Taiwan has a big problem
Tom Rogan
Video Embed
If the United States goes to war in defense of Taiwan, thousands of U.S. military troops are likely to die. Many of these young Americans will probably suffer brutal concussive or shock injuries to their organs, including their brains. Others will suffocate, burn to death, or drown. Facing China‘s ideologically motivated People’s Liberation Army, one that has spent decades arming and fixating on how best to defeat the U.S. over Taiwan (rather than mastering corruption like the Russian military), the PLA has a strong prospect of defeating the U.S. over Taiwan even if the U.S. commits its full forces.
The threat of such a war is very real. The CIA said Chinese President Xi Jinping has ordered his military to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2030. Xi views that conquest as the central measure of his personal leadership narrative and a critical ingredient on the path toward Chinese Communist global hegemony. Taiwan will hold elections next year. If Xi doesn’t like the outcome, he’ll surely contemplate a quote from the most powerful Chinese Communist leader before him: “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”
DEBT LIMIT: HOW THE COMPROMISE COMPARES TO THE ORIGINAL GOP DEBT CEILING BILL
Though the White House has backtracked each time, President Joe Biden has said four times that he would order the U.S. military to intervene in Taiwan’s defense. However, there are two major problems with the idea of a U.S. intervention.
First, the U.S. military lacks enough of the capabilities it needs to provide confident deterrence and a high assurance of wartime victory. Biden bears significant blame here for his deficient defense budgets, deployment of too many high-end military assets to Europe, and his administration’s arrogant unwillingness to contemplate what defeating China in a Taiwan war would actually entail — namely, the destruction of the PLA fleet-in-being and associated Chinese mainland air and missile bases.
Congress also shares the blame. Even some of the best China strategists, such as China select committee Chairman Mike Gallagher (R-WI), are willing to put local jobs before warfighting needs. Missile stocks are also limited across all of the Taiwan-relevant fields. Stockpiles of weapons, such as man-portable Javelin anti-tank and Stinger anti-air systems, are also severely depleted due to the war in Ukraine. And due to the woeful condition of both the military-industrial base and the munitions-industrial base, buying more ships and weapons won’t be a solution until the very late 2020s at the earliest.
The second problem? Taiwan isn’t serious about its own defense.
Taiwan’s civilian population is lethargic in the face of the threat, and even the more hawkish elements of the Taiwanese political establishment are unwilling to take truly bold action. At just 2.4% of its GDP, for example, Taiwan’s defense spending is, put simply, a total joke. Taiwan should be spending at least four times that amount.
Political leadership is also largely absent. We gained another example of this reality via Taiwan’s de facto Ambassador Bi-khim Hsiao in Washington. As the New York Times reports, Hsiao pushed back this week against the basic military reality that what is expended in Ukraine cannot be stockpiled in Taiwan. Instead, Hsiao stated that Ukraine is key because Taiwan’s “best hope is that Beijing also takes the lesson that aggression will not succeed, that there will be tremendous international pushback against aggression.” Hsiao said she is not concerned about weapons stock depletion since Taiwan has separate weapons orders.
A few things here.
For one, if you’re betting on hope, you need to read a lot more military history. Napoleon hoped Tsar Alexander I would sue for peace once he seized Moscow in 1812. Instead, Napoleon’s army and the foundation of his empire were annihilated amid a brutal retreat. For another, weapons orders will not sink the PLA’s superb Type 055 air-defense destroyers; batteries of Harpoons will.
But Hsiao’s suggestion that weapons stocks don’t matter is particularly ridiculous. Don’t get me wrong: The U.S. has vested strategic interests in assisting Ukraine to defeat Russia and liberating most of its territory. I also believe that Ukraine needs HIMARS artillery more than Taiwan needs them. Still, Taiwan definitely needs Stingers, Javelins, and Patriot missiles — and a lot of them. Unfortunately, Stingers don’t grow on trees. And to emphasize the point, it shouldn’t take a genius to figure out that what is used in Ukraine cannot be used in Taiwan. At best, Hsiao is hedging that Xi will not order an attack before 2030. The best U.S. intelligence suggests this is a very, very dangerous gambit.
There’s a broader philosophical-political point Taiwan neglects here. As Taiwan strategist Elbridge Colby put it, “If Taiwan is so blithe about its own defense, why should Americans stick their necks out? How much should Americans be willing to suffer if Taiwan isn’t even prepared to advocate for its own defense? Taiwan’s defense is already a tough case. She’s making it a lot tougher.” Colby also noted the absurdity of Hsiao’s claim that Taiwan has shown it is serious about its defense because it is “increasing the length of its compulsory military service for men from four months to one year; is working with the United States to improve military training; and is creating the capability to service F-16 fighter jets on its own.”
Servicing F-16 fighter jets is going to be rather irrelevant if the PLA can smash every Taiwanese airfield with hundreds of missiles in the first two days of the conflict. Better training and compulsory service are going to be very irrelevant if the PLA can cross the Taiwan Strait and establish multiple shoreline strongholds from which to bring legions of armor, artillery, and gunships ashore.
Top line: Considering America’s own inadequacies in terms of readiness for what is likely to come, if this is Taiwan’s attitude about the gathering storm, it has a big problem. After all, I don’t see how even the most persuasive of U.S. presidents could justify to American families that they should sacrifice thousands of their fellow citizens to fight for a faraway land that isn’t terribly interested in even preparing to fight for itself.