Taiwan getting even more worried about China
This topic has come up here before, but now we have the Taiwanese explaining just what’s going on with the Chinese military buildup:
China is building up its military defences to deter US intervention in case of war with Taiwan, the island’s defence ministry said Monday.
Beijing is focusing on developing long-range missiles “to strike at American bases and battle carrier groups stationed in the Asia-Pacific… so as to block the United States from coming to the rescue of Taiwan should war break out in the Taiwan Strait,” the ministry said in a report released Monday.
…
The People’s Liberation Army’s budget increased 17.8 percent to 44.94 billion US dollars in 2007, official figures show, making China the third largest military spender in the world after the United States and Russia.But Taiwan’s report said the true figure was two or three times that, and warned that China’s rapid military expansion had tipped the military balance in the Strait.
In discussions on the internet, I find that people continually downgrade the threat from China, based on its past history of having a woefully underequipped, outdated military. That, unfortunately, was old China. The new China has a lot of cash, and has been using that cash to buy weapons from Russia, as well as develop its own military-industrial complex.
Taiwan has always been able to count on our naval superiority, but China is focusing its military planning on deterring our navy from defending them. We should take note of their warnings and plan accordingly.
May 12, 2008 at 12:23 pm
Geoff, I assumed we had given up on Taiwan, that when push comes to shove, we won’t get involved (somewhat like the big European powers and their many agreements which were conveniently ignored when Hitler began his imperialist campaign).
Is there any indication that we have had any intention in the recent past to honor our agreements with Taiwan?
May 12, 2008 at 12:38 pm
Oh, and how do these developments (namely, China’s military build-up and China’s correspondingly increased ability to threaten US ability in the region) affect the security, confidence, and ability of Japan and South Korea? Could these efforts be a prelude to American insistence on Japan and South Korea beefing themselves up (nuclearly if necessary)?
May 12, 2008 at 1:15 pm
Counter-point: it is in Taiwan’s economic interest to inflate any threat from China. Doesn’t necessarily make it untrue, but something to consider.
China’s rapid military expansion is not new, and unfortunately for America, the most obvious solution is to hit them before they can build up enough force to overwhelm us. That is not politically feasible, especially because it is in China’s military interest to avoid conflict until it is ready.
To what extent is the threat of, say, a couple long-range missile strikes on Beijing a sufficient deterrent? Obviously a bomb or two in the capital won’t stop military efforts on the Straits, but it could undermine the government’s ability to retain control after a successful invasion, no? (Assuming, of course, the political will to bomb Beijing.)
May 12, 2008 at 1:38 pm
The Chinese seem to be playing a very clever game.
I don’t know if we are mentally prepared to deal with it.
May 12, 2008 at 2:10 pm
At the same time, it’s not like their devoting a lot of money to, say, building earthquake-proof buildings and chemical plants.
I wonder what it would take to foment a decent revolution over there.
May 12, 2008 at 2:25 pm
That, Sobek, is one thing I think we Americans are overlooking to our detriment.
Trade with China has fallen recently. I know of a number of people in my industry (biopharmaceuticals) who were so gung-ho about going into China to produce products, who who now have nixed all plans to even consider China. China’s own corruption and poor quality will, sooner or later, hurt China significantly. On top of that, they recently promulgated laws to phase out all special economic or tax-free (or specially-taxed) zones, which was what attracted so much investment in the past. Couple that with rising internal discontent and the very shaky nature of Chinese infrastructure, and things look quite bad.
It may be we can make the Chinese loose by how we made the Soviets loose: the Soviets focused so much of their money on defense rather than infrastructure and food that eventually it all imploded. Could happen to China. I predict that if we play our surreptitious cards right–helping to foment the free flow of information and communication in China, connecting Chinese with each other and with the outside world–it will only be a matter of time before China implodes.
May 12, 2008 at 2:26 pm
Besides, as you said, all we need to do is ask Cheney and Rove to focus their Republican Weather Machine to create a few cyclones and earthquakes, and our wo(r)k is done.
May 12, 2008 at 3:39 pm
I assumed we had given up on Taiwan, that when push comes to shove, we won’t get involved
Well, I assume that that’s what this was all about.
China’s rapid military expansion is not new
It’s not all that old, either. And it’s really just starting to bear fruit.