Thread: Is Taiwan Worth It?

^fair points. I worry that Xi is flexing his muscles (india and taiwan) because he knows there is a fucktard in the White house.

Originally Posted by HuangLao

That'll be awhile, if it ever manifest.

Originally Posted by bsnub

Fuck off Jeff

Originally Posted by tomcat

...^555...been a while since I've seen the Jeff salute...

他媽的傑夫

Tā mā de jié fū

Originally Posted by HuangLao

That'll be awhile, if it ever manifest.

It is not without the bounds of possibility that Jeff is calling it right. Scary thought, not impossible.

Taiwan is nuclear level sensitive for China.

So any Seppo designs on taking an island an inch away from mainland China and historic Chinese territory is a pipe dream.

Just like Crimea. A few PRC troops would be dispatched and it would be over in a day. Taiwan has no nukes. Mainland China does

Originally Posted by bsnub

China has no successful combat operations outside its boarder in its history. In 1979 China attempted to attack Vietnam and was badly bloodied by the Viets forcing them to retreat in defeat. China is still fuming over that humiliation decades later.

Attacking Taiwan will not be an easy task for any country let alone one with absolutely no experience in amphibious warfare. The factor that is getting overlooked here is that the Chinese are afraid of being humiliated again as they were in '79.

The won't be attacking Taiwan anytime in the near future it is all empty bluster.

Fisher Price

My first geopolitics

The chinkies won't invade Taiwan. But they won't let it go independent either.

So they keep up this campaign of threatening and trying to scare them, because that's how they roll.

Originally Posted by Plan B

I'm sure the US will have plenty of time to get its shit together. An invasion force is not just dispatched on a whim. It's a logistical nightmare that involves massing large amounts of men, tanks, equipment, transports, subs, air cover in one place with supply lines, space constraints, security issues, infrastructure needs. It's not something any country can easily hide. Think D-Day level preparations. It's not the same as chucking the kids in the car for a weekend away.

Recent history tells us supremacy in the air is the key to any land invasion.

So the first thing they would have to do is bomb the shit out of Chinastan's military and logistics infrastructure.

That's probably more bombing than they've got bombs for.

Unless.......


Don't even think about it.

Originally Posted by Norton

Agree. Xi will as always talk the talk but let us not ignore the fact he as in most all national leaders is restrained by the monied elite.

Xi takes an action which financially hurts the rich, he is gone. He got the job via support from the elite and he knows will lose the job when that support group deems time for him to go.

That's not how the Chinese system is set up. It's not the USA. The class of billionaires in China have nothing to do with the government in the way that the US billionaires do

Originally Posted by Backspin

Taiwan is nuclear level sensitive for China.

So any Seppo designs on taking an island an inch away from mainland China and historic Chinese territory is a pipe dream.

Just like Crimea. A few PRC troops would be dispatched and it would be over in a day. Taiwan has no nukes. Mainland China does

Leaves me bewildered why Taiwan is spending >$50bn on fighters that would be overwhelmed in no time at all in a military engagement, and that's if they decide to use them rather than surrender and hand them over for China to copy and sell at half price.

Originally Posted by jabir

Leaves me bewildered why Taiwan is spending >$50bn on fighters that would be overwhelmed in no time at all in a military engagement,

...you may be underestimating Taiwanese determination and US training and grossly overestimating Chinese fighter pilots...

Originally Posted by Norton

Agree. Xi will as always talk the talk but let us not ignore the fact he as in most all national leaders is restrained by the monied elite.

Xi takes an action which financially hurts the rich, he is gone. He got the job via support from the elite and he knows will lose the job when that support group deems time for him to go.

Doesn't matter if he leaves or is pushed, the way I see it the CPCs ideological long game provides for continuity with goals that are barely affected by leadership change.

Originally Posted by tomcat

...you may be underestimating Taiwanese determination and US training and grossly overestimating Chinese fighter pilots...

His comments are just dumb, and he is making a big assumption that the US would not respond in kind with its own fighters based in Japan, Guam, South Korea and the likelihood that there would be at least a couple of aircraft carrier battle groups in the area by that time because the US would be well aware that the Chinese were planning an attack due to troop movements.

That does not even factor in that ROC has just under 300 combat aircraft 115 of which are F-16s, and they happen to be US trained.

I would find it difficult to believe The US military have not practised the chinese invasion scenario.

I'm sure they have, but to paraphrase a general, no military plan works beyond the first engagement.

Sun Tzu, yes that's him, brilliant read btw

^

No, Mike Tyson.

Originally Posted by TheRealKW

Sun Zao

Fraid not. It was first said by Field Marshal Helmuth Karl Bernhard Graf von Moltke (1800-1891)

"no plan of operations extends with any certainty beyond the first contact with the main hostile force" (translation)

Helmuth von Moltke the Elder - Wikiquote

Originally Posted by nidhogg

Fraid not. It was first said by Field Marshal Helmuth Karl Bernhard Graf von Moltke (1800-1891)

"no plan of operations extends with any certainty beyond the first contact with the main hostile force" (translation)

Helmuth von Moltke the Elder - Wikiquote

Fair enough, I stand corrected. I also misspelled his name.

Originally Posted by TheRealKW

Fair enough, I stand corrected. I also misspelled his name.

No worries. I am just chuffed that I knew it was not a Sun Tzu quote.