I'm concerned that the quantity and quality of weapons that Taiwan deploys is the least of Taiwan's defense problems.
Yeah, I'm fully on board this assessment:
U.S. leadership has been wasting its scarce political capital, trying to convince Taiwan to improve the relevance of its armaments purchases, when it should instead be focused on resolving Taiwan’s crisis of self-confidence, which will impact more immediately on Taiwan’s will to prepare and fight.
I'm very worried about Taiwanese resolve to fight hard if China invades. And I see a recent CRS summary states:
Civil defense preparedness is insufficient, according to some observers, and Taiwan’s military struggles to recruit, retain, and train personnel. At a societal level, it is not clear what costs—in terms of economic security, well-being, safety and security, and lives—Taiwan’s people would be willing or able to bear in the face of possible PRC armed aggression.
And if the Taiwanese lack the will to fight or even to spend to prepare to fight, some Taiwanese may go to Plan B to survive the conquest. This is something that keeps me awake at night.
[If China invades Taiwan, it will] "rely on treason within Taiwan’s astonishingly lackadaisical armed forces to win quickly."
And winning quickly may only require getting ashore intact and defying efforts to eject the PLA. I don't think that the Taiwanese are island Israelis. Or even Ukrainians.
Indeed, it is this problem that makes me extremely hesitant to sell advanced weapons to Taiwan:
But if Taiwan starts out believing they are doomed, I don't care how many fancy weapons Taiwan buys or develops. Taiwan will lose. And lose before we can even begin to make a decision to intervene.
Because if China believes that Taiwan's troops and people will crack as soon as a significant Chinese force makes it ashore, the price China would have to pay plummets tremendously.
And worse for Taiwan, the moment we think that Taiwan won't use weapons we sell them, we will stop selling Taiwan advanced weapons to match China out of fear that China will simply capture large amounts of advanced American weapons technology.
And we'll have to consider attacking Taiwanese ports, airfields, and army depots as Chinese troops fan out over the island to turn as much of what we provided into piles of junk rather than allow the Chinese to examine them at their leisure. Remember the British in World War II and how they viewed the Vichy French fleet.
China's best weapon against Taiwan is a Taiwanese belief that China can't lose a war with Taiwan. Sadly, we can't sell Taiwan the kind of resolve they need to survive so close to China.
A decade later, I still worry China could capture Taiwan exploiting that weakness. Indeed, one reason for advocating the use of American Army troops to drive the PLA into the sea (in Military Review) was that it would bolster the Taiwanese to know real help is coming even if the Chinese get past the anti-ship and air defense missiles to land on Taiwan. This help will take time to arrive--even after America builds the logistics and transportation assets to move the units to Taiwan--so Taiwan needs the determination to fight even when things look dark until that help can arrive.
We can build on Ukraine's resistance--assuming Russia doesn't win in the end--to bolster Taiwanese resolve. Because if Russia still wins this war--perhaps because the West falters in supporting Ukraine--Taiwan will lose all hope of surviving.
I sometimes worry that Taiwanese troops will fold if the Chinese actually make it ashore in any strength despite the modernization effort taking place in the Taiwanese army. I sometimes worry I don't worry enough.
With a long quote about the fall of Constantinople to illustrate my worry.
Have a super sparkly day.
UPDATE: Hmmm:
If Taiwan becomes a concrete porcupine -- with trained soldiers, modern weapons and reinforced bunkers supported by air and sea assets delivering sea mines and missile strikes -- Beijing will never take the island.
"If" does some heavy lifting in that advice. And that first element is the hardest conditional statement of all.
Remember, Constantinople had a massive "concrete" porcupine wall with impressive counter-siege weapons. But once the attackers in small numbers made it past the wall, the technically proficient but poorly motivated defenders collapsed.
NOTE: TDR Winter War of 2022 coverage continues here.
