China vs Taiwan in a cross trait conflict

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merocaine

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My question is would the Chinese be able to make an American intervention in the straits of Taiwan too costly.

In a long drawn out war America would win, its stand off weapons, blue water navy, statigic bombers and cruise missles would severly hamper any offencive
movements by the chinese.

The Senario is thus,
China and Tiawan are moving toward greater union. The Army back by the political opposition cease power. Taiwanies President arrested The Goverment is placed under house arrest. America signals tact support for the coup Leaders, but is caught of balance as it had no advance warning. A new Goverment is quickly formed.

China reacts.
China Declares that the coup is illegal, and demands the reinstatement of the old goverment, this is rebuffed.
Major Tiawanise army and airbases are attacked by bomber and cruise missle assault. Covert Chinese special forces attack selected targets on the Island.
The Chinese land airbourne troops at major transportation hubs around the main landing beaches, amfibious assault quickly follows, although in smaller numbers than had been hoped.
Tiawans Navy and Airforce are unable to cope, but do cause significant caulties to the landing forces esp the paras.
It becomes apperant that without urgent american air support Tiawans fall is a very real possiblity, due to the suppression of air defences and nutraliation of the navy.

What would american counter moves be, and what kind of losses would it be willing sustain?
 
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FutureTank

Banned Member
Merocaine,

I would suggest you reduce your scenario to the basics. Expereince from other historical periods is useful here.

Lets say Taiwan is a fortress surrounded by a large moat.
A King finds himself besieged in the fortress, and eventually decides to give into the the besiegers. However his troops have other ideas and throw him into the dungeon.

What would an Allied force do? It is after all allied to the king and not his troops.
So that is Issue #1.

Secondly, how does one storm a fortress?
There are two ways: the hard way and the easy way.

The easy way is to expand a large amount of ammunition trying to knock the walls down while filing in the moat. This is an all out effort. Failure means defeat, and retreat.

The hard way is by infiltration. This is also an all out effort, but depends more on human resourcefullness then on material resources.
The idea is to find weaknesses in defence of the fortress and expand these to allow the larger force to gain access to the fortress, preferably when the defenders are not prepared.

Any effort that is short of achieving the end goal of capturing the fortress is a waste of time.:)
 
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Khairul Alam

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America wud first weigh the possible costs abd the benefits. No doubt america can come out victorious from a face off with china. But victory wud come at a massive cost. China's military, although inferior to that of the US, can cause significant damage. There is already talk of china building ICBMs that can defeat US defences.
It wud also be wrong to assume that the american navy can get a strong foothold in taiwanese waters immediately after a chinese invasion. china's navy is being equipped with the latest russian and chinese subs and destroyers. any invasion of taiwan wud surely be followed by a naval blocade around taiwan to prevent US forces from entering taiwan
 
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Rich

Member
We would fight. Their ICBMs are irrelevant. We have a hundred times more megatonnage we can deliver on China then they can on us. And they know it! It all comes down to the question "do they have the ability to cross that straight and take that Island with an army"? They can severely damage the Taiwanese nation and economy and we can surely do the same on them. And in a shooting war where the Chinese are killing Americans we would most certainly attack their mainland targets and slowly strangle them with a sea blockade.

When this subject comes up in my circles I often get variations of three responses from people. The first one is, "Oh but the Chinese have nukes". Well the Chinese would take far fewer casualties shooting their nukes at themselves then doing so at us. And looking from their viewpoint, America is the only country in history that has shown the National will to use these weapons in the first place and they must surely know we would turn their country into a nuclear wasteland should they ever use their limited arsenal.

#2 is some variation of, "Oh there are over a billion of them". Well, I dont see how 1.3 billion people are going to pick up and run across The Straights of Taiwan, with rusty SKS's, let alone the entire Pacific ocean.

#3, Is variations of "remember Korea". Well, this wouldn't be Korea. This would be a high-tech, amphib, naval OP of great difficulty and precision. Of which the mainland Chinese have no experience in wartime. Thats "zero" experience. Will they ever have the capability? Who knows? But I'm starting to think never in my lifetime. They have developed credible means to defend themselves but to take Taiwan by force of arms against an allied force????

Communists, even ones with credit cards, are neither gamblers nor stupid. They have had success getting back ex-Brit holdings without firing a shot and they will take the long view about getting back Taiwan. The Taiwanese have shown themselves slick by so intertwining the two economies and making such a war scenario even more indigestible economically to the mainlanders.

Originally Posted by merocaine
What would american counter moves be

Complain alot at the UN.
Click to expand...
I dont think so..........
 
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