4 ms·
>fighting China would be a proper all-out war I figure it would probably be like the US backing Ukraine's defense against Russia but backing Taiwan's defense a
by tim333 2mo ago
>fighting China would be a proper all-out war
I figure it would probably be like the US backing Ukraine's defense against Russia but backing Taiwan's defense against China. It would probably be quite hard for China to take Taiwan. There's a lot of sea in between and you can see how well Russia's navy has done against Ukraine's drones and missiles.
- ericmay 2mo agoI don't think so because China would not be sure what and how the US would be involved and because it would be incredibly risky to attack Taiwan without striking US forces in the area they'll likely attempt to strike US forces in Korea, Japan, Guam, the Philippines, and elsewhere. The best US strategy is to just arm Taiwan to the teeth by selling weapons to make the invasion as risky as possible. But China can (and this is their smart play, IMO) is to just win Taiwan over politically over the long term.
- sarchertech 2mo ago> is to just win Taiwan over politically over the long term. That was their plan until Xi became ruler for life and decided that he wanted Taiwan sooner rather than later.
- zardo 2mo ago> But China can (and this is their smart play, IMO) is to just win Taiwan over politically over the long term. Yeah, that is certainly the smart play and one China is almost guaranteed to win in the long run. But that won't secure Xi as the leader that reunited the nation. He might prefer the option where he gets a chance at glory to the smart one.
- bobthepanda 2mo agoI think Hong Kong has been enough of a cautionary experience for Taiwan that this is more or less not going to happen willingly.
- gadflyinyoureye 2mo agoWhat does winning them over look like? Are the Taiwanese supposed to come to the CCP with open arms?
- nemomarx 2mo agoEconomic integration and benefits, trade stuff, whatever they'd like to ask for. I think there's a local party in Taiwan that's been pushing for it a little? https://www.npr.org/2026/06/11/g-s1-127478/taiwan-opposition-leader-says-xi-meeting-avoided-reunification-talk https://www.npr.org/2026/06/11/g-s1-127478/taiwan-opposition...
- brazzy 2mo agoRead up on current politics in Taiwan. The KMT, the party that lost the civil war, fled to Taiwan, and still claimed to be the true government of China, is now essentially a PRC puppet.
- missedthecue 2mo agoHow hard would it be for China to make sure no ships or airplanes arrive to Taiwan for a few weeks? The island has only days worth of food and energy. No bloody D-Day landings needed to force a political capitulation. To continue to borrow from your example, Russia has completely shut down all commercial Ukrainian seaborne and airborne traffic.
- sarchertech 2mo agoYes they could starve them out and maybe they will. But China is certainly preparing for an amphibious invasion, so they think it might be necessary.
- audunw 2mo agoA blockade of Taiwan could be met with a blockade of China. China can survive much longer on their own supply and reserves. But it’s still something to make them think twice. They don’t have the blue water navy to respond to a blockade. Land connections do not have the scale to work around it. There’s a small port on the east side of Taiwan which could be used to supply some of the bare necessities. I don’t know if USA would fully enter a war but I do think they might do freedom of navigation exercises east of the island. Would China dear hit a US military vessel with missiles and escalate the conflict. I don’t think so.
- missedthecue 2mo agoGiven China's enormous land borders and the surrounding seas they share with south east asian neighbors, it's quite difficult to impose a blockade. Observers have been shocked about China's oil resilience during this whole Hormuz fiasco. What would a blockade of Malacca do aside from starving and pissing off south east asian allies and Japan?
- maxglute 2mo agoUSN on paper not capable of blockading PRC anymore, refer to latest Pentagon China Power report, PRC missiles coverage up to west CONUS, likely further, which means USN is globally vulnerable. Iran's shit tier A2D2 can push USN to standoff range, PRC can push USN out of hemisphere. This not mentioning PRC answer to energy/food blockade is proportional CONUS energy infra strikes to deny CONUS energy. PRC doesn't need blue water navy to break US blockade. Highend rockery breaks USN model at scale, on the cheap, relative to bluewater. There is US subsurface but do the math, US subs will run out of VLS cells before they meaningfully dent size of PRC merchant fleet. There is no part of TW that is not within PRC land base munition range, every inch can be hit within 7 minutes. Of course PRC would hit US ships in blockade scenario which is by definition war. If USN doesn't blockade, then FONAP does nothing, anything supply ship to west TW would be trivially sunk, NVM legally any ship during PRC TW blockade scenario is running PRC blockade (read: entering sovereign One China waters) and can be treated as hostile. US either tries to blockade (goto war with PRC who will run blockade / test US resolve), and if turns hot, risk its westpac / global replenishment chains (including CENTCOM/CONUS) being blown up, or CONUS hits. Just hitting USN replenishment ships, which are exquisitely vulnerable (has to spend hours in port) means USN becomes single deployment assets, i.e CSG in high tempo operations will exhaust fuel (escorts), munitions in days. USN expeditionary model simply isn't viable vs peer who can cripple US logistics tail within ~10000km radius of PRC. Or US does functionally nothing, i.e. FONAP in TW blockade scenario is theatrics.
- FuriouslyAdrift 2mo agoTaiwan is one of the most heavily armed land masses on Earth (they buy mostly from the US).