A tabletop exercise simulating a Chinese invasion of Taiwan suggested that China could seize Taiwan’s outlying islands before conducting a surprise attack from the east of Taiwan proper, a source said.
Nine retired generals from Taiwan, Japan and the US on Tuesday and Wednesday last week participated in the tabletop exercise, the results of which have not yet been officially released.
The exercise, hosted by the Taipei School of Economics and Political Science Foundation, was the first operational-level military simulation of a potential cross-strait conflict organized by a civilian organization in Taiwan and the highest-level simulation involving participants with military backgrounds.
Photo: Ritchie B. Tongo, EPA-EFE
The simulation was set in 2030, and assumed that Taiwan had already acquired planned asymmetric capabilities, Council on Strategic and Wargaming Strategies director-general Huang Chieh-cheng (黃介正) said on the first day of the exercise, adding that it focused primarily on a military conflict, minimizing political and economic factors.
The war game simulated a four-stage invasion strategy, transitioning from “gray zone” harassment to full-scale war, including China seizing outlying islands and launching a surprise attack from the east, the source said.
The simulation was composed of a guidance team, control team, China team, Taiwan team, US team and Japan team, with senior officials and retired military figures representing their respective countries.
China was imagined to adopt a four-stage model, initially using government vessels to intrude into Taiwan’s territorial waters, accompanied by three aircraft carrier battle groups conducting exercises between the South China Sea and the first and second island chains, while forcing supply ships off course to raise regional tensions.
China then seized Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙島) and launched cyberattacks to destroy energy and surveillance facilities throughout Taiwan, before launching helicopters and special forces from container ships to carry out multipoint landings and amphibious assaults, advancing toward Taiwan proper.
In the final stage, the China team launched a full-scale invasion of Taiwan with an unexpected strategy: a surprise attack from the east, rather than a frontal assault from the west.
During the first scenario of “gray zone” harassment, with Chinese warships within 12 nautical miles (22.2km) of Taiwan, the Taiwan team, seeking to avoid provocation without showing weakness, simulated Taiwan’s military entering a state of heightened combat readiness and conducting joint intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations.
The team did not fire the first shot to avoid responsibility for starting a war, the source said.
Following the exercise, the Taiwan team said it focused on having the navy drive the Chinese forces away in a manner similar to during the 1996 Taiwan Strait crisis, avoiding escalation.
Taiwan would seek to avoid dragging the US or Japan into a war, they said, adding that Taiwan has a shared responsibility in maintaining regional peace and stability.
The control team said that there was no perfect decision in such a scenario, but that the military and government should consider what Taiwan’s rules of engagement should be if Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) forces entered the 12 nautical mile zone.
The Chinese-language magazine Global Views reported that the US team concluded that a PLA landing on Taiwan’s east coast would be highly unexpected because of the complex terrain, and would carry significant risk for China.
Throughout the exercise, the Japan team participated in nearly all of the US team’s actions, which the magazine said reflected changes in US-Japan cooperation in response to China’s growing coercive actions in the Indo-Pacific region.
However, due to constitutional constraints, unless China attacked Japan directly, it could only provide logistical support to US forces during a conflict in the Taiwan Strait, and would not send troops to fight in the conflict, the magazine said.
“Taiwan should understand Japan’s limitations and what kind of assistance Japan could provide if a Taiwan contingency occurred,” it said.
Additionally, the US team concluded that Taiwan would need US assistance to prevent a full-scale Chinese occupation, it said.
“It would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for Taiwan to achieve that alone,” it said.
The will and determination of Taiwanese to defend their country would greatly affect the outcome of such a conflict, it said.
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