I'd say that claiming that they want to "Reclaim" Taiwan is linked to CCP maintaining its power. I'm pretty sure that they don't really want to militarily conqu

I'd say that claiming that they want to "Reclaim" Taiwan is linked to CCP maintaining its power. I'm pretty sure that they don't really want to militarily conquer it even if they were certain it would not result in a full scale war with the US. Any such invasion, assuming Taiwan resists, would result huge damage to the Chinese and the global economies and likely result in China completely losing western markets (at least long-term). They would much rather continue increasing Taiwan's economic reliance on China and eventually peacefully take it over (even without necessarily full integrating it into their state). Any saber rattling it basically to deter foreign government's from recognizing Taiwan in any way which would strengthen the independence movement there and decrease it's reliance on China. >prefer full annexation if they knew NATO wouldn't intervene You mean of the entire Ukraine? Because it would cost them more than it's worth. No Russian actions since 1991 have so far indicated that they actually want to conquer any foreign area not inhabited by a Russian speaking majority or whose population would be likely to actively resist such occupation.