I don't know Paul Warburg -- I came across him just today -- but he makes good sense, above. It's kinda long, but worth it for those interested in the geo-politics of our region here in East Asia.
I've long thought the best thing for China-Taiwan relations is simple: the status quo.
There's no real good outcome for China for an attack on the island of Taiwan, which would be fraught at best.
Meantime: Beijing threatens. And gets a lot of attention for that. It gets leverage. The best outcome for China is precisely the current one: keep pressure on the world, keep it wrong footed, use the leverage of threats to "regain" the "renegade province" in any international negotiations.
But don't actually do anything.
China would have a tough time if it did attack Taiwan. It has a limited amphibious landing fleet, that can only slowly be replenished. It has no decent Blue Water fleet. Its two aircraft carriers are ancient Russian rust buckets.
Taiwan is protected by its mountainous terrain and limited beaches to land on. It's defensible. Taiwan now has huge inventories of anti-ship and anti-aircraft missiles and the latest military drone technology from Ukraine. All the pressure would be on the attackers.
Meantime Taiwanese are 70-80% in favour if staying just as it is. No interest there in becoming part of the motherland. Our Hong Kong experience has made it clear to Taiwanese just what it means to have "One Country, Two Systems", an early strategy of China, to make it seem attractive to its "renegade" to come back into the embrace of the Motherland. Since the 2020 Hong Kong riots and the resulting National Security legislation, that's no longer a reasonable hope.
Another thought: China has had no experience of war or battles since it fought Vietnam in 1979. Which didn't go well. It now has 45 years of Zero experience in war, apart from a few trifling border skirmishes with India. The United States, meantime, for better or worse, has been in almost constant war. Its Navy is well practiced and hugely outguns and out-technologies the Chinese. Some war game scenarios have China winning; but, really, I can't see them winning against the battle-hardened, technologically superior US Fleet, assuming it came in support of its ally Taiwan. Don't believe me? Check out some of the amazing vids of on-board training exercises on US carriers.
I've also seen reports that Chinese naval commanders are not up to chop. They're inexperienced soyboys.... (So goes the scuttlebut). FNGs in military slang.
Warburg also suggests that a number of countries in the region -- Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Japan -- would come to the support of Taiwan, in case of any Chinese aggression.
As for the Naval Blockade scenario. The trouble with that from China's point of view is that it's easily countered. A blockade of Taiwan would lead to counter blockades of China, blockades of the Straits of Malacca, of the ports of Burma, Bangladesh and Pakistan. It would see a catastrophic drop in its trade and in imports of energy.
And all for what? For pride? For getting hold of Taiwan's chip industry? (not likely to survive a war). For... what.... I don't see it. A game not worth the candle.
Anyhow: let's hope Warburg and I are right. The status quo is the most attractive, for sure. We hope that China, Beijing, also sees that it is.
