It is good to see that analysts are accepting that ejecting a Chinese invasion force is necessary to defend Taiwan.
Excellent:
America, Taiwan and any other partners willing to enter the fray would need to concentrate on stopping the invasion, putting every available hindrance in the way of China’s armada and aircraft. Think sea mines and anti-ship and anti-air missiles launched from various platforms on land, at sea and in the air. The defenders would also need to eliminate or eject any Chinese forces that managed to land. [emphasis added]
The public recognition of the need to eliminate the PLA bridgeheads (and air heads) is a new thing, as a Forbes article about a U.S. Army role to deter a Chinese invasion of Taiwan highlighted:
As Brian J. Dunn observed in a seminal assessment for Military Review last year, "To defeat Taiwan and avoid war with America, all China needs to do is get ashore in force and impose a cease-fire prior to significant American intervention."
The link in the quote goes to my Military Review article where I explored that issue. I go into it a bit more in this post. Heck, even the idea that China can make it ashore in force was mocked not that long ago as a "million-man swim." That is an idea I've long disputed.
But I take issue with part of this:
But meeting this standard of defense will be a tall order. To be able to effectively defend Taiwan — and by extension its other Asian allies — the US will have to drastically reduce its military commitments in the Middle East, Africa and Europe. There simply isn’t enough military capacity to defend Taiwan and other allies in Asia from China while simultaneously fielding a major presence elsewhere. This will leave a vacuum in these regions, which are important but pale in significance compared with Asia.
America's military commitments to Africa are minimal. America's European presence is a shadow of its Cold War level. And America's Middle East commitment is far from the peaks of fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan.
While I do believe the Army has a ground role for Asia and the Pacific, which I addressed in Military Review several years ago, we can afford to commit 15 combat brigades to Europe and the Middle East to support allies and watch threats, I think. America might need to move mobilized National Guard brigades to Europe and the Middle East to allow at least some of the active Army forces to shift to China. But our logistics right now are no doubt too atrophied to sustain even 15 brigades in INDOPACOM in high intensity warfare outside of South Korea.
And why would America abandon the Middle East when anything America has in the Middle East could shift to face China pretty easily by moving across the Indian Ocean. Indeed, our Middle Eastern forces would need to sweep up Chinese military assets on the ground and at sea in the region before shifting to the Pacific.
Although the author's point is certainly strongest for deploying the Navy.
Further, we simply don't have bases to operate all of the aircraft that we have for a campaign against China. So having some in Europe or the Middle East doesn't seem like much of a problem to me. We'll have aircraft in the continental United States to reinforce and replace losses without abandoning the rest of the world.
But because American military commitments outside of Asia really are minimal, this is spot on:
In a war over Taiwan, the UK could help address Chinese forces in other theaters, perhaps alongside India’s efforts. But together with other western European countries, it would need to concentrate on ensuring that Russia and Iran did not see an opportunity to exploit America’s focus on Taiwan.
Indeed, Germany's recent military initiatives in Asia frustrate me beyond belief, as I expressed in this data dump:
What is the fucking point of the German outreach?! "Defense Minister Nobuo Kishi on Friday said Japan will step up military cooperation with Germany in the Indo-Pacific region as he welcomed a port call by the first German warship to visit Japan in about 20 years." Maybe the Germans could focus on controlling the Goddamn Baltic Sea so the Russians can't fight for control. Maybe that's more important? The Germans don't do enough on defense and what little they do is wasted on frivolous gestures.
The bottom line is that America must be able to focus on the Pacific while leveraging regional allied support to deter or fight China; while counting on allies to hold the line in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa with minimal or at least not major American support.
So I salute that author for making those points. And I concede that the question for how much American military power outside of Asia is necessary is up for debate. But abandoning the rest of the world to focus on China seems premature.
Taiwan needs to do more and America can help to keep China from ending a war with troops on Taiwan. But unlike Taiwan which has the one objective of national survival, America has multiple objectives around the world to defend.
