|
「兩岸關係」 – 開欄文
|
瀏覽8,105 ｜回應46｜推薦2 |
|
|
|
俄烏戰爭在一年半以後，俄國憑藉其龐大的國力和人員，似乎拖垮了烏國的戰力、士氣、和民心。以巴戰爭又平地一聲雷的爆發，不但以國周邊的阿拉伯諸國虎視眈眈、蓄勢待發；也讓美國軍力和軍援左支右絀。這些發展勢必影響美國當下和未來在台海的軍事部署和決策。
我曾預估：2027年前台海無戰事。但俗話說，世事難料；我們升斗小民只能期望政治領袖們不以老百姓為芻狗，盡量發揮理性和睿智以和平方式解決利益衝突。
兩岸關係從過去的和平對峙隨著中、美國力的長消，逐漸進入外弛內張的狀況。雖然還說不上戰雲密布或圖窮匕見；但讓關切時局者緊張兮兮應該是有的。這個部落格過去也常有報導和評論；現在開一個專欄，今後將把相關議題集中討論。
本文於 修改第 4 次
|
|
台灣殷殷期盼的保護傘沒了？ - Vishwam Sankaran
|
|
|
推薦0 |
|
|
|
看來，某君既抱不緊川普的大腿；又貼不上他的冷屁股；真是情何以堪。或許，石敬瑭模式可以管活命。
Taiwan’s omission from Trump’s new defence strategy raises alarm as China conducts sorties near island
Vishwam Sankaran, 02/01/26
The absence of any mention of Taiwan in Washington’s new defence strategy document has raised concerns in Taipei, at a time when Beijing continues to threaten the island with naval and air force sorties.
The 2026 National Defense Strategy has been described by analysts as a dramatic reordering of the Trump administration’s defence priorities, and where it sees its limitations.
And while the 2022 edition of the document mentioned Taiwan several times, with Beijing described as launching “increasingly provocative rhetoric and coercive actions” that “threatened stability” across the Taiwan Strait, there was not a single direct reference to Taiwan in the new version released last week.
Earlier editions made note of China’s overt threats to Taiwan – Chinese president Xi Jinping has vowed to “reunite” the self-governed island with the mainland by force, if necessary, and the US is bound by treaty to help arm Taipei to defend itself from attack.
One Sunday, Taiwan’s defence ministry said it detected a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) helicopter and six naval vessels on sorties that crossed the median line between the island and the mainland.
The defence ministry said it deployed aircraft, naval ships, and coastal-based missile systems in response. “We have monitored the situation and responded,” it said in a post on X.
Some experts said the omission of Taiwan from the NDS document was part of a wider strategy for the Trump administration to remain open for negotiations with Beijing.
Trump is scheduled to meet the Chinese president in April, according to Dennis Weng, a Taiwanese political scientist.
“This document adopted a more restrained, pragmatic and even reconciliatory language for Beijing,” Dr Weng, founding director of the Asia Pacific Peace Research Institute (APPRI), said in a post on Facebook.
Taiwan’s main opposition party, Kuomintang (KMT), raised concerns over what message the omission sends before Trump’s planned meeting with Xi.
“Even though we have spent so much buying US arms, there is no mention of Taiwan’s security in this strategy. That shows where Trump’s priorities lie,” KMT legislator Lai Shyh-bao told SCMP.
“Taiwan has met what the US demanded, but cannot even get a single mention in return. That leaves people with a bitter feeling,” said Wang Hung-wei, another KMT lawmaker.
Officials from the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) cautioned against reading too much into the report, arguing that Americas’s “actions and institutions” meant more than any strategy document.
The document also appeared to suggest that the new US defence strategy would focus more on internal security.
“As US forces focus on Homeland defence and the Indo-Pacific, our allies and partners elsewhere will take primary responsibility for their own defence with critical, but more limited support, from American forces,” the document noted, indicating a reduction in US military presence in other parts of the world.
The document does mention security in the Asia-Pacific region, even if it is short on details. The document says the US military will “erect a strong denial defence along the First Island Chain” – a string of islands that includes Taiwan, Japan, and the Philippines.
It adds that the US military presence in East Asia would continue “to ensure that neither China nor anyone else can dominate us and our allies”.
本文於 修改第 2 次
|
|
透視中國解放台灣的作戰規畫 - Allegra Mendelson
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
How China plans to land the world’s largest army on Taiwan
An invasion would likely start at the ‘red beaches’ – now among the most dangerous places on Earth
Allegra Mendelson, 01/03/26
It’s a gloomy day in northern Taiwan and fisherman have gathered on Linkou beach to chat about the day’s haul.
We’re about 30 minutes’ drive from Taipei, and in warmer weather one might sees families under umbrellas on the sand, here to escape the hustle and bustle of the city.
At first glance, Linkou Beach looks like any other. Yet it might be one of Taiwan’s – even the world’s – most dangerous places.
This is one of up to 20 “red beaches” – sections of Taiwan’s coast that are considered likely places for China to land its troops during an invasion.
Linkou makes up part of the coastline of New Taipei City, a municipality that surrounds the capital. Of all the red beaches, this one holds the most strategic value.
It’s near Taiwan’s largest airport, which services the capital; it’s next to the Port of Taipei, a strategic deep-water port, and it borders the mouth of the Tamsui river, which flows through the centre of Taipei and into the Taiwan Strait.
Dr Tzu-yun Su (蘇紫雲) is a research fellow and director at Taiwan’s Institute for National Defence and Research (INDSR), a military think tank.
He said: “Seizing this area would cut Taiwan’s primary external connections to Taipei, isolating the capital, disrupting its food supply, and undermining morale – essentially a blitzkrieg-style campaign.”
The threat posed by China was demonstrated on Tuesday, when it launched its most extensive military drills around Taiwan to date. It fired rockets towards the island and simulated a blockade of its major ports – including the Port of Taipei.
China called it a “stern warning” against “Taiwan independence separatist forces and external interference”.
Experts estimate that if China successfully lands at Linkou – and that is a big “if” – it could access Taiwan’s main control centres in less than an hour.
An invasion would require hundreds of thousands of well-trained troops, and a vast navy with cutting-edge warships, ordinary civilian barges and everything in between. It would take months or years of planning. Yet, Beijing already seems to be building up such a force.
An unmatched navy
China has one of the most active shipbuilding industries in the world. Experts estimate that its shipbuilding capacity is at least 200 times greater than the United States’, despite its much smaller military budget ($246bn in 2025 against $850bn).
Today, China has an estimated 405 warships to the US Navy’s 295, and is on track to have at least 30 more by 2030.
In fact, a recent report from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) found that, while most of China’s defence firms had been losing revenue, the one area where revenue was rising was shipbuilding.
However, China wasn’t always a maritime leader. It’s only in recent decades that it has turned its navy – and its entire military apparatus – into one that rivals the world’s major powers.
Ridzwan Rahmat, the principal defence analyst at Janes, a leading military intelligence platform, said: “For a long time, the Chinese military modernisation focused on the land domains, because that was the existential threat at that time.
“But over the years, especially in the last 30 years or so, China’s existential threats have appeared from the sea, and the sea is a domain where they have been lacking compared to their adversaries.”
Today, China’s defence priorities are mostly maritime. These include disputes over islands in the South China Sea and its claims over Taiwan, which is across a nearly 100-mile wide body of water.
Xi Jinping, who came to power in 2012, has made the “reunification” of Taiwan central to his legacy. Hardly a week goes by without the president or one of his officials mentioning Beijing’s goal of bringing the country under China’s control.
The topic has had a particularly high profile in recent weeks, after Sanae Takaichi, the new prime minister of Japan, suggested that a conflict over Taiwan could trigger Japanese military involvement, prompting a fiery response from Beijing.
An $11bn arms package supplied to Taiwan by the US has similarly angered China.
A civilian armada
While the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Navy has hundreds of warships, these alone would not be sufficient for an invasion of Taiwan, said Tom Shugart, a former US submarine officer and senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS).
He said: “There’s no question whatsoever that if you just look at the grey-painted PLA Navy amphibious assault shipping, it is nowhere near enough to do an invasion.”
Instead, China has maximised its dual-use shipbuilding, where civilian vessels are kitted out with military technology. Since 2015, all civilian shipbuilders have been required to ensure that any new ships could be used by the military in the event of an emergency.
The China Classification Society, a shipping industry association, said at the time that this plan would “enable China to convert the considerable potential of its civilian fleet into military strength”.
The plan included five types of ships, which are already being tested: container, roll-on/roll-off, multi-purpose, bulk carrier and break-bulk cargo vessels.
The roll-on/roll-off vessels, known colloquially as “ro-ro ships”, are commercial transport ships with reinforced ramps that can transport large military trucks and equipment.
China has been increasing production of ro-ro ships in recent years, with an estimated 200 set to be completed between 2023 and 2026 – more than double the number manufactured between 2015 and 2022, according to the US-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
It has also been increasing its use of semi-submersible vessels – heavy-lift ships that can partially submerge their cargo – as helicopter carriers. They are being tested in landing trials that seem to simulate a Taiwan operation.
Six ro-ro ferries were monitored in a recent Reuters investigation, alongside six-deck cargo ships, as they sailed from shipyards near Beijing in northern China to the waters off the coast of Guangdong further south, in what appeared to be a practice landing operation.
In 2020, the Chinese Ministry of Defence carried out a training scenario using semi-submersible ships to refuel helicopters as it rehearsed rescue operations with injured soldiers.
‘Squeeze Taiwan until it surrenders’
While China appears to be preparing for a large-scale amphibious assault, it is unlikely that an attack against Taiwan would begin with a landing operation.
Alexander Huang, the chairman of the Council on Strategic and Wargaming Studies, has spent the past 10 years simulating different ways China could attack Taiwan.
Based on his research, he sees two possible paths.
The first begins with a cyber attack as well as moves against critical infrastructure to “kill Taiwan’s communication control and command control systems”. This strategy would seek to “divide or weaken Taiwan for a swift victory”, said Mr Huang.
The second starts with a “maritime quarantine”, which would gradually block Taiwan’s energy supply and communication networks, to cut the island off from the rest of the world. Unlike a blockade, which would be enforced by the military, a quarantine would use coastguard and civilian ships.
As an island, Taiwan relies on imports for its energy and food, and a quarantine or blockade could be disastrous. Experts told The Telegraph that its current energy supply – which includes liquefied natural gas, renewable production and coal resources – could sustain the island for about 40 days.
A major military operation against Taiwan would likely take four times as long, and, said Mr Huang, China would effectively “squeeze Taiwan until it surrenders”.
Beijing has been practising this type of coercion for years. It has routinely deployed hundreds of ships and planes around Taiwan as part of its “grey zone” pressure – activities that fall short of open warfare but aim to demonstrate strength in the lead-up to an actual conflict.
Prior to the latest drills on Dec 30, China had previously launched a massive exercise around Taiwan days after Lai Ching-te was inaugurated as president in May 2024. More than 110 aircraft and 50 navy and coastguard ships were deployed.
Donald Trump said the latest drills were not a cause for concern because China had “been doing naval exercises for 20 years in that area”.
However, Taiwan’s Coast Guard Authority told The Telegraph that China seemed to be using the tactics “to familiarise themselves with the battlespace for future operational planning” and were simulating blockades “to apply military pressure to test Taiwan’s defence readiness”.
How ‘China’s D-Day’ could unfold
With a fleet at the ready, the next question is where China would land its troops – and how.
The Taiwan Strait is 110 miles wide, but with strong winds and high waves, it is a difficult body of water to navigate. Monsoons and typhoons – especially in summer – make it all the more treacherous.
If China were planning an amphibious assault, it would likely be limited to a handful of months.
What’s more, most of its vessels would need to dock at a port or jetty because they are too large to reach land through the shallow waters around much of Taiwan’s coastline.
Experts said that if China were able to take a port, it would make an invasion far easier, but it is unlikely to be allowed to do that in a wartime situation.
Mr Rahmat, of Janes, said: “In the event of an invasion, port infrastructure [and] a lot of piers and jetties will have been destroyed by Taiwan to slow down the invasion forces.”
China tests landing barges during an exercise off Donghai island. (東海島) They could be used to create a deep-sea port off Taiwan – Vantor 照片
Instead, China has been building barges, which seem ideal for a landing on a vulnerable red beach. These commercial vessels are equipped with legs that anchor into the sea floor, and extendable bridges that can connect to land, or other barges or ships.
China has at least two sets, according to satellite images seen by The Telegraph. Each set consists of three ships of different sizes. They could be used to create a deep-sea port miles off the coast, allowing it to land troops and equipment.
Mr Rahmat said: “The barges play a large part in ensuring that there is still connectivity between the large transport ships and logistic ships and [Taiwan’s] island itself.”
Even with the barges, some experts, including a former defence official who spoke to The Telegraph on the condition of anonymity, were sceptical of China’s ability to land troops on Taiwan.
They believe that changing sea levels and commercial construction, among other factors, along Taiwan’s coast have made virtually all of the beaches untenable for a landing operation.
Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defence said its armed forces “regularly survey major beaches and deploy marine corps to verify if the beaches are potential landing sites”, but wouldn’t comment on which locations posed the greatest risk.
The warships
While Beijing is focused on its dual-use maritime capabilities, it also has hundreds of cutting-edge amphibious warships on hand.
In November, China launched a new aircraft carrier known as the Fujian.
It is the most advanced carrier in its fleet, and has an electromagnetic aircraft launch system allowing it to catapult fighter jets on and off its deck. The only other ship in the world with this ability is the US Navy’s newest carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford.
Before the Fujian was commissioned, building was already underway for China’s next new carrier – its fourth, and known as 004 – which will most likely be nuclear powered.
Experts told The Telegraph that in satellite images of the carrier at the Dalian shipyard, there did not appear to be exhaust ducts, which suggest it will rely on nuclear power instead of diesel.
Mr Rahmat said: “The problem with diesel aircraft carriers is that you can’t deploy too long beyond a two or three week window.
“Every three weeks you need to bring the ship back to port so it can be refuelled. However, if you have a nuclear aircraft carrier, the ship can remain on station almost indefinitely.”
A satellite image of early construction work on China’s vast 004 aircraft carrier, which experts believe will be nuclear powered – Vantor 照片
For this reason, the latest US carriers are nuclear powered, and China has long been looking to do the same, although it has struggled to master the shipbuilding techniques.
A nuclear powered ship would give China a major leg-up in the event of escalation with Taiwan because it would allow the ship to remain at sea.
Along with the 004, China also recently launched the first amphibious assault ship in the world equipped with an electromagnetic catapult capable of launching drones, including the advanced GJ-11 stealth combat drone and the WZ-7 reconnaissance drone.
These warships would very likely join the merchant fleet in any assault against Taiwan, bringing the number of Chinese ships to an unprecedented scale.
Mr Shugart, of CNAS, said: “On the Chinese side, this is where I think most people may not understand the scale of what China would bring to a landing campaign. It’s not going to be dozens of ships in the Taiwan Strait, it’ll be thousands.”
This article is the third of four pieces The Telegraph is publishing on Taiwan’s plans to repel a Chinese invasion and Beijing’s efforts to undermine the island’s defences. The fourth story will be published at 6am on Sunday.
Try full access to The Telegraph free today. Unlock their award-winning website and essential news app, plus useful tools and expert guides for your money, health and holidays.
本文於 修改第 2 次
|
|
中國隱形機接近屏東空軍基地 - Christopher McFadden
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
請參考：
* 不只空拍101，高雄85大樓也入鏡！解放軍釋出更多畫面：新竹空軍基地疑被鎖定，殲-20與屏東同框？
* 殲20飛越恆春沒偵查到？軍事專家曝偵測手段
* 陸殲-20戰機進逼台灣空軍基地？專家打臉了
此之謂「兵臨城下」還在花銀子買廢銅爛鐵？還是：你有「隱形機」，我有「大嘴砲」？讀到這條新聞後，讓我不禁想起李義山的《北齊》之一：
一笑相傾國便亡，何勞荊棘始堪傷。
小憐玉體橫陳夜，已報周師入晉陽。
最近逛皮箱店的人，或許會碰上幾位賴政府的高層？
China’s stealth fighter jet approached key Taiwanese airbase without detection: Report
The PLA’s latest footage fuels uncertainty over how close stealth aircraft can operate to Taiwan without escalation.
Christopher McFadden, 01/03/26
New footage has been released that seems to show a Chinese Chengdu J-20 stealth fighter flying close to a Taiwanese airbase during a recent military exercise. Purportedly taken during the recent “Justice Mission 2025," this has sparked debate as to whether the aircraft was able to approach undetected or not.
“China’s J-20 stealth fighter flew within visual range of Taiwan’s coastline. The Taiwanese failed to detect the J-20. It would’ve been a propaganda coup if Taiwan got a photo of the J-20 with their F-16 sniper targeting pod. This happened around Checheng township in Pingtung, at the very southern tip of Taiwan,” wrote a defence analyst on X.
While hard to confirm, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) has claimed that one of its J-20s managed to fly close to Taiwan's Pingtung airbase. According to reports, this incident occurred on Tuesday (Dec 30) during the second day of the exercise.
It is important to note that these claims have yet to be confirmed by third parties, notably whether the J-20 was actually able to penetrate Taiwanese airspace in the first place.
J-20 approaches Taiwanese airbase
If true, then such an occurrence would be very worrying for Taiwanese defense forcesm notably how this could happen in the first place. It could, of course, just be a bluff from the PLA to make Taiwan question its defensive readiness against Chinese forces.
While no missiles were fired or lives lost, the supposed incursion by China's fifth-generation J-20 will not be without consequences. Likely, Taiwan will now have to assume worst-case scenarios and spend some time investigating what happened.
They will want to know if the J-20 was able to find radar blind spots in its air defense and take corrective actions accordingly. That will come at a cost for Taiwan.
The focus on Pingtung is also interesting as it is one of the nation's key airbases. It has some critical training and sortie-running infrastructure for the Taiwanese air force and is a cornerstone of its air defense.
If China can operate stealth aircraft near that area (even occasionally), it compresses Taiwan’s reaction time in a real crisis. That is strategically more important than whether this specific flight happened exactly as claimed.
Playing a dangerous game
So far, Taiwan has remained silent on the matter, with key officials neither confirming nor denying China's claims. This is likely deliberate to prevent China from taking a public relations victory.
If they deny the claim, this will look to some like Taiwan is covering up for a failure of its air defenses. Confirming the event would also validate PLA propaganda.
Whether the J-20 incursion occurred or not, it has wider implications for the region, too. Firstly, it helps to normalize PLA proximity to Taiwan and blurs peacetime versus wartime behaviour.
It also serves as a training for PLA forces under realistic conditions, and can be used by them to sow doubt and confusion. So while the claim could be fictitious at worst or exaggerated at best, it will have very real impacts on Taiwan one way or the other.
本文於 修改第 2 次
|
|
中國將攻打台灣 – Vikas
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
China Will Attack Taiwan: Stop Playing With Fire
Japan’s Statement: Rise of Nationalism and Pushing East Asia Toward a Historic War
Vikas, 11/14/25
0. 前言
Tension in East Asia has reached a level the world has not seen in decades. A single statement made in Japan’s parliament has triggered warnings, threats, death threats, viral debates, and global fear of a coming conflict.
And all of it revolves around one issue: the Taiwan question.
China has openly warned Japan, “stop playing with fire,” and this warning comes at a time when nationalism in China is rising, Japan is becoming more assertive, and Taiwan is living under the shadow of a possible war.
During a Diet hearing, she said that if China used battleships or force against Taiwan, it could create a “survival-threatening situation” for Japan. This phrase is not casual.
Under Japan’s 2015 security law, it allows Japan to activate its Self-Defense Forces and even join a conflict.
Beijing saw this as a direct challenge.
Within hours, China condemned the remark as “egregious” and demanded Japan withdraw it. Japan refused. China escalated.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson posted bilingual graphic warnings on X:
“Stop playing with fire on the Taiwan question. If Japan dares to meddle, China will respond firmly. Those who play with fire will perish by it.”
This was one of the harshest warnings China has issued to Japan in modern times. But it did not stop there.
China’s Consul General in Osaka posted something no diplomat should ever say. He wrote that Japan’s Prime Minister’s “dirty head” should be “cut off.”
The post was deleted, but the shock was global. Japan protested. China defended the diplomat. Tension skyrocketed.
It showed how emotionally explosive the China–Japan relationship is, especially when Taiwan is involved.
1. Why China Reacts So Aggressively When Japan Mentions Taiwan
To understand Beijing’s fury, you must understand its history.
During World War II, Japan’s military killed an estimated 35 million Chinese civilians. This trauma is deeply rooted in China’s national identity.
The Communist Party has built decades of nationalism around this memory. School textbooks, films, speeches, and propaganda keep this anger alive.
So when Japan speaks about Taiwan — an issue China considers sacred — the emotional reaction in China is instant and intense. This is why Taiwanese think that if Japan gets involved in Taiwan’s defense, China will attack “10,000% guaranteed.”
In their eyes, Japan’s involvement turns a dangerous situation into a guaranteed war. Inside Taiwan, fear has started rising again. Many Taiwanese citizens believe Japan is serious when it says it will defend Taiwan.
But they also know that Japan’s support may provoke China faster than anything else. Taiwan faces a painful reality. If it stands alone, China may hesitate. if it forms deeper alliances with Japan, China may attack.
The island sits at the center of a geopolitical triangle where every choice carries a risk. No matter what Taiwan does, the danger grows.
2. China’s Timeline and Xi Jinping’s Pressure
China’s rise has transformed the balance of power in Asia. Under Xi Jinping, nationalism has become central to China’s identity. China calls the loss of Taiwan part of the “Century of Humiliation.” Xi has promised “reunification” before 2049.
China is building the world’s largest navy. Its missile systems, drones, fighter jets, and cyber capabilities are expanding rapidly. Military modernization is designed to peak around 2027.
But China also knows the clock is ticking.
Its population is aging. Its economy is slowing. Its demographic window is closing. If China wants to take Taiwan, the next decade is its strongest moment. This is why many experts believe China will act sooner rather than later.
3. Why a Taiwan War Would Change the World
A Chinese attack on Taiwan would cause global shockwaves.
As we all know, Taiwan produces 92% of the world’s advanced semiconductors. Every smartphone, every car, every computer depends on chips made in Taiwan. If war breaks out, production collapses. Global trade melts down. Technology supply chains freeze.
A Bloomberg estimate found a Taiwan war could cost the world $10 trillion. More than the entire economy of Japan.
China would face crippling sanctions. Its oil supply, which passes through the Malacca Strait, could be blocked. The US Navy could choke off China’s trade in multiple areas. China knows this. But pride and nationalism are pushing Beijing toward a historic gamble.
Japan is trapped by its geography.
Most of Japan’s energy, food, and essential trade passes through waters near Taiwan. If China controls Taiwan, Japan loses its strategic lifeline. This is why former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said:
“A Taiwan emergency is a Japan emergency.”
Japan cannot remain neutral. Even if it tried, it hosts tens of thousands of US troops. The moment China strikes Taiwan, American bases inside Japan become targets. China has already said that if Japan intervenes militarily, Beijing will treat it as an act of invasion.
That means Japan’s involvement instantly becomes a China–Japan war. And a China–Japan war automatically becomes a US–China war. This is how easily the Taiwan crisis becomes a global crisis.
Beijing will not forgive Tokyo for speaking on WWII and the Taiwan question. Military drills will intensify. Nationalism will rise. And one day, the world may wake up to the news that China has launched a massive assault across the Taiwan Strait.
Written by Vikas
I'm a writer, editor, and researcher who likes to explore a wide range of topics but passionate about geopolitics.
Published in The Geopolitical Economist
In The Global geopolitics, truth is one, but the wise interpret it differently.— Here, we interpret these diversions.
本文於 修改第 1 次
|
|
中國在台海戰爭中將擊潰美軍 - Benedict Smith
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
本欄/本部落格已經刊出過多次類似下面史密斯先生這篇文章的報導；它並非「新聞」，只是「舊聞更新」。
“big five” defence companies：1 ·Lockheed Martin 2 ·RTX Corporation 3 ·Northrop Grumman 4 ·Boeing 5 ·General Dynamics
China would destroy US military in fight over Taiwan, top secret document warns
Beijing’s hypersonic missiles ‘could sink US aircraft carriers within minutes’
Benedict Smith, 12/11/25
Washington loses ‘every time’ in war games against China, the Pentagon has warned - Jeanne Accorsini/SIPA/Shutterstock照片
China would defeat the US military in a war over Taiwan, according to a top-secret US government assessment.
US reliance on costly, sophisticated weapons leaves it exposed to China’s ability to mass-produce cheaper systems in overwhelming numbers, the highly classified “Overmatch Brief” warns.
A national security official under Joe Biden who reviewed the document is said to have turned pale on realising Beijing had “redundancy after redundancy” for “every trick we had up our sleeve”, The New York Times reported.
Losing Taiwan, the US’s key bulwark against Chinese power in the western Pacific, would deliver a severe strategic and symbolic blow to Washington.
The country’s most advanced aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R Ford – recently sent to the Caribbean for Donald Trump’s crackdown on drug traffickers – is often destroyed in the wargames outlined in the brief.
The $13bn (£9.75bn) vessel, which entered service in 2022 after years of delays, is vulnerable to attacks from diesel-electric submarines and China’s arsenal of some 600 hypersonic missiles, capable of travelling at five times the speed of sound.
The Pentagon is planning to build nine additional Ford-class aircraft carriers - TAJH PAYNE/DoD/AFP via Getty Images照片
Beijing displayed its ship-destroying YJ-17 missiles, estimated to travel at eight times the speed of sound, at a military parade in September.
Nevertheless, the Pentagon is planning to build nine additional Ford-class aircraft carriers, while it has yet to deploy a single hypersonic missile.
China paraded ship-destroying missiles at a military parade in September - VCG via Getty Images照片
Eric Gomez, a research fellow at the Taiwan Security Monitor, said the end result was unclear when he participated in a wargame for a Taiwan conflict, but noted the US suffered heavy losses.
“The US loses a lot of ships in the process. A lot of F-35s and other tactical aircraft in the theatre are degraded pretty rapidly too,” he told The Telegraph.
“I think the high cost of it was really sobering when we did the after-action summaries, and we’re like, ‘Okay, like, you guys lost 100-plus fifth-generation aircraft, multiple destroyers, a couple of submarines, a couple of carriers’.
“It’s like, ‘oh gosh, man, that was a heavy toll’.”
Hegseth: China could destroy US carriers in minutes
Last year, Pete Hegseth, the defence secretary, said that “we lose every time” in the Pentagon’s war games against China, and predicted the Asian country’s hypersonic missiles could destroy aircraft carriers within minutes.
China has significantly expanded its arsenal of short, medium, and intermediate-range missiles, which means it could destroy many of the US’s advanced weapons well before they could reach Taiwan.
Meanwhile, the “big five” defence companies, a number which has dwindled from ten times that amount in the 1990s, continue to sell the US government costlier versions of the same ships, aircraft and missiles, according to The New York Times.
Defence officials have realised the US is vulnerable because these complex weapons are impossible to mass produce, following a series of recent wars, including the Ukraine-Russia conflict, which have shown the devastating capabilities of relatively cheap weapons like drones.
Congress has earmarked around $1bn (£750m) to produce 340,000 small drones over the course of the next two years.
Mr Trump views Taiwan as important to the US economy because a third of global shipping heads through the South China Sea - REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein照片
Mr Trump has appointed Dan Driscoll, the US head of the armed forces, as his “drone guy,” charged with modernising America’s outdated tech and countering enemies’ drone efforts.
However, the US is nevertheless playing catch-up with its adversaries, and experts have previously told The Telegraph that it cannot compete on costs with countries like China, where labour costs are lower and regulations looser.
A decisive change in US policy would likely need substantial investment, yet defence spending is at its lowest level in around 80 years, at roughly 3.4 per cent of GDP.
Jake Sullivan, the former national security adviser, has warned the US would quickly run out of essential munitions like artillery shells in a war with China.
Internal Pentagon assessments show China vastly outnumbers the US in its arsenal of almost all cruise and ballistic missiles. Both superpowers maintain a stockpile of 400 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).
The US reportedly used up roughly a quarter of its high-altitude missile interceptors to defend Israel against Iran’s 12-day ballistic missile barrage in June this year.
Moreover, China’s state-sponsored hacking group Volt Typhoon has installed malware on critical computer networks for power grids, communications systems and water supplies for American military bases.
How Taiwan invasion could develop – and Trump’s response
The security threat, which US officials have struggled to locate, could hamstring the military’s ability to move weapons and forces if war breaks out in the Pacific.
Xi Jinping, the Chinese leader, claims seizing Taiwan is an “historical inevitability” and has ordered his military to be ready to seize the island by 2027.
Nevertheless, he is thought unlikely to move unless China achieves such an overwhelming military advantage that it could effectively be certain to take the island. Failing to do so would be a humiliating blow that would likely end his 13-year-premiership.
The US has no formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan and, since the 1970s, has pursued a policy of “strategic ambiguity”, avoiding saying explicitly whether it would militarily defend the island chain.
Xi Jinping claims seizing Taiwan is an ‘historical inevitability’ - DALE DE LA REY/AFP via Getty Images 照片
However, since the days of Dwight D Eisenhower, it has viewed the island as an important check on Chinese expansionism, and is obliged by law to provide weapons for Taiwan to defend itself.
Mr Trump has stuck to the “strategic ambiguity” policy, although he has complained about the cost of protecting Taiwan.
“I think Taiwan should pay us for defence. You know, we’re no different than an insurance company. Taiwan doesn’t give us anything,” he told Bloomberg last year.
He went on to note that Taiwan was a short distance from China’s coast compared to thousands of miles from the US, which gave Beijing “a slight advantage”.
“That’s the apple of president Xi’s eye,” he added.
In the Trump administration’s national security strategy, published last week, it said the island was important to the US economy because a third of global shipping passes through the South China Sea.
The US’s priority is to preserve “military overmatch”, it stated, meaning that America’s military capabilities must outstrip China’s so far as to deter Xi against making a move, something which, according to this memo, it has failed to do for some time.
China and the US have launched a frantic arms race to prevent either from achieving a decisive advantage that could embolden Beijing or deny its imperialist ambitions.
In January, The Telegraph reported China had constructed D-Day-style barges that could be used to bypass Taiwan’s beaches and provide multiple fronts for tanks in an amphibious invasion.
Try full access to The Telegraph free today. Unlock their award-winning website and essential news app, plus useful tools and expert guides for your money, health and holidays.
本文於 修改第 2 次
|
|
武統快來了? -- The Week UK
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
Is China about to invade Taiwan?
Conflict in East Asia ‘would be one of the most dangerous and consequential events of the 21st century’
The Week UK, 11/28/25
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission.
Taiwan split from the People's Republic of China during a civil war in the 1940s| Credit: Illustrated / Getty Images 請至原網頁觀看示意圖
Taiwan’s president has announced a $40 billion security package to strengthen the island’s defences against a possible invasion by China.
Warning that Beijing’s threats are “intensifying” and its preparations to invade are speeding up, Lai Ching-te said: “This is not an ideological struggle, nor a ‘unification vs independence’ debate, but a struggle to defend ‘democratic Taiwan’ and refuse to submit to being ‘China’s Taiwan’”.
The new eight-year plan includes the development of a “T-dome” air defence system, modelled on Israel’s Iron Dome,“ accompanied by a focus on the use of artificial intelligence, drones and other high-tech defence methodologies to boost Taiwan’s ‘asymmetric’ response to a Chinese attack”, said The Times.
Beijing views Taiwan as a rogue breakaway territory that needs to be brought back under control, by force if necessary. This makes it arguably “the most dangerous place on Earth”, said The Economist.
How likely is an invasion?
US Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth warned in May that China’s attempt to conquer Taiwan by force “could be imminent”.
Yet experts “disagree about the likelihood and timing of a Chinese invasion”, said the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) think tank.
China has been engaging in “unprecedented aggression and military modernisation”, Admiral Samuel Paparo, the commander of US Indo-Pacific Command, told the US Congressional Armed Services Committee earlier this year. Underscoring the seriousness of this escalation, he said China’s drills around Taiwan are “not just exercises – they are rehearsals”.
While “alarming”, said the Atlantic Council, this “unfortunately reflects a broader, consistent trend” of escalating activities by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), including persistent crossings of the Taiwan Strait’s median line.
Data from Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defence found that sorties across the Taiwanese-declared dividing line between Taiwan and China have increased from 953 incidents in 2021 to 3,070 in 2024.
There are other indications that Beijing is preparing to move on Taiwan. China has been stockpiling record amounts of gold, which could be part of a strategy to defend itself from Western sanctions in the event of an attack on Taiwan. It has also been building a solid legal ground for a potential invasion, aiming to frame the attack as a legitimate internal matter.
“This will help the country to delay a collective security and economic response from the West,” said The Sun.
When could an invasion happen?
Paparo told members of Congress that the PLA are “stretching their legs” to meet President Xi Jinping’s military readiness goal of being capable of taking Taiwan by force by 2027. That year is seen as “magical” because it marks the centenary of what was to become the PLA, said Robert Fox in London’s The Standard.
Despite living under the constant shadow of Chinese invasion, most people in Taiwan – 65%, according to a survey released in May by the military-affiliated Institute for National Defense and Strategic Research – believe it is unlikely that China will attack in the next five years.
Lai and his government have adopted a mantra: “by preparing for war, we are avoiding war”. They have initiated “major military reforms”, expanded the mandatory conscription programme, “increased pay and benefits for the military, and introduced more rigorous training”, said the BBC. The extra $40 billion announced this week is part of a “long-term plan” to raise defence spending to 5% of GDP by 2030, “a response to demands from the Trump administration not to rely solely on the United States coming to its aid”, said The Times.
“Others believe 2049 is a critical date,” said the CFR, as Xi Jinping has “emphasised that unification with Taiwan is essential to achieving what he calls the Chinese Dream, which sees China's great-power status restored by 2049”.
How could an invasion start?
There are three possible avenues that could lead to conflict, said Joel Wuthnow in Foreign Affairs.
A “so-called war of choice” would see Beijing “try to capture Taiwan by force after careful consideration of the economic, military, and political risks”.
Alternatively, a “war of necessity” might be launched if it felt Taiwan “had crossed a political red line that permanently threatened China’s control of the island”; for example, with a formal declaration of independence.
The third possibility, that “has received much less attention – yet may be even more likely”, is a war resulting “from an accident or miscalculation that spirals out of control”.
Given recent events it is easy to see how such a miscalculation could spiral into full-blown conflict.
Chinese military drills last year surrounded Taiwan’s main island with joint exercises by all branches of the PLA and, unusually, an increasingly militarised coast guard. Then, in January, Naval News first reported the construction of new amphibious barges at Guangzhou Shipyard, in southern China.
These new barge-like Shuiqiao ships (水橋型兩棲登陸艇) are potentially a game-changer for Beijing and provide “insight into China's integration of its military, paramilitary and civilian operations – and its plans for a potential invasion”, said The Guardian.
The barges feature bridges that could be used to transport tanks and supplies over previously uncrossable land, said The Telegraph, giving them multiple fronts for an invasion and “thinning out” Taiwan’s line of defence.
The likely strategy is to overwhelm Taiwan with a massive attack with little warning.
That would mean in the early hours of a Chinese invasion, the narrow strait separating the island from the mainland would likely be “transformed into a ferocious battlefield”, said Business Insider. Aside from deploying more traditional weapons such as missiles or warships, “vast fleets of unmanned aerial and naval drones will likely darken the skies and hide beneath waves, bringing with them a deadly threat that Taiwan and its allies are ill-prepared to counter”. During Joe Biden’s presidency, the US strategy to counter this – dubbed “Hellscape” – hinged on deploying thousands of new drones that would swarm the Taiwan Strait and keep China's military busy until more help could arrive.
How would it play out?
Chinese action against Taiwan would be an “act of war that sparks a global crisis”, said The Wall Street Journal. “It would provoke a military response by Taiwan, force President Trump to decide whether the US military should help defend the island, disrupt global trade and impel European nations to impose punishing sanctions on Beijing.”
China has warned it will “crush” any foreign attempts to interfere on behalf of Taiwan, after Japan announced plans to deploy missiles near the independent island. It comes less than a week after Japan’s new prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, said her country would regard an attack on Taiwan as an “existential threat” to security in the region and would likely intervene.
If a conflict were to break out it would be “a catastrophe”, said The Economist. This is first because of “the bloodshed in Taiwan”, but also because of the risk of “escalation between two nuclear powers”, namely the US and China.
Beijing massively outguns Taiwan, with estimates from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute showing that China spent about 23 times more on its military in 2021. The PLA also boasts more than two million active soldiers. The US is bound by the Taiwan Relations Act to “provide Taiwan with arms of a defensive character” and discourage China from using force or coercion to achieve its goals regarding the island. This could see Washington drawn into any conflict – although there is growing scepticism in Taipei that Trump would intervene militarily in the event of a full-blown Chinese attack.
That means any invasion “would be one of the most dangerous and consequential events of the 21st century”, said The Times, and “would make the Russian attack on Ukraine look like a sideshow by comparison”.
本文於 修改第 5 次
|
|
防止台海發生戰事的最佳戰略 - Zack Cooper
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
How War in Taiwan Ends
If Deterrence Fails, Could America Thwart China?
Zack Cooper, 11/06/25
In recent years, many in Washington have focused on deterring China from invading Taiwan. Before taking office earlier this year, Elbridge Colby, the U.S. undersecretary of defense for policy, asserted that Taiwan should be “laser focusing on implementing a denial defense against invasion.” Indeed, an array of small, inexpensive weapon systems holds great promise for repelling a Chinese amphibious landing. The Trump administration’s new National Defense Strategy is therefore correct to embrace a strategy of denial for stopping an invasion of Taiwan.
But rebuffing an invasion might not end the war. Joel Wuthnow, an expert on the Chinese military, has warned, “There is no scenario in which China, following an unsuccessful invasion, accepts responsibility, acknowledges that military solutions are impractical, or pivots to a fundamentally different set of political objectives toward Taiwan.” In the wake of a failed invasion, Chinese leader Xi Jinping (or his successor) would be unlikely to simply pack up and go home. Instead, Chinese leaders might reason that they have less to lose by continuing the fight.
This is why the political scientist Michael Beckley has argued that “war over Taiwan likely would become protracted, as nearly all great power wars have since the Industrial Revolution.” World War II ended only when Allied forces captured Germany’s capital and the United States dropped nuclear weapons on Japan. Neither option seems advisable in the context of a U.S.-Chinese war; Washington needs to find other ways to end it. And so, in the years to come, the United States must prepare two forces: one to stop a Chinese invasion and another to end the conflict. Preventing a war from starting in the first place will rely to some extent on the innovative forms of deterrence by denial on which the Trump administration and others have focused. But denial capabilities on their own will not be enough. Ending a war that churns on even after a failed invasion will also require old-fashioned power projection.
IN DENIAL
In the twentieth century, the United States perfected the art of projecting power around the globe. A combination of forward bases and aircraft carriers allowed U.S. forces to operate worldwide. With the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, the U.S. military’s dominance also meant that one set of forces could employ two distinct forms of deterrence simultaneously: denial and punishment.
表單的頂端
表單的底部
Consider the role of U.S. aircraft carrier strike groups during the 1996 Taiwan Strait crisis. At the time, China was staging military exercises and testing missiles in the waters around Taiwan. As tensions rose, Washington maneuvered two carriers near the island. Those strike groups practiced deterrence by denial by threatening to physically repel an attack. But they also performed deterrence through punishment by threatening severe consequences if Beijing went through with it, since carrier-based aircraft could strike ships heading toward China and even targets on the Chinese mainland.
In the last few years, however, the United States has begun tailoring its forces—and those of its allies and partners—for more specific missions. Forward bases and aircraft carriers are expensive to build and maintain, yet still vulnerable to ballistic missiles and other asymmetric systems. Pentagon officials are therefore pushing to acquire more “attritable” systems, which are relatively cheap to produce and designed to be expendable, for use by small units operating within the expanding area that China threatens. As David Berger, the former commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps, explained at a defense industry conference in 2021, the United States must “get comfortable with throwaway things.”
Ending a war over Taiwan will require old-fashioned power projection.
But attritable systems are of limited use against China’s day-to-day coercive operations in the air and sea around Taiwan. Last year, Taiwan detected 5,105 Chinese sorties into its airspace. Defending against these aircraft requires expensive jets rather than low-flying drones. In the maritime context, responding to Chinese naval incursions in the waters around Taiwan will require vessels that can monitor those activities and challenge Chinese forces if necessary.
Even after open conflict begins, denial is still only a partial answer. U.S. mines and missiles can sink Chinese vessels, killing thousands of troops in the process, but Chinese leaders might still seek at least a partial victory. The People’s Liberation Army could attempt to seize Taiwan’s outlying islands or conduct a maritime blockade while its military arsenal makes the waters around Taiwan a no man’s land. “There is no path to U.S. victory that does not include the long blockade,” the former intelligence officer Lonnie Henley has argued.
That is why the United States must be able to convince China that it will face unacceptable costs if it continues fighting in the wake of an unsuccessful invasion. A strategy of denial is only step one; the threat of punishment will be the United States’ ultimate trump card.
CAN’T STOP, WON’T STOP
The war in Ukraine illustrates the difficulty of terminating a conflict even after an initial invasion has bogged down. With small and cheap systems such as drones and mines, Ukraine was able to deny Russia a swift victory but has failed to impose costs high enough to convince Russian President Vladimir Putin to stop fighting. Russia has suffered terrible losses in the war, but Putin appears to have calculated that the costs of continuing are lower than the costs of admitting defeat.
Russia’s example serves as a warning about China’s likely behavior. Ideally, the prospect of a failed invasion of Taiwan would deter China, but Chinese leaders might perceive several incentives for protracting a war following an initial loss.
First, China’s industrial capacity far outstrips that of the United States, so it could recapitalize its forces more rapidly. Over the last three decades, China has undergone a massive military buildup. The Office of Naval Intelligence has assessed that China has over 230 times the shipbuilding capacity of the United States. Meanwhile, U.S. armed forces face significant munitions shortages, with some experts predicting that American stockpiles would be expended after just weeks, or even days, of a conflict with China.
Beijing might believe it can outlast Washington and Taipei in terms of other supplies, as well. Getting provisions across land into Ukraine has proved challenging; delivering even basic necessities over water to Taiwan amid a conflict with China would be an order of magnitude more difficult. Taiwan is a relatively small island with limited food and energy stockpiles. Conversely, Beijing’s rapid expansion of wind, solar, and nuclear power would help insulate it against a U.S. energy blockade.
Beijing believes it could win a contest of wills over Taiwan.
A conflict over Taiwan could eventually become a contest of wills—which Beijing believes it could win. Chinese officials have described Taiwan as “the very core of China’s core interests.” U.S. President Donald Trump’s take is decidedly different: “Taiwan is 9,500 miles away,” he said in an interview with Bloomberg Businessweek. “It’s 68 miles away from China. I just think we have to be smart . . . it’s a very, very difficult thing.” The American people support Taiwan, but many do not want a direct conflict with China: when asked in 2024 by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs about their commitment to defending Taiwan from a Chinese invasion, the majority of Americans surveyed either opposed such a policy or were unsure.
A Chinese failure in a conflict over Taiwan could also threaten Xi or his successor’s hold on power and undermine the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party. Xi would want to avoid an admission of failure and thus might order the Chinese military to keep waging an unsuccessful war. Without the prospect of punishment, the CCP might decide that failure poses a greater risk than continuing the conflict.
For all these reasons, Chinese leaders might prefer to keep fighting even after an initial defeat. To bring the conflict to a close, the United States would need to credibly threaten punishment. Colby and other Trump administration officials clearly recognize this; he co-authored a 2022 report advocating “selective punishment operations” and “cost-imposition to favorably manage escalation and seek to terminate a war with China.” These operations could include an embargo or the seizure of Chinese assets held abroad. But Beijing has been insulating itself against political and economic pressure, so military escalation might well be required, including strikes on critical infrastructure and parts of China’s defense-industrial base. These moves would raise the costs for China of continuing a conflict, but they also present a strategic dilemma.
THE GOLDILOCKS PARADOX
A number of factors would complicate any threat of punishment.
First is what researchers at the RAND Corporation have termed the “Goldilocks challenge”: threats of punishment must be high enough to persuade Beijing to end a conflict in which it is deeply invested but low enough to avoid provoking unacceptable escalation, such as nuclear use. Finding this middle ground would not be an easy task.
It will therefore be important to try to keep an initial fight over Taiwan limited in order to provide Chinese leaders a pathway for deescalation. Chinese leaders might back down after claiming to have taught Taiwan a lesson or taken some contested territory. Yet China’s own messaging before a conflict could set a higher bar: Chinese leaders might demonize Taiwan and the United States to rally public support, while trumpeting the PLA’s military superiority and China’s great rejuvenation. An invasion of Taiwan might start with Beijing metaphorically burning its ships so there would be no turning back.
In the aftermath of a conflict in the Taiwan Strait, politicians in Washington, Taipei, and elsewhere might themselves raise the stakes. They could seek to use Beijing’s moment of weakness to constrain China’s ambitions, formalize Taiwan’s independence, or undermine the CCP’s hold on power. There would be a fine line between “too hot” and “too cold” policies, and the tradeoffs would become more difficult as the war grew longer, bloodier, and more destructive.
A second challenge is that U.S. “horizontal escalation”—widening the scope of the conflict—may not be as effective today as it once might have been. Devoting more funding to denial capabilities risks cannibalizing resources for military platforms more capable of threatening punishment, such as stealthy bombers and submarines armed with cruise missiles. And although American strategists have discussed the possibility of a blockade to prevent China from importing energy supplies, the country’s nuclear power plants and renewable energy sources now account for a third of its energy production, so that Beijing is less vulnerable to an energy blockade. Cutting China’s fossil fuel imports would hurt over time, but Taiwan would be in a far more dire position.
Therefore, the biggest challenge for the Trump administration’s National Defense Strategy is not whether it allocates resources to a strategy of denial but how it integrates denial and punishment into a holistic deterrence framework. Rebuffing an initial attack on Taiwan is necessary but not sufficient. Without a plan for terminating a war, Washington would risk repeating the pattern of U.S. strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan that many Trump officials critiqued: winning the first battle but losing the war. If the United States is to deter China, it will have to persuade Chinese leaders that Washington has a strategy not only for the early stages of a conflict but also for the end stage of a war.
ZACK COOPER is a Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a lecturer at Princeton University. He is the author of Tides of Fortune: The Rise and Decline of Great Militaries.
* More by Zack Cooper
Related
* Taiwan
* Security
* Defense & Mil
Subscribe to Foreign Affairs This Week
Our editors’ top picks, delivered free to your inbox every Friday.
Sign Up
* Note that when you provide your email address, the Foreign Affairs Privacy Policy and Terms of Use will apply to your newsletter subscription.
本文於 修改第 2 次
|
|
中國對台新策略–Arran Hope
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
雖然我只讀了下文的「前言」部份(「摘要」和第1、2兩段)，不客氣的說，作者的分析難逃「霧裏看花」或「隔靴搔癢」之譏。各位要是沒啥事好幹，倒也不妨姑妄讀之。
Beijing’s New Approach to Taiwan
Arran Hope, China Brief Volume: 25 Issue: 20, 10/31/25
Executive Summary:
* In 2025, Beijing has intensified its approach to Taiwan across legal, military, discourse, and political dimensions.
* In October, a local public security bureau opened investigation into a sitting Taiwanese lawmaker for the first time, enhancing its legal warfare tactics against the democratic state.
* Purges at the top of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) may have precipitated a tactical switch away from He Weidong’s approach, which emphasized persistent gray-zone activities, toward Zhang Youxia’s expressed preference for buying time to build up military capacity.
* The Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) has ramped up its media and social media presence in recent weeks, while other parts of the messaging apparatus are foregrounding the phrase “Taiwan’s inevitable return” across official media channels.
* The new chair of the Kuomintang, Cheng Li-wun, has shown a willingness to engage with Beijing. She exchanged letters with General Secretary Xi Jinping, and sent a newly appointed vice chair to meet with TAO director Song Tao, who announced a “new starting point” in their relations.
* Beijing sees its relationship with the United States as a key variable influencing its behavior toward Taiwan.
Beijing is shifting its approach to Taiwan. Over the course of 2025, it has intensified legal and cognitive pressure toward its small democratic neighbor, advanced a strategy of political warfare, and adapted its military posture. Several factors have informed this shift. Personnel changes within the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) may have played a role. Political developments within Taiwan also likely contributed. And behind all these considerations are the position of the United States under the new administration of President Donald Trump. As General Secretary Xi Jinping has often pointed out, U.S.-PRC relations are “one of the most important bilateral relations in the world” (世界上最重要的雙邊關係之一) (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, October 16, 2024).
A question remains about whether Beijing’s evolving approach constitutes a change of degree or of kind. Some of the actions taken this year, especially in the legal domain, have relied on instruments that the PRC has created over the past few years for this purpose. Shifts in military posture may similarly have as much to do with the availability of new capabilities coming—or current capabilities meeting capacity limits—than with tactical changes. Possible avenues for political influence, chiefly through the nationalist Kuomintang, similarly are just now becoming clear following the election in October of a new party chair. Whichever the case may be, the general trend of Beijing’s actions is the same: toward greater coercion and a ratcheting up of pressure across all domains.
Beijing Steps up Lawfare With Puma Shen Investigation
On October 28, Chongqing City’s public security bureau announced that it was opening an investigation into the “diehard ‘Taiwan Independence’ activist Puma Boyang [Puma Shen]” (“台獨”頑固分子沈伯洋). Shen is a member of Taiwan’s Legislative Yuan. He is also a co-founder of the Kuma Academy (Black Bear Academy; 黑熊學院), a Taiwanese non-profit civil defense organization. [1] According to the bureau’s announcement, public security officials will “resolutely crack down on Puma Shen’s criminal activities aimed at splitting the nation” (為堅決打擊沈伯洋 … 分裂國家犯罪活動) (People’s Public Security News, October 28).
This is the first time PRC authorities have opened a criminal investigation into a sitting Taiwanese lawmaker. But it is not the first time that the PRC has sought to use lawfare to harass Puma Shen or his family. In October 2024, the Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) added Puma Shen to a list of “diehard ‘Taiwan Independence’ activists,” according to the announcement. In March 2025, the TAO relaunched a webpage (originally introduced the preceding year) for reporting “malicious acts of ‘Taiwan independence’ separatists and accomplices persecuting fellow Taiwanese” (‘台獨’打手、幫兇迫害臺灣同胞惡劣行) (TAO, August 2, 2024). And in June, the office unveiled sanctions against a company owned by Shen’s father (TAO, June 5). This latter measure is part of Beijing’s long history of using intimidation and coercive techniques against the family members of its critics in an attempt to silence them (The Wall Street Journal, March 30, 2018; Council on Foreign Relations, November 23, 2021; Human Rights Watch, May 4; Amnesty International, accessed October 31).
PRC authorities have used law enforcement to pursue additional targets this year. In June, a separate Public Security Bureau, this time in Guangzhou, offered a reward of renminbi (RMB) 10,000 ($1,400) for information leading to the apprehension of 20 retired and active personnel in Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense (MND). This was the first known instance of PRC public security authorities targeting Taiwanese military personnel via law enforcement framework (China Brief, July 25).
The legal basis for the bureau’s investigation into Puma Shen include provisions of the PRC’s Criminal Law (刑法) and the Opinions on Punishing Diehard ‘Taiwan Independence’ Activists for Crimes of Secession and Inciting Secession (關於依法懲治“台獨”頑固分子分裂國家、煽動分裂國家犯罪的意見) (China Law Translate, June 21, 2024). The latter opinions were drafted collectively by the Supreme People’s Court, Supreme People’s Procuratorate, Ministry of Public Security, Ministry of State Security, and Ministry of Justice and released in mid-2024. Laws invoked in other cases include the Cybersecurity Law (網路安全法), the Counter-Espionage Law (反間諜法), and the Anti-Secession Law (反分裂國家法). The PRC has little ability currently to enforce its laws extraterritorially in Taiwan. But as with other legal instruments drafted to apply beyond the PRC’s borders, these opinions have symbolic force and psychological weight. And while they may have little effect on dampening Puma Shen’s individual efforts to enhance Taiwan’s resilience, they may well affect the considerations of others who might wish to speak out against Beijing.
Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) now fears that the next step Beijing could take is to leverage Interpol and issue an arrest warrant for Puma Shen (CNA, October 30). This would not be unprecedented. The PRC’s Ministry of Public Security has issued a number of “red notices” in recent years, not against criminals, but against critics of its regime (Human Rights Watch, September 25, 2017; Safeguard Defenders, October 23, 2024; Red Notice Monitor, February 24; International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, April 25).
Personnel Changes Behind PLA’s Tactical Switch
The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) also appears to have changed its approach in recent months. In 2024, the percentage of aerial sorties by the PLA Air Force that crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait was not markedly higher than the previous year. The same was true for the frequency of peak incursion periods. Analysts have argued that this plateauing could indicate that the operational capacity of the PLA’s Eastern Theater Command Air Force had reached its limits (China Brief, January 17). PLA activity so far in 2025 has not provided dispositive evidence of this thesis. Instead, there has been a notable slowdown in recent PLA air and maritime activities around Taiwan, according to Ma Cheng-kun, director of the Research Project on China’s Defense Affairs (RCDA). [2] Not only have the scale and frequency of activity around the Taiwan Strait decelerated, but August—a typical peak time for drills and exercises—was relatively quiet this year.
One potential reason for this change relates to personnel changes. In March, Central Military Commission (CMC) Vice Chairman He Weidong (何衛東) disappeared (his expulsion from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was confirmed on October 17) (China Brief, October 17). He had been responsible for planning and executing the PLA’s exercises encircling Taiwan following U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to in August 2022, after which he was promoted to CMC vice chair. Following his promotion, He oversaw the military’s Political Work Department, which emerged as a key driver of the PLA’s gray-zone operations. But his tenure also coincided with heightened tensions in the Taiwan Strait, the election in Taiwan of a Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) president for a third consecutive term, and worsening relations with the United States, including over Taiwan. He’s downfall may not be a direct result of his handling of PLA activities toward Taiwan, but Xi Jinping may not have appreciated heightened instability in the Taiwan Strait and a lack of success in intimidating Taiwan’s public.
Since He’s disappearance, the CMC’s other vice chair, Zhang Youxia (張又俠), likely has had more influence over the PLA’s approach to Taiwan. Ma Cheng-kun argues that Zhang is more pragmatic than He, and sees buying time to build capabilities as a priority, instead of escalating tensions through persistent gray-zone operations. New capabilities have been detected in recent months, which lends credence to this argument. Some have been deployed for testing and others used for training. These include a Type 072 tank landing ship, pontoon-style landing barges, a Chinese-flagged tug boat circumnavigating Taiwan, and large roll-on/roll-off cargo ships repositioned to Fujian Province, across the strait from Taiwan.
Influence Operations Intensify
If military gray-zone operations have reduced in salience in recent months, the same cannot be said for the PRC’s approach in the social media and discourse domains. Influence efforts on social media stepped up on October 18, when the Taiwan Affairs Office launched a Facebook page. Across its first two weeks, the TAO has been active, posting multiple times daily; though most of the comments and reactions under its posts suggest that it will not succeed in winning the hearts and minds of Taiwanese (Facebook/TAOspokesperson, accessed October 23). [3] The office has also doubled the frequency of its press conferences and appointed a new spokesperson, Peng Qing’en (彭慶恩), who has been working on Taiwan issues since 1995 (CNA, October 29). In traditional media, the TAO also published a trilogy of articles with Xinhua under the pseudonym Zhong Taiwen (鐘台文) to coincide with “Taiwan Retrocession Day” (Xinhua, October 26, October 27, October 28). These changes within the TAO could signal a desire to emphasize the material benefits of warmer cross-strait ties. For instance, Peng, the new spokesperson, remains head of the office’s economic bureau. One of the Xinhua articles, meanwhile, highlighted the positive economic returns that national unification would bring.
These supposed carrots are also coupled with rhetorical sticks. A PRC television drama about Taiwan has recently popularized the phrase “Taiwan’s inevitable return” (臺灣必歸) (Xinhua, October 24). The phrase has been around for a number of years. Foreign Minister Wang Yi (王毅) used it at a press conference in 2022. And CCTV unveiled a poster featuring the phrase in mid-2024. But its use in the show “Silent Honor” (沉默的榮耀) has driven its promotion, to the extent that it has now been used by an official at the Ministry of National Defense (MND). Its mention came at a press conference hosted by the Office for International Military Coordination (OIMC; 國際軍事合作辦公室). The OIMC is in part responsible for foreign intelligence and information operations and is directly subordinate of the CMC. [4] The office spokesperson used a question about the TV show to state that “Taiwan’s inevitable return is an unstoppable force. The unfinished cause of our martyrs shall be fulfilled” (臺灣必歸，勢不可擋，先烈們未竟的事業必將完成). He also argued that President Lai Ching-te (賴清德) was positioning himself “on the opposite side of history” (到歷史的對立面) and would “inevitably be buried by the tide of history and face the most severe judgment of justice” (必將被歷史潮流埋葬，受到正義最嚴厲的審判) (MND, October 30).
The press conference also provided an opportunity for further intimidation. A state media journalist noted that a commercial satellite had recently released multiple high-definition satellite images of Taiwan, in which “every street in Taiwan is clearly visible” (臺灣的每條街道都清晰可見). The journalist then wondered whether, given such clear images were available from commercial satellites, the PLA’s military satellites are even more precise. The spokesperson simply responded that it is “perfectly normal for Chinese satellites to observe the beautiful landscapes of Taiwan, China” (中國的衛星看看中國臺灣的大好河山很正常) (MND, October 30).
The KMT’s ‘New Starting Point’ With the CCP
Taiwan’s domestic politics has also provided fertile ground for advancing influence. October saw a former spokeswoman for the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), Ma Chih-wei (馬治薇), handed a two-year sentence for taking CCP money to run as a legislator in 2024 and providing information to her CCP handlers, including a list of contacts for central government agencies and business cards for personnel involved in national security (UDN, October 16). But perhaps the most significant change this year is the KMT’s recent election of a new party chair.
The arrival of Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) as chairwoman of the KMT could herald a new approach for the CCP. Cheng, who identifies as Chinese (“我是中國人”), received a congratulatory letter from Xi Jinping, to which she responded in kind. According to Xinhua, in her letter she called for “opening up a grand future for national rejuvenation (為民族復興開闢宏偉前程) (China Brief, October 4; Xinhua, October 19). To provide a sense of Cheng’s politics, she used her first interview with international media to double down on her stance that Russia is a democracy and Putin a “democratically elected” (民主選舉產生的) leader (DW, October 30). Her first appointments also indicate her desire to engage with the CCP. At an October 28 meeting with the TAO’s director Song Tao (宋濤), her new vice chair Hsiao Hsu-chen (蕭旭岑) echoed the language from her letter to Xi and criticized Taiwan’s administration. Song responded by saying that they were “Standing at a new starting point” (站在新的起點上).
Cheng is content to call for unification, but her statements to date suggest that she believes unification can be achieved on terms other than those dictated by Beijing. This is not what the CCP means when it talks of unification. As laid out in a recent op-ed by the PRC’s consul in Denpasar, Indonesia, reunification means “fully sharing the dignity and honor of the People’s Republic of China on the international stage” (將來海峽兩岸實現統一後，海內外臺灣同胞將更能夠與全國各族人民一道，充分共用中華人民共和國在國際上的尊嚴與榮譽) (PRC Consulate in Denpasar, Indonesia , October 25). The Republic of China is not mentioned.
Conclusion
Across legal, military, social, and political dimensions, Beijing has engineered a shift in its approach to Taiwan. It is difficult to gauge what level of coordination exists between the PLA/CMC, the TAO, the MPS, and other relevant parts of the system on a unified strategy. But in each of these areas—with the possible exception of military gray-zone activity (though not overall PLA pressure)—the ratchet has tightened. Whether this constitutes a “new starting point,” in TAO director Song Tao’s words, remains to be borne out. For now Beijing is making its intentions clear, seeing no reason to stop forging ahead in its pursuit of unification.
Notes
[1] Puma Shen has previously written for China Brief (China Brief, February 16, 2024).
[2] The information in this section comes from a paper that Ma Cheng-kun titled “China’s Military Posture Toward Taiwan” delivered at the International Conference on U.S.-China Strategic Competition in 2025: Implications for China and Cross-Strait Relations. The conference, hosted by the MAC, was held in Taipei on October 21, 2025.
[3] Most comments either troll the TAO or contain pro-Taiwan content. And on the account’s first post, by far the largest proportion of engagements were “angry” reactions.
[4] Miller, Frank, Tung Ho, Kenneth Allen, and Arran Hope, eds. The People’s Liberation Army as Organization Volume 3.0. Washington, D.C.: The Jamestown Foundation; Vienna: Exovera, 2025. p.85.
[5] The press conference also provided an opportunity for further intimidation. A state media journalist noted that a commercial satellite had recently released multiple high-definition satellite images of Taiwan, in which “every street in Taiwan is clearly visible” (臺灣的每條街道都清晰可見). The journalist then wondered whether, given such clear images were available from commercial satellites, military satellites are even more precise. The spokesperson simply responded that it is “perfectly normal for Chinese satellites to observe the beautiful landscapes of Taiwan, China” (中國的衛星看看中國臺灣的大好河山很正常).
本文於 修改第 1 次
|
|
自作孽之莽夫賴清德 ---- Lyle Goldstein
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
美國老大哥發話了，賴清德還要「作死」嗎？你要找死是你自家的事，可別拉著台灣老百姓跟你陪葬！
The U.S. Must Beware of Taiwan's Reckless Leader
Lyle Goldstein, 10/23/25
With all the news out of the Middle East and the ongoing war in Ukraine, it’s easy to forget that Taiwan is the world’s most dangerous flashpoint. China has long laid claim to the island and acting on those claims could lead to a spiral where Washington and Beijing come to blows over the issue—and nuclear use would remain a terrifying possibility.
Now, a confluence of factors have made the situation in the Taiwan Strait even less stable. The U.S. has been burned badly by Asian nationalism more than a few times in the past, and so should act with utmost prudence today.
At the heart of this growing storm is the brash, new leader of Taiwan, President William Lai of the nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). Instead of taking a low profile and playing down any claims to Taiwan’s independent status like his more cautious DPP predecessor Tsai Ying-wen, Lai has lurched toward formal independence with a succession of speeches making the case for Taiwanese nationhood.
One columnist at Taipei Times succinctly summarized Lai’s first address: “Never before has a Taiwanese president devoted an entire speech to laying out clearly, point-by-point, and unequivocally how Taiwan is unquestionably a sovereign nation.”
Not surprisingly, Beijing has reacted to Lai’s address with a string of invective. A June 26 editorial in the state-run Chinese newspaper the Global Times said that he “once again exposed his radical ‘Taiwan independence’ stance” and accused him of “pushing cross-strait relations and Taiwan's development to the edge of more conflict and risk.”
The political milieu on Taiwan is polarized, with islanders in July rejecting an unprecedented recall vote of opposition lawmakers from the Kuomintang (KMT), which controls the legislature and opposes formal independence. When the KMT this week elected a new chairperson, Cheng Li-wun, the party was accused of falling victim to an influence campaign orchestrated by Beijing.
When Taiwan held its annual Han Kuang military exercises earlier this year, it involved numerous innovations meant to address the growing Chinese military threat. The exercises lasted longer than usual, involved the extensive use of reservists, showcased new weaponry, and practiced urban warfare.
But it was another sign of Taipei misdirecting its defense efforts. That money would be better spent, as military experts have long said, on asymmetric weapons like mines given that Taiwan’s ports and air bases would be the main targets for China’s initial air and missile campaign. Shifting the focus to more affordable and widely dispersed ground combat systems makes sense for Taiwan.
But even that approach has problems. American M1 Abrams tanks joined Taiwan’s forces for the first time, but they have been paraded around Russia as trophies from the war in Ukraine. It’s beyond any doubt that the PLA has secured from Russia the very latest intelligence on this platform’s weak points and doctrine on defeating it. The same is true on the vaunted HIMARS system that have also arrived in Taiwan.
Other factors don’t bode well for Taiwan. There has been much talk about the shortage of American-made Patriot anti-missile batteries thanks to the Russia-Ukraine War, so the PLA may wish to act before that shortfall can be rectified. Nor can it be ruled out that China, while normally cautious, might instead act decisively against Taiwan at a point of crisis for Kyiv, since the West would likely be more distracted.
Beijing is obviously trying to read the tea leaves in Washington. President Donald Trump has judiciously taken a cautious approach on Taiwan, especially when compared to his predecessor. But some of his top advisors, including Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, have adopted a notably hawkish tone. Elon Musk, the Trump advisor who was most knowledgeable about China and whose experience with Beijing goes back decades, is now nowhere near the Oval Office.
On the high-stakes Taiwan issue, Washington should tread carefully. Taiwan constitutes a core interest for China and the military balance gets ever more lopsided against Taiwan by the day.
American leaders should not hesitate to rein in Taiwan’s evidently reckless leader, perhaps with a private warning. It would not be the first time that Washington has rebuked Taipei for threatening the status quo.
In the meantime, the U.S. should refocus its defense efforts in the Pacific on protecting actual treaty allies Australia, Japan, the Philippines, and South Korea—a wholly realistic and sensible goal. But Taiwan does not represent a vital U.S. national security interest. It is not a treaty ally, nor are the various geostrategic or economic rationales to defend Taiwan enough to risk a potentially catastrophic great power war.
Contact us at letters@time.com.
Read More:
Taiwan in the Shadow of War
How Trump Can Avoid War Over Taiwan
本文於 修改第 7 次
|
|
從中國政府的角度思考「統一台灣」策略 -- Jeffrey Michaels/Michael John Williams
|
|
|
推薦1 |
|
|
|
基本上這是一篇值得細讀和探討的分析；可惜，我腦力空空外，也興趣缺缺。
全文兩個敗筆：
1) 沒有給予「封鎖」(或「隔離」)戰略適當和充分的討論。
2) 全文最後一段中的： “the U.S.-led rules-based order in Asia …” 這句話。
A Wargame to Take Taiwan, from China’s Perspective
Jeffrey Michaels/Michael John Williams, 10/07/25
In August 2025, 25 international experts gathered at Syracuse University to do something unusual: plan China’s invasion of Taiwan. For two days, academics, policy analysts, and current and former U.S. officials abandoned their typical defensive postures and attempted to inhabit Beijing’s offensive strategic mindset in a wargame. They debated not how America should respond to Chinese aggression, but how China might overcome the obstacles that have so far kept it from attacking the island nation.
This role reversal yielded an uncomfortable insight. The invasion scenarios that dominate U.S. military planning — involving massive amphibious assaults on Taiwan and preemptive strikes on American bases — may fundamentally misread Beijing’s calculus. As the wargame revealed, analysts seeking to understand China’s intentions should pay greater attention to plausible alternative military pathways to reunification that involve far less force and far more political calculation.
Thinking Like Beijing
Our intention in designing the wargame in this way was motivated by concern that insufficient attention has been given to understanding how China’s leadership and war planners may conceptually approach the problem of bringing Taiwan to heel. This was particularly important given our participant composition: while predominantly U.S.-based, the group included a few international players. Participants brought diverse high-level experience, including former U.S. officials from the State Department, Department of Defense, and CIA, as well as the UK Cabinet Office. Several participants had military backgrounds, having served in the U.S. Army or Navy, and a few were established scholars in international relations. Around half the participants had expertise in the Chinese military or the Chinese Communist Party. Therefore, we deliberately designed the game to force participants to confront practical questions Chinese strategists would face when they draft and update their war plans, such as: How much force is enough to compel surrender without triggering U.S. intervention? What surrender terms would Taipei accept? How does Beijing transition from military action to political control of Taiwan to a favorable post-war status quo in the region and beyond?
These types of questions expose a gap in American strategic thinking. Most U.S. wargames focus on operational and tactical military interactions — ship movements, missile salvos, casualty counts, what percentage of Chinese troops land in the north of Taiwan vs. the south. The focus is overwhelmingly on the invasion scenario. They rarely examine the political context that shapes military decisions. This narrow focus produces a dangerous blind spot: the United States prepares for the war it can fight or prefers to fight, not the one China expects to win.
The exercise revealed three scenarios that generated the most debate among participants.
First, a limited missile barrage followed by diplomatic ultimatum — essentially, coercion without invasion.
Second, a graduated escalation that stops short of attacking U.S. forces.
Third, an assault designed to cripple U.S. forces at the outset and present Taipei with a new reality of isolation. Each path reflected different risk tolerances and assumptions about American resolve.
Calculated Restraint
Participants quickly discovered that when confronted with the decision to attack U.S. forces, this seemed to make little strategic sense when they attempted to look at it from Beijing’s perspective. A typical assumption held by many analysts, including most participants prior to the game, and one that features prominently in American wargames, is that China will simply launch a preemptive surprise strike against U.S. forces in a manner somewhat analogous to Pearl Harbor. But why start a war with America when you might avoid one? As the game participants soon found, there is no guarantee of U.S. military involvement, nor Japan’s, nor other countries‘, if China refrains from attacking them in an opening round. By placing themselves in the shoes of Chinese planners — who in real life are presumably familiar with the contemporary American political scene and the historical record of how Washington reacts to unprovoked attacks — participants recognized there would almost certainly be a natural hesitancy to initiate a war against the United States. In other words, rather than assume Chinese planners simply ignore the difficulties any U.S. administration would face in starting a war with China if American forces are not attacked first, they might instead use these difficulties to Beijing’s advantage and design their war plans accordingly. Indeed, it is precisely because of these difficulties that most U.S. wargame designers wanting to get a war going between Chinese and American forces begin with the Chinese attacking American forces rather than the other way around.
This logic shaped the exercise’s most plausible hypothetical scenario. China launches precision strikes against Taiwan’s military infrastructure while simultaneously offering generous surrender terms: local autonomy, preservation of democratic institutions, and minimal mainland administrative presence. The message to Taipei is clear: accept reunification on favorable terms or face devastation. The message to Washington and the American public is equally clear: this is a Chinese civil matter, not worth American lives.
The comparison to Hong Kong’s former autonomy arrangements, once seemingly reasonable, now rings hollow given Beijing’s crackdown there. Participants struggled with this credibility gap. Would Taiwan believe any Chinese promises after Hong Kong? Even if the Taiwanese don’t believe them, do they have a better alternative to accepting them? The debate highlighted a crucial uncertainty: China’s ability to make its threats credible while keeping its surrender terms sufficiently enticing.
A Military Reality Check
The exercise forced participants to confront an uncomfortable truth about China’s military capabilities. Despite decades of modernization, the People’s Liberation Army has not fought a major conflict since 1979. It has never conducted an amphibious assault on a major scale. Its logistics remain untested. Its command structure is riddled with political interference. In contrast to most wargames that portray the Chinese military as a competent machine operating at maximum efficiency, the perspective from Beijing is likely more sobering.
These limitations don’t make China weak — they make it cautious. Why attempt a Normandy-style invasion when missile strikes and economic strangulation might achieve the same goal? Why risk military humiliation when political victory remains possible? Participants found themselves naturally gravitating toward strategies that minimized operational complexity and maximized the potential to de-escalate if things went badly wrong and then re-escalate later at a more favorable time.
This caution extends to the timeline. Any major amphibious operation requires weeks, if not months, of visible preparations. Participants recognized this transparency as China’s greatest vulnerability but also noted the world’s failure to deter Russia in 2021–2022 despite similar warning signs. International condemnation means little without credible threats of military intervention.
What Successful Deterrence Requires
The wargame’s insights challenge conventional deterrence thinking in three ways.
First, deterrence can’t focus solely on defeating an invasion. If China’s theoretically preferred strategy involves limited strikes and political coercion, Taiwan needs resilience against pressure campaigns, not just beach defenses. This means hardening critical infrastructure, preparing the population psychologically, and maintaining political unity under extreme stress. It also means understanding the dynamics of how China will attempt to lure Taiwan into an early surrender and then taking steps to undermine these.
Second, the exercise showed that uncertainty about U.S. intervention shapes every Chinese decision. But credibility isn’t just about presidential statements or forward deployments. It’s about Chinese assumptions about the circumstances in which the president would authorize force, Congress would support military action, whether the American public would accept casualties, and whether allies would provide meaningful support. A key takeaway from the game was that Chinese strategists will be focusing at least as much on these basic issues about whether the United States will use force as opposed to what forces they will use.
Third, deterrence requires denying China easy political victories, not just military ones. If Beijing believes it can achieve reunification through limited force and favorable terms, traditional military deterrence fails. Therefore, arguably more important than Taiwan’s military vulnerabilities are its political vulnerabilities. While Taiwan has so far remained steadfast in maintaining its independence, the combined effects of China finally crossing the military threshold, limited prospects of outside military help, and Beijing offering favorable surrender terms (backed by threats of massive escalation for refusal), might prove sufficient to undermine the will to fight.
The Unresolved Questions
Several critical debates remained unsettled when the exercise ended. Participants disagreed sharply on whether China would choose to blockade Taiwan — some saw it as perfect graduated pressure, others as an invitation for U.S. naval intervention, an opportunity for Taiwan to bring its forces to maximum readiness, or prone to rapidly escalate to a full-blown confrontation if attempts are made to break through it.
Most revealing was the disagreement over timing. Some participants argued China must move within this decade while it maintains a favorable military balance. Others speculated the timing might be tied to the 72-year-old Xi Jinping wanting to achieve reunification before his death. Alternatively, it was contended that time favors Beijing — Taiwan’s economy increasingly depends on the mainland, younger generations lack their parents’ anti-communist fervor, and the conventional and nuclear balance may become even more lopsided in China’s favor.
These unresolved debates matter because they reflect legitimate uncertainties about Beijing’s decision calculus. American planners who assume they know China’s timeline or red lines are deceiving themselves.
Next Steps
The Syracuse exercise represents just one attempt to understand Chinese strategic thinking. Its participants brought their own biases and blind spots. They may have overcorrected for perceived American misunderstandings. They certainly lacked access to classified Chinese planning documents.
Yet the exercise’s value lies not in perfect prediction but in expanding imagination. By forcing Americans to try and think like Chinese planners, it revealed possibilities that U.S. planning overlooks. It showed that the most dangerous scenarios might not be the most dramatic ones. And it demonstrated that effective deterrence requires understanding not just China’s capabilities, but also its images of future war, the doubts of its leaders, and the difficulties of its planners to confidently provide winning options.
The next step is translating these insights into policy. This means wargaming not just military scenarios but political ones. It means understanding Beijing’s conceptions of what a war over Taiwan looks like and the content of Chinese war planning. It means testing assumptions about alliance cohesion and domestic resolve. It means preparing for the many types of wars China is developing options to wage, not just the one we’re comfortable planning against.
The stakes couldn’t be higher. Taiwan’s future, regional stability, and the U.S.-led rules-based order in Asia all hang in the balance. We can’t afford to misunderstand Beijing’s thinking. The Syracuse exercise offers a start — thinking like the adversary to avoid becoming its victim.
Jeffrey Michaels is an associate of RAND Europe and a strategic adviser at the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies. He is the co-editor with Tim Sweijs of Beyond Ukraine: Debating the Future of War (2024), and co-author with Lawrence Freedman of The Evolution of Nuclear Strategy, 4th Edition (2019).
Michael John Williams is director of the Carnegie-Maxwell Policy Planning Lab and associate professor of international affairs at Syracuse University. He is the coauthor of International Security: Theory and Practice (2025) and of Science, Law, and Liberalism in the American Way of War (2015).
BECOME A MEMBER
本文於 修改第 4 次
|
|
|
本城市首頁
看回應文章
等級：8
