"Porcupine" defense strategies are nonsense. It's a wonderfully alluring analogy that falters in the real world when taken too far.
Just stop trying to doom Taiwan:
The growing quantitative gap between the Taiwanese military and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) makes competing symmetrically an increasingly difficult task.
Instead, Taipei should seek to deter Beijing asymmetrically by becoming a “porcupine”— an animal that defends itself by inflicting such grievous wounds on the predator that hunting it is not worth the cost. The quills of this porcupine should include cheap and numerous one-way attack drones, similar to the Iranian-made Shahed-136 drones that have seen success in conflicts in the Middle East and Europe.
There is nothing wrong with using weapons that at low cost inflict disproportionate losses. I encourage that. But they are not a silver bullet that lifts the burden of defeating an enemy army on the battlefield.
One, a so-called porcupine strategy rests survival not on defeating the enemy and driving them from the battlefield, but on making them pay too high a price to win. That's a dangerous bet because you can't know how much the enemy is willing to pay. Either before the war starts or as the war continues.
Would anybody have argued Russia would still be fighting Ukraine after 50,000 dead soldiers? I sure didn't. And I don't pretend to know how many soldiers China would spend to take their most core of core interests once the shooting starts.
And two, if the enemy is willing to pay the price to take some of your territory you may find you lack symmetrical means of driving the enemy back. Which I argued in Military Review not too long ago.
Admit it, without examining the Definitions Section, we may find China essentially won the war before we even realize it.
And as long as they were brought up as Exhibit A, resting your argument on suicide drones is nonsense. Sure, they inflict damage. As do all the explosive things on the battlefield. But what operational "success" have they achieved in Middle East and European conflicts? Yay "success"!
I'll concede Azerbaijan achieved a win in their recent war with Armenia. And drones seemed to have been a major part of that. But surprise use of drones played a big role in that short war. Lets' see how Armenia learns to cope.
There is no cheap silver bullet solution to Taiwan's defense problems. Taiwan needs to do it all to avoid being swallowed by China.
UPDATE: About that casualty stimulus that is supposed to keep attackers away:
Western analysts believe that Russia has lost (killed, seriously wounded, captured or missing) 250,000 soldiers since early 2022[.]
NOTE: TDR Winter War of 2022 continues here.
