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They would not be able to stop it though. By the time it was announced, it would already be done. The only real option China would have would be 'force' and a

They would not be able to stop it though. By the time it was announced, it would already be done. The only real option China would have would be 'force' and a frontal war with China is a really big deal. That said, US-provided nukes for Taiwan would be a major escelation and fingers would be pointed in the direction of the US for 'blame' etc.. A lot of people would throw a fit over that. It might be better to just put a US base there because it means the same thing, and more: if you mess with Taiwan, even if you overrun the local US forces, you have 'awoken the actual Dragon' and no amount of 'internal division' in the US would hamper them from becoming united against China and of course all sorts of other huge material fallouts. Ironically, I think it's the American regime who would not be able to pull it off. It would require cooperation among to many agencies and serious leadership. There'd have to be a pretty good President, with a lot of leverage, he'd have to be popular in the polls, have the backing of the Pentagon etc. etc.. I just can't see that working out so directly. It'd have to be done in a roundabout way.

thenewwazoo 5y ago
Your presumption of unity is doing a lot of work here. I, for one, would absolutely oppose going to war against China for the sake of Taiwan, instead preferring that that money go to humanitarian causes that would help Taiwanese suffering under a CCP regime. War, especially nuclear war, is abhorrent and I would not stand for it.
- jollybean 5y ago
  It doesn't matter whether you or I would support war, it matters what the population wants, and given a direct assault on US forces and the invasion of an ally, 1/2 the US population would be gunning for war and enough of the rest would be convinced. Unfortunately 'some money to helping Taiwanese' would basically be futile, as there wouldn't likely be a way for that to be applied. (Donations are not going to help Hong Kong, now and won't help Taiwan in the event of invasion) It also doesn't matter if we 'abhor war', force is a fundamental part of the equation even in 2021, if you're not prepared to use it in the right context, you'll lose the freedom to have the choice. And by that I don't mean 'You need to carry a gun!' because you don't, I mean we need to be prepared to use the Armed Forces (or force in generally) as is reasonably necessary. And that would effectively be a pretty much necessary case. These conflicts have 'knock on effects' - for example, if Saddam was able to simply roll into Kuwait willy-nilly, there's no reason to believe that Qatar or Saudi wouldn't be next. That, and 'because Oil stability' -> War. It's unlikely the US would respond with an invasion of Taiwan because that would be essentially impossible, but probably there would be a 'war' in the South China sea and a Cold War after that.
- R0b0t1 5y ago
  You're an idiot. It is hard to believe China would actually resort to nuclear war. What is happening now is they keep bluffing and everyone falls for it.
- stickfigure 5y ago
  > I, for one, would absolutely oppose going to war against Germany for the sake of Jews, instead preferring that that money go to humanitarian causes that would help Jewish suffering under a Nazi regime. Neville Chamberlain, is that you?
eloisius 5y ago
>By the time it was announced, it would already be done. There are almost no surprises on either side of the Straight. Spies from both sides have thoroughly penetrated the other.
xnyan 5y ago
Something that most westerners, particularly my fellow Americans, are unaware of is that the Soviets already had over 100 nuclear warheads in Cuba, many of them having fully functional delivery systems capable of striking the US. Even if we got them there, it’s not the end of the story For some reason the following simple truth is difficult for my countrymen to accept, but you have to know on some level that all of this matters more to China than it does to us, and unless we completly overmatch them in power (as we did in the past, and do not now) in the long term they will always win in the east. We could not even keep Afghanistan before our commitment flagged - what makes you think we could outlast the efforts of the largest economy in the world to remove weapons of mass destruction from Taipei?
- jollybean 5y ago
  'They will always win in the East'? The didn't win in Korea, they didn't win in Japan. They didn't even win in Vietnam, the US completely destroyed N. Vietnam military machine ... and then left. By the time the US actually left Vietnam there was very little fighting and no casualties. The US could have stayed. Similarly in Afghanistan ... there were very few soldiers there, with a different Foreign Policy there's no reason to believe the US could have chosen to 'stay'. There are still major bases in Korea, Japan and Germany, no reason not to keep a base in Afghanistan if they thought they wanted to. Nukes in Taiwan would really upset China (a lot!) and throw a big wrench into everything, but it's a very legit threat, it would make direct assault really hard. Certainly one 'Omega Weapon' would be a short range, small yield nuke that Taiwan could use against an invading maritime force. Scary, but real power.

thenewwazoo 5y ago

Your presumption of unity is doing a lot of work here. I, for one, would absolutely oppose going to war against China for the sake of Taiwan, instead preferring that that money go to humanitarian causes that would help Taiwanese suffering under a CCP regime. War, especially nuclear war, is abhorrent and I would not stand for it.

jollybean 5y ago
It doesn't matter whether you or I would support war, it matters what the population wants, and given a direct assault on US forces and the invasion of an ally, 1/2 the US population would be gunning for war and enough of the rest would be convinced. Unfortunately 'some money to helping Taiwanese' would basically be futile, as there wouldn't likely be a way for that to be applied. (Donations are not going to help Hong Kong, now and won't help Taiwan in the event of invasion) It also doesn't matter if we 'abhor war', force is a fundamental part of the equation even in 2021, if you're not prepared to use it in the right context, you'll lose the freedom to have the choice. And by that I don't mean 'You need to carry a gun!' because you don't, I mean we need to be prepared to use the Armed Forces (or force in generally) as is reasonably necessary. And that would effectively be a pretty much necessary case. These conflicts have 'knock on effects' - for example, if Saddam was able to simply roll into Kuwait willy-nilly, there's no reason to believe that Qatar or Saudi wouldn't be next. That, and 'because Oil stability' -> War. It's unlikely the US would respond with an invasion of Taiwan because that would be essentially impossible, but probably there would be a 'war' in the South China sea and a Cold War after that.
R0b0t1 5y ago
You're an idiot. It is hard to believe China would actually resort to nuclear war. What is happening now is they keep bluffing and everyone falls for it.
stickfigure 5y ago
> I, for one, would absolutely oppose going to war against Germany for the sake of Jews, instead preferring that that money go to humanitarian causes that would help Jewish suffering under a Nazi regime. Neville Chamberlain, is that you?

eloisius 5y ago

>By the time it was announced, it would already be done. There are almost no surprises on either side of the Straight. Spies from both sides have thoroughly penetrated the other.

xnyan 5y ago

Something that most westerners, particularly my fellow Americans, are unaware of is that the Soviets already had over 100 nuclear warheads in Cuba, many of them having fully functional delivery systems capable of striking the US. Even if we got them there, it’s not the end of the story For some reason the following simple truth is difficult for my countrymen to accept, but you have to know on some level that all of this matters more to China than it does to us, and unless we completly overmatch them in power (as we did in the past, and do not now) in the long term they will always win in the east. We could not even keep Afghanistan before our commitment flagged - what makes you think we could outlast the efforts of the largest economy in the world to remove weapons of mass destruction from Taipei?

jollybean 5y ago
'They will always win in the East'? The didn't win in Korea, they didn't win in Japan. They didn't even win in Vietnam, the US completely destroyed N. Vietnam military machine ... and then left. By the time the US actually left Vietnam there was very little fighting and no casualties. The US could have stayed. Similarly in Afghanistan ... there were very few soldiers there, with a different Foreign Policy there's no reason to believe the US could have chosen to 'stay'. There are still major bases in Korea, Japan and Germany, no reason not to keep a base in Afghanistan if they thought they wanted to. Nukes in Taiwan would really upset China (a lot!) and throw a big wrench into everything, but it's a very legit threat, it would make direct assault really hard. Certainly one 'Omega Weapon' would be a short range, small yield nuke that Taiwan could use against an invading maritime force. Scary, but real power.