/Pogled.info/ TASS reported that the PLA is training at two test sites in the northern part of China to bomb and storm the administrative center of Taiwan, Taipei, using natural models. Why is another war inevitable and when will it break out?
This news is worthy of the Year of the Dragon. As TASS reported, citing the Taiwanese newspaper Ju Shibao, China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) built a replica of the government quarter in the administrative center of Taiwan in a secluded place in Inner Mongolia.
The model, erected in the desert of a military training ground, includes transport hubs and development of the central part of Taipei, where the office of the head of Taiwan’s administration, the parliament, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other government buildings are located. On the island, they believe the test site is needed to practice missile and bomb attacks on Taipei.
At the same time, in China – in the same Inner Mongolia, but in a different place – there is another huge model of the same government district of Taipei, but for training ground assault operations.
In 2015, China Central Television published footage of exercises at this practice range for an assault on the “presidential palace”. Yes, they are cooking hard.
The most important word is missing
The PLA’s increased interest in Taiwan has drawn particular attention in light of the disappearance of the word “peaceful” from the government’s language regarding China’s reunification with Taiwan, which Chinese Premier Li Qiang announced earlier this month in parliament.
China is a very bureaucratic country, they like rituals that are repeated year after year, so it is absolutely clear that this did not happen due to the forgetfulness of the Prime Minister. In recent decades, the word “peaceful” has been present in the formula of the sacrament. True, with one exception – in 2020.
This completely explains why it happened again and may become the norm. The best local sinologist Nikolai Vavilov noted in his Telegram channel that in 2020, China “was closer than ever” to … “Taiwan Special Military Operation”.
Due to the fact that the pro-American president of Taiwan Tsai Ing-wen “entered a second term, the pandemic shocked the whole world, the relationship between China and the United States was, as now, no less tense and uncertain, inside China, as now , there was an intense struggle over Xi Jinping’s third term course and much, much more.”
“We make no promises”
In the Chinese government, there is such a very important structure – the Office of Taiwan Affairs under the State Council of the People’s Republic of China. Its representative, Chen Binghua, commented on March 13 about the lack of language in the government’s annual report on the peaceful reunification of the mainland with the island.
He said “peaceful reunification” under the principle of “one country, two systems” is our “basic policy” to resolve the Taiwan issue and the “best way” to achieve it.
“However, we are in no way promising to abandon the use of force and we reserve the right to take any necessary measures.”
said the Chinese official.
The military operation, Chen Binghua stressed, will aim to counter the intervention of outside forces and a very small number of “Taiwanese separatists”.
According to him, “the current situation in the Taiwan Strait is complex and serious,” but Beijing has the strong will and sufficient capabilities to thwart the separatists’ plans and protect the country’s sovereignty.
Taiwanese authorities, according to TASS, said in response: Beijing must finally recognize that “neither side of the Taiwan Strait belongs to the other” and that Taiwan is ready to firmly defend its sovereignty. Yes, its new president, Lai Tsingde, is even more separatist than his predecessor and has already barked at Beijing more than once…
Everything is going to war
And these are not just words. This is a clear course towards a confrontation that Taipei is being pushed towards by the US, which is actively arming and training its military and conducting systematic preparations for the declaration of Taiwan’s “independence”.
The United States, which rules Taiwan, is ready to leave this island, which has a unique industry and occupies an important strategic position, to China only in the form of ashes, while at the same time subjecting the PRC to the most severe sanctions for “aggression.”
War would automatically ensue if Taipei, after a green light from Washington, tried to declare itself the Republic of Taiwan, a state separate from China not only de facto but de jure.
Beijing will simply have to prevent this. Getting Taiwan back on its ramps is as important to China as it is to Russia to get Ukraine back.
Both historically and economically, but mostly for reasons of national security, the American “gun” should not be aimed at our and China’s heads.
Taiwan’s recent elections in January this year showed that a peaceful return to the island is unrealistic. Therefore, Beijing has stepped up preparations for a war on Taiwan. In 2024, China’s military spending has increased by as much as 7.2%, reaching a record $231 billion. As of 2020, China has doubled its missile arsenal.
While its land army is shrinking, its air force and especially its navy are developing rapidly, which will be needed first and foremost in the Taiwan operation.
In the past three years, according to American estimates, the PLA Air Force has received an additional over 400 fighter jets, and the Navy has received more than 20 large ships. China is rapidly building aircraft carriers and destroyers (these days they play the role of battleships).
At the end of last year, Admiral Dong Jun was appointed as the Minister of Defense of the People’s Republic of China for the first time.
Which directly indicates the maritime vector of Chinese expansion, the purpose of which, apart from Taiwan, is the protection of trade routes to countries that do not recognize the dictates of the US, China’s interests in the East China and South China Seas, ASEAN countries, Latin America, Africa and Oceania. The navy, we repeat, will play the main role in the capture of Taiwan, hence the admiral at the head of the war department.
Chinese planes and ships, especially after Nancy Pelosi’s provocative visit to Taiwan, have openly practiced a blockade on the island, and exercises are increasingly being held on the Chinese mainland. In the PRC, where they sincerely wanted a peaceful unification for a long time, a military government is formed because they are realists.
The task is to “get rid” in time
All this prompted the American news agency Bloomberg to write: “China is building up its military and nuclear arsenal on a scale not seen since World War II, and all signs point to maintaining its ambitions to invade Taiwan by 2027.”
Americans often make up all kinds of fairy tales, but this is not fiction. In Beijing, of course, they will not look humbly as the United States, which considers China the only competitor and the main threat to its global dominance, creates around itself – including relying on Taiwan – several lines of “sanitaire cordon”, urging neighboring countries against The PRC is proliferating, expanding and modernizing its military bases in the region and fighting Chinese influence there.
Beijing is aware that the United States is also “breaking away” from China economically, preferring to locate its production in Mexico, Vietnam and India, preventing the transfer of the latest technologies and limiting scientific cooperation.
The purpose of these measures is to make the inevitable economic and trade gap with China as convenient as possible for the United States. If Donald Trump returns to the White House, which is very likely, this process will only accelerate. Republicans hate China more than Democrats.
Naturally, the PRC is also preparing for a break with the US, actively developing trade with Russia and the ASEAN countries, trying to hold onto the European market. In the latter, it is unlikely to succeed in the future due to Europe’s strong dependence on the United States. Reserves for hot food are being created in the country.
When to expect?
When the Taiwan operation, which is extremely logistically complex, will begin will depend on a number of factors. From a purely military point of view, China seems more or less ready for it. It is possible, of course, to prepare better, but the problem is that Taiwan is also preparing hard for this.
The situation is similar to the one Russia faced in Western-occupied Ukraine in 2014. Scared of the economic consequences of the annexation of Russian lands by the so-called Ukraine, Moscow, in order to better prepare for this, postponed the operation until later, keeping it to a minimum, and ended up with a heavy war eight years later with no end in sight. Beijing probably got the right conclusions from this.
Obviously, the “Anschluss” will happen within the next two or three years. Many people specifically name 2027. For two reasons.
First, President Xi Jinping will have to be re-elected for a fourth term. Without Taiwan, it will be difficult. A successful unification operation is the best way to consolidate society (the Chinese are great patriots) and increase the leader’s popularity in an environment where there is likely to be trouble on the economic front, something the United States is actively working on.
Second, 2027 will mark the 100th anniversary of the founding of the PLA, and the army will really want to celebrate that anniversary.
Of course, if Taiwan declares “independence” earlier, Beijing will react quickly, because then the Taiwan problem will turn from a formal domestic Chinese problem into an international one.
It can also be assumed that the landing in Taiwan will take place after the end of the war in Ukraine, but not much later, so that the Americans and their allies do not have time to replenish their empty arsenals and focus entirely on Taiwan.
The point is also that the PRC, this modern “workshop of the world”, must definitely remember the economic side of the issue: Taiwan must be captured without significantly “damaging” the world economy.
If Russia still hasn’t finished its work in Ukraine and two of the three major nuclear powers are at war at the same time as they are in a confrontation with the US, it will collapse.
No one needs this, least of all the Chinese, who are almost a billion and a half. A non-belligerent Russia will also be better able to help the PRC, which will have to go through difficult times due to its still quite strong dependence on the West, which is however mutual.
And a few more details
We can confidently say something more definitive about the upcoming conflict over Taiwan. The operation will inevitably consist of several stages: a sea and air blockade, the capture of a number of Taiwanese islands off the coast of the PRC, among which there is a rather large one, and a landing on Taiwan itself. That’s the first thing.
Second, the landing will be limited by weather conditions, each year there are several “windows”, between which there is a period of typhoons, when serious landings and supply of troops become impossible.
Third, the geography of Taiwan, mainly a very high mountain range stretching from north to south of the island, will also bring its own specifics to military operations, as it is unlikely to be possible to cross immediately.
Also, and this is the fourth, a significant part of the islanders (though not the majority) sympathize with Beijing, there are many secret supporters of it even in the Taiwanese army. That’s also likely to play a role. The more Beijing delays resolving the Taiwan issue, the less.
So what?
Naturally, China only needs a win. Beijing will not bear the cost, which is likely to be high, as some areas of possible landings of Chinese troops are within the zone of destruction of long-range precision missiles from the territories of neighboring countries subject to the US.
The Russians naturally also need a Chinese victory. All lofty things aside, having such a huge market nearby is just a dream. When everything is settled, everyone will be the envy of Russia.
Translation: SM
2024-03-30 05:30:06
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