3 ms·

> very difficult blockade of the eastern side of Taiwan Essentially every inch of TW shores, including east side is within 7 minute range of being hit by PRC l

> very difficult blockade of the eastern side of Taiwan Essentially every inch of TW shores, including east side is within 7 minute range of being hit by PRC land based fires - PRC does not require naval or aviation elements to maintain a blockade, that's what makes it appealing, the ease. It's byproduct of TW proximity to mainland fires, short range ~1000km fires that PLA have in stupid abundance of that it's easy for PLA to shut down everything around TW from purely mainland, meaning any effort to break blockade requires escalating to mainland attacks, which is to put it mildly is hard. Anything prepositioned close to TW is also ~7 minutes away from being destroyed, and can't be resupplied in first place, and islands themselves too small to preposition enough hardware to matter. PRC A2D2 is not just water, it covers everything within missile range, which given their cruise missile gigafactory that makes 1000 components a day, is essentially everything in 1IC / 1500km, aka US can literally preposition all every missile cell in their inventory (including 10000+ VLS on ships) and a few weeks of PRC production is enough to satuate with spares for punitory follow up against US partners for hosting. Hence they so far haven't, outside a few token security theatre deployments / not in #s that matter. IMO negotiating basing for land missiles, especially road mobile the hardest - it's difficult geopolitical problem, not reliable (like carriers) / can be revoked pending PRC friendly gov or if host country gets cold feet / domestic politics doesn't allow, i.e. civilians/constituants NIMBY about US military deployment, even if they're pro US defense partnership. Can only put so much eggs in that basket, when perception of PRC force balance in theatre is increasingly overhwelming, host countries risk calculus change when PRC had a few 1000 missiles split among all targets years ago, to 1000 missiles per day, enough to deindustrialize them for cooperating/enabling US to intervene in Chinese civil war. IMO no easy move to break TW blockade, because it's contingent on winning total war against PRC mainland.

ethbr1 2y ago
YJ-100s? What would the targeting sensor platform be? Even a spot of the ocean is big, and they'd need RQ-180-alikes to maintain 24/7 ISTAR to the east of Taiwan, where the biggest problem is that everything is on the other side of a mountain range. I'm not sure the Huanjings have detailed enough space-based SAR for ship targeting purposes, but even if so ASAT is a poor exchange in terms of satellite cost vs method of destruction. Absent something like the US' future LEO SBR, it doesn't fulfill the persistence criteria. > satuate with spares for punitory follow up against US partners for hosting. If the Chinese escalate to full strikes against host countries, then it's WWIII. (Maybe without nukes, if we're lucky)
- maxglute 2y ago
  Yaogan triplets / gaofen / jilins+ other commercial, PRC has put up 100s of new satellites last couple years with more every week, for near persistent ISR in region, including SAR. Space sensing network in region is densen now, not spotty like 10 years ago. PRC not doubling down on smart munitions without building up required kill chain. Not sure ocean is big for modern processing methods anymore. Sure there's chance for ASAT wars but if fallback is drone ISR, PRC has numeric advantage there as well. If host countries are staging ground for attacks on PRC of course they're going to get hit, they become legitimate military targets then, hence reluctance to host. Drawing US / compelling them to fight in 1IC where PRC force balance strongest is beneficial, ultimate PRC geostrategic goal is to displace US security architecture in region by making hosting untenable, can only demonstrate that by taking out US hardware based there, plus extra dose of pain for host countries for participating to deter others from hedging with US security once TW Damocles off the table. Big reason region reluctant to host US hardware is because they don't want to be missile sinks in TW scenario. PRC net security posture worse if region thinks hosting US forces after TW cost free, so every reason to make examples out of those who currently do. Dont know exact cruise missile model, just they have manufacturing infra in place to build stupid amounts of them. Clips of doc showed proper turbo jet components, i.e. they're not building shit tier shaheeds using moped engines. Both of which are non ballistic / has maneuverability to hit east of mountains.

ethbr1 2y ago

YJ-100s? What would the targeting sensor platform be? Even a spot of the ocean is big, and they'd need RQ-180-alikes to maintain 24/7 ISTAR to the east of Taiwan, where the biggest problem is that everything is on the other side of a mountain range. I'm not sure the Huanjings have detailed enough space-based SAR for ship targeting purposes, but even if so ASAT is a poor exchange in terms of satellite cost vs method of destruction. Absent something like the US' future LEO SBR, it doesn't fulfill the persistence criteria. > satuate with spares for punitory follow up against US partners for hosting. If the Chinese escalate to full strikes against host countries, then it's WWIII. (Maybe without nukes, if we're lucky)

maxglute 2y ago
Yaogan triplets / gaofen / jilins+ other commercial, PRC has put up 100s of new satellites last couple years with more every week, for near persistent ISR in region, including SAR. Space sensing network in region is densen now, not spotty like 10 years ago. PRC not doubling down on smart munitions without building up required kill chain. Not sure ocean is big for modern processing methods anymore. Sure there's chance for ASAT wars but if fallback is drone ISR, PRC has numeric advantage there as well. If host countries are staging ground for attacks on PRC of course they're going to get hit, they become legitimate military targets then, hence reluctance to host. Drawing US / compelling them to fight in 1IC where PRC force balance strongest is beneficial, ultimate PRC geostrategic goal is to displace US security architecture in region by making hosting untenable, can only demonstrate that by taking out US hardware based there, plus extra dose of pain for host countries for participating to deter others from hedging with US security once TW Damocles off the table. Big reason region reluctant to host US hardware is because they don't want to be missile sinks in TW scenario. PRC net security posture worse if region thinks hosting US forces after TW cost free, so every reason to make examples out of those who currently do. Dont know exact cruise missile model, just they have manufacturing infra in place to build stupid amounts of them. Clips of doc showed proper turbo jet components, i.e. they're not building shit tier shaheeds using moped engines. Both of which are non ballistic / has maneuverability to hit east of mountains.