times on Monday reported that the two nations are nearing a trade deal to reduce Taiwan’s tariff rate to 15 percent and commit Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to building at least five more facilities in the US. “The agreement, which has been under negotiation for months, is being legally scrubbed and could be announced this month,” the paper said,
Japan and the Philippines yesterday signed a defense pact that would allow the tax-free provision of ammunition, fuel, food and other necessities when their forces stage joint training to boost deterrence against China’s growing aggression in the region and to bolster their preparation for natural disasters. Japan has faced increasing political, trade and security tensions with China, which was angered by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s remark that a Chinese attack on Taiwan would be a survival-threatening situation for Japan, triggering a military response. Japan and the Philippines have also had separate territorial conflicts with Beijing in the East and South China
RSS