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I heard it put this way once: the US can’t stop a Chinese invasion of Taiwan any more than China could stop a hypothetical US invasion of Cuba. In both cases i
by api 5y ago
I heard it put this way once: the US can’t stop a Chinese invasion of Taiwan any more than China could stop a hypothetical US invasion of Cuba.
In both cases it’s a battle right off the coast of a superpower with pretty massive home court advantage to the closer nation. Right off shore means no supply lines and the ability to just fire shit from shore at enemy ships and planes. The entire industrial output of the closer nation is right there.
Note that I am leaving thermonuclear escalation off the table. Nobody really wins that one. I’m imagining a scoped conventional conflict in the form of an intervention.
- Retric 5y agoGiven some warning the US could actually stop a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. The US Navy has the second most powerful air force in the world just behind the US Air Force. That’s the rather insane scale we’ve invested into the current military. Cruse missiles are a different story, China could trivially destroy TSMC’s factories. That said, the US is hardly the only nation likely to react to such an invasion.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- mytailorisrich 5y agoI think that the US would not want to directly attack China, and China would not want to directly attack the US. The US would provide weapons, intelligence, etc. but would not fire on the Chinese because that would be an unlimited and uncontrolled escalation, in effect a declaration of war on a country actually larger than them, a nuclear power which government could not afford to be seen as weak and defeated. That's partly why the US have always refrained from entering into any formal obligation to intervene militarily. Likewise, I don't think it would be in China's interest to destroy TSMC's fabs. Quite the opposite, I think they would probably want to keep them intact if they can help it and resume business as usual as soon as possible.
- publicola1990 5y agoUS couldn't stop the Japanese from invading Philippines.
- jimmygrapes 5y agoA lot has changed since then
- jollybean 5y agoChina could easily stop a US invasion of Cuba merely by putting several garrisons of soldiers in Cuba. They probably could not stop an 'all in invasion' - of course - but that's not the point. The point would be to raise the cost significantly i.e. 'invading Cuba would mean war with China'. There are a lot of things the US could to do raise the cost of the invasion of Taiwan, but it's hard. Every move comes with a counter move. The US would have to coordinate with everyone else on this. They're trying to do that but it's hard.
- United857 5y agoThe two scenarios are not comparable, US has 11 carriers, China only has 1-2 right now. The US could also use its forward bases in Japan and South Korea. China doesn't have any equivalent of those.
- lmz 5y agoWhy would it need carriers? The mainland is 200km away.