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Why do people still compare Taiwan with Ukraine, can people not read maps? This isn't 1996 anymore. Contrary to the US China has hypersonic missiles that the U
by rjzzleep 4y ago
Why do people still compare Taiwan with Ukraine, can people not read maps? This isn't 1996 anymore. Contrary to the US China has hypersonic missiles that the US military admitted they work.
The area Russia has captured in Ukraine is 3 or 4 times the size of Taiwan. Ukraine borders a couple of NATO countries with huge borders, has pipelines going through its country that Russia didn't touch the entire conflict. Taiwan on the other hand is 150 miles away from China and thousands of miles away from its big backers. Most of eastern Ukraine was Soviet infrastructure heavily fortified over 8 years. Taiwan on the other hand is mostly uninhabitable mountains that barely have roads going through them with very densely populated cities on the west.
Taiwan gets its oil and gas from Indonesia and most of its resources from China. Last time they did missile drills they had to stop them because the launchers failed.
China just embargoed the island for a couple of days and nothing could move in an out. China doesn't really need to do anything to win. There isn't really any scenario where this plays out in Taiwans favour. The US can't even keep up with Russia's ammunition production[1], how would it match China's manufacturing?
While the US moves their warship through the area every now and then as a show of power everyone agrees that there is no protection from hypersonic or even most supersonic missiles and that much of the US Navy are sitting ducks if there were ever a real conflict.
Biden was born in 1942 and believes the world is stuck in the 90s. It's extremely dangerous to think and act like that.
[1] https://www.military.com/daily-news/2023/01/11/navy-might-have-choose-between-arming-service-and-aiding-ukraine-due-ammo-delays-officials-say.html https://www.military.com/daily-news/2023/01/11/navy-might-ha...
- rocqua 4y agoWhat is the range on hypersonic missles? Perhaps the defense is avoiding detection and keeping a standoff distance until you want to strike?
- rjzzleep 4y ago“Launch in August of nuclear-capable rocket that circled the globe took US intelligence by surprise” Not sure where your stand-off distance would be. https://www.ft.com/content/ba0a3cde-719b-4040-93cb-a486e1f843fb https://www.ft.com/content/ba0a3cde-719b-4040-93cb-a486e1f84...
- JumpCrisscross 4y agoChinese and Russian hypersonic capabilities are a money bell for American defence contractors. For cross-strait warfare, they’re irrelevant. (Conventional artillery dominates at that range.)
- simonh 4y agoHard for American carrier based air assets and AEGIS cruisers to help defend Taiwan if they all got killed by hypersonic missiles.
- red-iron-pine 4y agoThat carriers would be sunk pretty much instantly is a given, and has been for a while now. The USN invests heavily in subs, and you don't hear much about them for a reason...
- cpursley 4y agoYou’re getting downvoted for stating extremely uncomfortable truths. It’s not what westerners want to hear. Ignoring these objective facts is foolish and dangerous. The reality is, with hypersonics (currently deployed), Russia or China could disable entire surface battle groups and there’s not much the US could do about it (conventionally). I encourage everyone to break from their myopia and get a better understanding of the significant geoeconomic and power realignments going on right now. It’s no longer 1992. We’re either headed towards global nuclear holocaust or back to a multi-polar world. May calmer heads prevail. Two books on these topics: - https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40658433 https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40658433 - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52962238-principles-for-dealing-with-the-changing-world-order https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52962238-principles-for-...
- gorilla0 4y agoGlad to see a book by Andrei Martyanov being recommended here. I have read all three of his books. There is no reason to trust or agree with everything he writes, but unfortunately the current trend is to try and suppress any kind of discussion rather than try and understand someone's viewpoint.
- cpursley 4y agoI also don’t agree with everything he writes or says (his YouTube channel is wildly entertaining). But I trust him more than others as he’s a pro western US citizen who has a solid background in the Soviet navy (anti shipping missile expert, I believe). He even gets into military mathematics and field manuals from time to time. https://www.youtube.com/user/smoothieX12 https://www.youtube.com/user/smoothieX12
- gorilla0 4y agoYes I watch all his videos. My favourite is “Some very needed comparisons”. I started doing.(just for fun) a complete under-graduate and graduate course in Mathematics in my spare time after watching this video.
- simonh 4y agoThey’re not the same, I even pointed out some specific ways they are different. My point is though that if (just a guess) the PRC analysis said Russia would take Ukraine easily, the fact they got that one wrong points out flaws in their approach to strategic analysis. If their strategic analysts is flawed, then that damages the credibility of any of their analyses.