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China has no interest in destroying Taiwan.

JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> China has no interest in destroying Taiwan China doesn't. But Xi might. I agree that the U.S. has no way of defending Taiwan against Beijing deciding to obliterate it. But short of Xi needing to pull a Falklands, that is unlikely. If China moves on Taiwan, it would be to control the territory and--most likely--its people.
- Apocryphon 5y ago
  Xi is an authoritarian, but he isn't a totalitarian. If he does anything to insane, like flatten a country of 24 million people and the 20th largest economy by GDP by PPP, he would get removed. This isn't some comic book movie where there are insane supervillains willing to commit wanton total destruction.
  - philliphaydon 5y ago
    Mao wasn't removed for killing millions of people, what makes you think Xi would be removed?
kelnos 5y ago
Right, and this is the thing I find frustrating about conversations like this. Could China completely destroy Taiwan without the US or anyone else being able to do anything about it? Sure, of course. But the odds of that being their goal, or even a backed-into-the-corner endgame are so low it's not even worth considering. China wants to govern Taiwan and its people. They certainly want to directly own Taiwan's economy. They can't do any of that if they burn it to the ground. And if they did commit an atrocity like that, they'd be signing their own death warrants on the global political stage. While I do believe China could successfully invade and occupy Taiwan, it would be incredibly bloody and costly to do so, and I don't think they're quite to the point where they want to take that leap.
dirtyid 5y ago
CCP wants peaceful reunion foremost. But forceful reunion is not off the table. And there are a variety of scenarios and redlines where PRC will at minimum destroy all TW defenses and more depending on level of resistence or foreign involvement.
- philliphaydon 5y ago
  > reunion reunion of what? China never owned Taiwan to begin with. China had presence in Taiwan but failed to control the country for 200 years. In 1887 after 200 years, one day they were like 'oh, lets call Taiwan a Provence", then when Japan invaded they were like "oh, yeah, no we don't want it" and bailed on Taiwan. When Japan left, they signed over Taiwan to the ROC, not to the PRC. So China and the PRC have no claim over Taiwan to begin with. Seriously, China's claim is the equivalent of a bunch of Americans setting up home in a city in Canada, then 200 years later saying "lets call Canada a State of America". Despite the fact that Americans never ruled in the country to any extent.
  - dirtyid 5y ago
    PRC assumed all of ROC holdings when UN recognition switched. Though really none of it matters, PRC / ROC is in an ongoing civil war over territories that both parties currently occupy. Historical narratives used to rationalize legitimacy and legality is just the veneer over domestic and geopolitics. While PRC having legal claims over TW helps, ultimately PRC will conduct even an illegal war over TW as police actions if it has to, just like how the US conducts illegal war around the world. The Chinese civil war never ended. At the end of the day, it's really that simple. If ROC/TW wants to hold on to what it conquered from natives of Formosa, they will have to defend it with blood. Ditto with Americans who think they can deter PRC on core sovereignty issues, when they couldn't even deter PRC from fighting over Korea while the US was a nuclear power. The west can craft whatever ahistorical story they want to cope, but until they commit to exchanging SanFrancisco/Sydney/Tokyo for Shanghai over Taipei, their opinions simply don't matter for PRC calculations over TW.

> China has no interest in destroying Taiwan China doesn't. But Xi might. I agree that the U.S. has no way of defending Taiwan against Beijing deciding to obliterate it. But short of Xi needing to pull a Falklands, that is unlikely. If China moves on Taiwan, it would be to control the territory and--most likely--its people.

Apocryphon 5y ago
Xi is an authoritarian, but he isn't a totalitarian. If he does anything to insane, like flatten a country of 24 million people and the 20th largest economy by GDP by PPP, he would get removed. This isn't some comic book movie where there are insane supervillains willing to commit wanton total destruction.
- philliphaydon 5y ago
  Mao wasn't removed for killing millions of people, what makes you think Xi would be removed?

kelnos 5y ago

Right, and this is the thing I find frustrating about conversations like this. Could China completely destroy Taiwan without the US or anyone else being able to do anything about it? Sure, of course. But the odds of that being their goal, or even a backed-into-the-corner endgame are so low it's not even worth considering. China wants to govern Taiwan and its people. They certainly want to directly own Taiwan's economy. They can't do any of that if they burn it to the ground. And if they did commit an atrocity like that, they'd be signing their own death warrants on the global political stage. While I do believe China could successfully invade and occupy Taiwan, it would be incredibly bloody and costly to do so, and I don't think they're quite to the point where they want to take that leap.

dirtyid 5y ago

CCP wants peaceful reunion foremost. But forceful reunion is not off the table. And there are a variety of scenarios and redlines where PRC will at minimum destroy all TW defenses and more depending on level of resistence or foreign involvement.

philliphaydon 5y ago
> reunion reunion of what? China never owned Taiwan to begin with. China had presence in Taiwan but failed to control the country for 200 years. In 1887 after 200 years, one day they were like 'oh, lets call Taiwan a Provence", then when Japan invaded they were like "oh, yeah, no we don't want it" and bailed on Taiwan. When Japan left, they signed over Taiwan to the ROC, not to the PRC. So China and the PRC have no claim over Taiwan to begin with. Seriously, China's claim is the equivalent of a bunch of Americans setting up home in a city in Canada, then 200 years later saying "lets call Canada a State of America". Despite the fact that Americans never ruled in the country to any extent.
- dirtyid 5y ago
  PRC assumed all of ROC holdings when UN recognition switched. Though really none of it matters, PRC / ROC is in an ongoing civil war over territories that both parties currently occupy. Historical narratives used to rationalize legitimacy and legality is just the veneer over domestic and geopolitics. While PRC having legal claims over TW helps, ultimately PRC will conduct even an illegal war over TW as police actions if it has to, just like how the US conducts illegal war around the world. The Chinese civil war never ended. At the end of the day, it's really that simple. If ROC/TW wants to hold on to what it conquered from natives of Formosa, they will have to defend it with blood. Ditto with Americans who think they can deter PRC on core sovereignty issues, when they couldn't even deter PRC from fighting over Korea while the US was a nuclear power. The west can craft whatever ahistorical story they want to cope, but until they commit to exchanging SanFrancisco/Sydney/Tokyo for Shanghai over Taipei, their opinions simply don't matter for PRC calculations over TW.