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Recent Chinese military exercises conducted in the wake of US Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan have resulted in the most dangerous crisis over the island since 1996.

Source : PortMac.News | Globe :

Source : PortMac.News | Globe | News Story:

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US strategy must change now China shows it can take Taiwan
Recent Chinese military exercises conducted in the wake of US Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan have resulted in the most dangerous crisis over the island since 1996.

News Story Summary:

Much of the commentary on the issue over the past two weeks has focused on the dynamics of the US-China strategic competition - But what of the Taiwanese?

The Taiwanese people have lived with Chinese threats, influence and coercion for decades.

While Beijing has always insisted there is "One China", it has until recently bided its time with what it saw as the eventual (and hopefully, peaceful) reabsorption of its renegade province.

However, the events of recent weeks have laid bare for Taiwanese citizens how China has eschewed any lingering ambiguity over forceful reunification.

This dynamic has changed with a significant build-up of sophisticated land, air, sea, space and cyber capabilities by the People's Liberation Army.

The rise of President Xi Jinping, and his vicious forms of nationalism and coercive diplomacy has also played its part in these changing dynamics.

To complicate matters for Taiwanese government leaders, the past couple of weeks have demonstrated that the US policy of strategic ambiguity is a creaking edifice from a different era.

Everything has changed:

Those who support strategic ambiguity argue that it has worked for the past 40 years and provided deterrence against China by reassuring Taiwan that it would not let an invasion go unimpeded.

And it did so in a manner that would not animate Taiwanese politicians who favour a formal declaration of independence.

It is a nuanced policy, and it worked well enough when China was too weak to take Taiwan by force and when it lacked global economic clout. All that has changed.

Taiwan must now construct its defence policy and international relationships in an environment where the US President, the US Department of State and US Congress this year have all offered differing interpretations of the current policy.

This is further complicated by continuing debate about military strategy within Taiwan.

The deliberation about Taiwanese national defence has centred on the implementation of something called the Overall Defence Concept.

The Overall Defence Concept (ODC) was formulated a decade ago by the former Taiwanese Chief of General Staff Admiral Lee Hsi-ming.

Based on the premise that Taiwan's military cannot win a conventional war against China in the Taiwan Strait, nor impose decisive costs on the modernised People's Liberation Army through attrition, a shift from its more conventional defence approach was required.

The ODC would focus on preserving the military force in the event of an invasion and the conduct of asymmetric attacks on invading Chinese forces.

Winning was defined as the Chinese failing to occupy Taiwan.

However, the implementation of this approach has been slowed by opponents in the army, air force and navy who feared the new strategy would see them denied the kinds of weapon systems that gave their services prestige.

There is an old saying that there is nothing harder to change in a military organisation than an idea.

The implementation of a new defence strategy for Taiwan is a great example.

Once the author of the Overall Defence Concept retired in 2019, a return to a more conventional approach was embraced.

While the new National Defense Review, released in 2021, saw a shift back in the direction of asymmetric capabilities, it has been the Russian invasion of Ukraine that has forced home that Taiwan must develop a modernised defence strategy.

Its Han Kuang exercises this year were explicitly based on lessons from Ukraine, according to Taiwan's Ministry of Defence.

Can Taiwan emulate Ukraine?

However, the Taiwanese still have some way to go to be able to implement the kind of strategy of corrosion that the Ukrainians have applied very effectively against Russia.

Its ability to generate the large-scale territorial forces so effectively used by Ukraine is compromised by the limited four-month Taiwanese conscription period.

Despite its boost in defence spending this year, Taiwan still lacks the quantity of long-range precision weapons to inflict significant casualties on a Chinese blockade or invasion force.

Taiwan also needs to demonstrate the ability to generate regional and global influence to support its cause.

Recent events will probably result in an increased tempo of military operations around Taiwan, and more hostile interactions between Chinese and Western military units around Taiwan.

This is a dangerous and potentially incendiary situation and it offers China plausible cover for the concentration of forces for a future blockade or invasion.

Hopeful talk of resets and return to normality are unlikely to succeed in the face of current Chinese aggression.

Ironically, China's actions last week will probably paint Xi into a corner with his domestic audience on the Taiwan issue.

He has whipped up nationalistic sentiment, and is heading toward a place where he may have no option but to launch either a military blockade or even an invasion of Taiwan.

That is not the situation yet.

But it is imaginable that the Taiwanese, and Taiwan's military partners, might find themselves in such a position soon.

For many observers, at stake is the future of Chinese and American influence in the western Pacific.

But for the people of Taiwan, the stakes are much higher.

Like the citizens of Ukraine, they know that their struggle against the authoritarian regime in Beijing is existential.

They have much thinking and preparing to do, and very little time to do it.

Original Story By | Mick Ryan : Mick Ryan is a strategist and recently retired Australian Army major general. He served in East Timor, Iraq and Afghanistan, and as a strategist on the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff.


Same | News Story' Author : Staff-Editor-02

Users | Click above to view Staff-Editor-02's 'Member Profile'

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