The scenario being played out during the manoeuvres -- part of five-day wargames codenamed "Han Kuang 23" -- was that a fleet of Chinese warships were found crossing the middle of the Taiwan Strait approaching northern Taiwan.
I agree with the assumption that Taiwan would not react until the Chinese commit to crossing the middle of the strait. Notions that the Taiwanese would initiate combat by striking the Chinese as they load ships and planes while still in Chinese territory might make sense militarily but politically but would never happen. The need to avoid looking like the aggressor at all to preserve help from America and Japan will be paramount.
I am also comforted by the assumption that the Chinese would invade and not just attempt to bombard Taiwan into submission. When Taiwanese exercises started a month ago, it seemed as if the Taiwanese were assuming that invasion was unlikely. Yet now, the exercises included this:
In another operation later in the day, hundreds of troops flanked by tanks and armoured vehicles surrounded a group of mock Chinese soldiers who had "seized" the central Taichung harbour.
This implies to me an assumption of a direct attack on the ports and not the much-ridiculed notion that China would attempt a D-Day style over-the-beach amphibious assault. We hit beaches in June 1944 and not the ports directly because the ports were defended and rigged for destruction. We had to hit the beaches in order to take the ports (and brought our own until we could take and fix a port). The Chinese would hit the operating ports directly to capture them for rapid reinforcements of heavier equipment and supplies. So noting that China lacks the amphibious warfare assets needed to recreat Overlord is meaningless.
Whether China plans to strike Taiwan before the Olympics in 2008 or not, Taiwan is entering a dangerous period as China builds their capacity to invade while Taiwan's capabilities lag. The Taiwanese may think they can win in 2012 but we are still in 2007. So exercises like this are useful both to identify weaknesses and to get Taiwan's military and people used to the idea that they will need to defend their island democracy.
Living in a fantasy world where China would never invade and America would magically save them would lead to paralysis in a real world where China does invade and America needs time to get forces into the fight.
UPDATE: Mad Minerva (be still my heart, female and an unreconstructed war monger!) has more news and links about the Taiwanese exercises. The public watching the exercises still smacks of Washingtonians riding out to watch the (First) Battle of Bull Run. So I don't think the exercises have yet conveyed the deadly serious nature of the threat they face. But it is a start.
