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As you probably know by now, I relish the chance to share some interesting thinking with you. It is rare to find it in today’s media. It is even rarer to find it among academic thinkers. But, find it we do, on rare occasions, and yesterday I discovered an interesting essay by Michael Anton, aka Anonymous, in The Federalist.
Anton addresses himself to the neoconservatives in our midst, and he challenges their view about Taiwan. By their lights and by the lights of all those who spend half of every day trash talking China, we must go to war to defend Taiwan.
By all accounts, we are bluffing. By all accounts China knows we are bluffing. By all accounts China would much rather annex Taiwan via a treaty than to mount an armed invasion.
Such is Anton’s view. For what it’s worth, it’s my view also. And yet, for today I wish to share some of his analysis.
He is not the first to suggest that the Taiwan issue is intrinsic to China’s national identity and territorial integrity. After analyzing the century of humiliation that Western powers imposed on China, he explains things thusly:
China wants Taiwan back. This is true not merely of the CCP leadership but of the vast majority of the Chinese people, who believe that Taiwan’s separate existence is the last remaining vestige of the “Unequal Treaties” and the “Century of Humiliation” and is thus an affront to their nation.
This desire is irrespective of who’s ruling in Beijing; it is a question of China’s national identity, which is inseparable from its conception of its historic territorial integrity.
So, Anton continues, the neocons are living in a dream world.
Even if the great neocon dream for China were suddenly to become reality, a “liberal democratic” Beijing would want Taiwan back too. This matters because, in any contest, the side that wants it more tends to get what it wants.
For the record, one imagines, because one does not know any better, that China is most desirous of gaining control over one of the world’s two leading manufacturers of semiconductors. For now, Taiwan Semiconductor does a considerable amount of manufacturing on the mainland. Watch China’s efforts to poach talent and to expand the company’s factories onshore.
When it comes to defending Taiwan, geography is not our friend:
Then there are basic considerations of geography. Every country in the world cares more about its own front yard than do countries half a world away. This is why it was so reckless of the USSR to try to place missiles in Cuba, and why it’s also reckless of the United States to needle Russia over Ukraine. One can utterly condemn Russian behavior in the Donbass, or China’s in the Taiwan Strait, and still see that those countries are more likely than not to fight over issues and regions that they see as vital to themselves but peripheral to us.
So, China would prefer to avoid a military confrontation:
China would like to get Taiwan back in much the same way as Beijing reincorporated Hong Kong: change the strategic reality on the ground (and in the air, and on the water) and persuade the other party, or parties, to make a deal.
How would this happen?
The Chinese regime, however, apparently believes that, given enough time and a large enough arms buildup, it can so change the balance of power that even the meanest observer will conclude that defending Taiwan against a Chinese attack would be impossible. At that point, it is hoped, cool heads among the Taiwanese leadership will persuade the Taiwanese people to make the best deal they can.
It is a combination of this hope, an uncertainty that a power imbalance sufficient to ensure an invasion’s success has yet been reached, and fear of the consequences to China’s international standing should it invade, that has thus far held China back. China waited 155 years to reclaim Hong Kong. It’s been about half that much time since it lost Taiwan. China would prefer not to wait another three-quarters of a century but also appears to believe time is on its side.
How far would we go militarily to defend Taiwan? Not as far as you think:
Remember: The Chinese care about Taiwan infinitely more than we do. Is it wise to threaten, much less launch, a nuclear strike over a territory they see as a vital organ but which is peripheral to us?
What is China’s likely response? In 1996, a senior People’s Liberation Army general explained that he did not think, in the final analysis, that the United States would want to “trade Los Angeles for Taipei.” In other words, the Chinese are willing to launch nuclear strikes against undefended American cities to have their way over Taiwan. Are will ready and willing to absorb such strikes, and launch similar strikes of our own—and likely still lose Taiwan?
On the other side, the American military, including the Navy, is undergoing a spasm of mindless wokeness. The Biden administration seems more to care about the right pronouns, about diversity, inclusion and equity, and about transgender rights than it does about winning wars.
Top American military leaders are incompetent and woke. To an outside observer, whether in Moscow or Beijing, this offers far more freedom of movement:
And, yes, I am sure that the military is not entirely incompetent and that many fine and talented people still serve. But the brass is woke and incompetent, and senior officers and civilian leaders tolerate and even encourage wokeness and incompetence; or to say better, they excuse and deny incompetence in furtherance of wokeness.
As for incompetence, the most recent example is the disastrous and humiliating withdrawal from Afghanistan. On wokeness, how about Gen. Mark Milley’s comment this past summer on “white rage”—or really, any statement by any general or flag officer over the last two years at least.
They’re all on record sounding like Robin DiAngelo, two octaves down.
As for the seaworthiness of the American Navy, consider this:
More directly relevant: Did you know that the Navy crashed or ran aground five ships in 2017? Doing so used to be a very big deal—a career-ender for the captain. When I was in high school, I vividly recall the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise running aground on Cortez Bank, a freakishly shallow, but well-charted, patch of the Pacific 100 miles from San Diego. The captain was relieved of duty on the spot.
As for those five 2017 mishaps, the official reports are marvels of esoteric writing. If you squint hard and read between the lines, you can discern what really happened: By prioritizing factors other than competence and seamanship, the Navy put into positions of great responsibility people who didn’t know what they were doing.
As for losing aircraft carriers, did you also know that we lost a light carrier in 2020? Not to enemy action, but to a fire—which appears to have been arson, set for personal reasons by a sailor involved in a love triangle with two other sailors—a fire, moreover, that the Navy did not know how to put out. As a result, the USS Bonhomme Richard was withdrawn from service and sold for scrap. Estimated replacement cost: $4 billion.
But, the Navy is not serious about holding anyone accountable for these fiascos. This implies that its sense of honor is sorely defective. It also means that it is not serious about military action:
No one, so far as I can tell, has paid a price for any of this, nor have the Navy’s priorities changed. If anything, that service (and the others) seem to be doubling down on wokeness.
The Biden administration’s nominee for vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Christopher Grady, testified that, if confirmed, one of his top priorities will be seeding “gender advisors”—i.e., woke commissars—throughout the services. Will part of their job be to find and defuse love triangles before they get more ships burned?
In any conflict with China over Taiwan, the Navy will take the lead for our side. Is it up to the task?
Would it be dishonorable to fail to defend Taiwan? After all, the Biden administration surrendered Afghanistan to the Taliban without, apparently, a second thought about the loss of national honor.
Of course, we have not been fighting a domestic insurgency in Taiwan for twenty years.
The final argument one hears from Taiwan hawks is that it would be dishonorable for the United States not to defend that island. How it can be dishonorable not to do a thing one has not pledged to do is never explained.
Nor is it ever explained how honor requires us to attempt to do something that, in all likelihood, we cannot do. Indeed, sensible nations led by serious statesmen carefully choose the commitments they make, with an eye toward ensuring those commitments are within national capabilities and serve the national interest.
So, is it in our national interest to go to war over Taiwan? Anton says that it is not.
Are we capable of defending Taiwan? Anton suggests and Pentagon planners have concluded that we are not.
If that is true, what is the neocon policy about anyway?
11 comments:
So-called "neocons" rose through the ranks of leftist "intellectuals" like Kristol, et al. and found a home in the Bush Administrations by flying a false flag of patriotism. Actually, their motivation was global hegemony with them at the top, and they were willing to use and abuse the American people and the nation's then-preeminent armed forces. They were, and remain narcissistic opportunists of the first water. As a result of their machinations, a substantial proportion of the people became disaffected and decided to believe that the half-Nigerian prince could be trusted to implement what he promised on the stump. After the suckers fell for his line of BS the second time, abetted by the combination of incompetence and pusillanimity of the "loyal opposition" (a/k/a the Republican Party) he implemented his real agenda which brought us to our current sorry state of affairs. However, in doing so, both the "neocons" (emphasis on "cons") and the RINO establishment were exposed for what they are.
The wild card in all this is whether the Taiwanese are a quarter turn of a fastener away from having nuclear weapons. I suspect the uncertainty around the answer is much more of a deterrent to the Chinese than we are at this point. Add to that the prospect that both Japan and South Korea would get out their wrenches and turn their fasteners if China invaded Taiwan, and I suspect the Chinese are more focused on intimidating the Biden administration to draw other concessions than they actually are interested in risking the invasion of Taiwan.
The notion of Chinese national land integrity gets mentioned a lot, but the various Chinese empires have expanded and contracted for several thousand years. Which one would you like to peg as "essential" to their modern notion of comfort? Tibet, for example?
No doubt the USS Bonhomme Richard will be replaced by the USS George Floyd.
We should have and would have defended Tiawan a year or more ago. But we should not now, because it is a trap. We would lose most of our ships and forces to a superior Chinese force who were there exactly for that reason. I do not think our current military leaders are able to fight a war and I don't think they would recognize an ambush even as it was happening. We should let China take Tiawan and use this as a lesson and a reason to rebuild our military and throw the fake guy out of the White House. Australia should wake up, they are next.
China taking over Taiwan would be a disaster for the U.S. standing in the region, and our global economic interests. Not the neocon interests, but our national interests.
Diplomacy and foreign policy choices are best made by clear, rational people who look at the entire global pie. Such leaders should look for political and economic stability. Moralizing around geopolitical issues betrays the national interest. Nations exist to look after their own interests. The best diplomatic leaders are sober, cool and ruthless in promoting the national interest. We don’t have that. The Biden Administration has no such skill. It’s a bunch of moralizing sycophants unworthy of leading a school board, much less U.S. foreign policy. And that’s why this China-Taiwan situation is fraught with danger.
The fact that Taiwan’s independence offends Chinese sensibilities misses the point entirely. China acts offended all the time about just about everything — no doubt an intentional play to the American culture of victimhood. In terms of Chinese national unity and solidarity, tell that to the Tibetans and Uyghurs. Or the people of Hong Kong. The CCP is manifestly mercantilist, corrupt (to the point of being a bona fide kleptocracy) and utterly ruthless. The CCP geopolitical view is incompatible with that of the United States. That’s the core problem. China successfully invading Taiwan would be massively destabilizing in the East. It would set in motion all kinds of moves, policies and events that would be devastating to U.S. global interests. Japan would go nuclear, then South Korea, then Australia, and the whole region would be on pins and needles — a tinderbox.
The U.S. must go to war to defend Taiwan. We have allowed China to become economically powerful, resulting in military strength. As years go by, we will lose whatever military advantage we have. The question is whether China has the technological wherewithal to sink one or more aircraft carriers. If they do, that is an important consideration, and we should rethink the naval orthodoxy around the carrier battlegroup as our best means of projecting global power. But we should also remember have massive, dispersed airpower assets in Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Guam and Australia. Chinese operations would be concentrated around invading and securing Taiwan. That would likely take months, depending on the level of Taiwanese resistance. This is an opportunity for the U.S., so long as we avoid a nuclear exchange. Such an exchange would not be warranted because there would be no existential threat to either actor — the confrontation would not threaten the Chinese mainland with invasion, nor would it threaten the U.S. mainland.
What we’re really looking at is the first head-to-head conflict about which nation will control trade in East Asia. It’s not just U.S. interests that are at stake. Certainly the Chinese have national pride and historical shame from the Western colonial era. They’re offended. So what? The Japanese, Taiwanese, South Koreans, Australians and others in the region have their own histories, interests and historical realities. The Chinese are universally distrusted by these regional powers, and for good reason. The situation is not as monolithic, linear or simple as people think. And this would not be a unilateral fight for us. The Chinese have a great deal to lose as well.
The most important question is: What is the U.S. interest in East Asia, and what is the optimal balance of power we seek? Certainly China is a growing power, but we have many allies who have their interests, too. And these interests are not in favor of Chinese expansion. And the Chinese know it. The great flaw in most American media and political analysis is that it’s China vs. the United States. That’s about all our SportsCenter media can get their heads around. It’s not the real problem. Abandoning Taiwan and skeedaddling in the face of threats to our allies would be a foreign policy catastrophe with wide-ranging economic consequences. Taiwan shouldn’t be treated as some bargaining chip or given as some magnanimous token for the benefit of Chinese national pride. Because we all know it won’t end with Taiwan anymore than Hitler’s ambitions ended when the Sudetenland Germans were brought back into the fold. Xi is a ruthless communist autocrat, and we know how those folks operate. His nation’s economic needs are insatiable. There will be no catharsis when we bend to his vision of Chinese self-esteem.
This isn't like going to war in Vietnam or Afghanistan. If we engage China they will win massively in their theater of operations leaving us the choice of running away with our tail between our legs or escalating to ww III. Don't doubt it. And worse, it is likely that China will win WW III.
It's amateur hour, again. You people don't understand that the real question is how much damage from the ROC armed forces is the PRC willing to accept in an invasion. Losses -- in men, material and sealift capability to transport and supply an invasion --will be far, far greater than you armchair strategists realize. This won't be a Pearl Harbor or even a Normandy and the time of the invasion will be known long in advance and you are delusional if you think the ROC will allow an invasion fleet to assemble without a preemptive strike.
I do not trust our government. Certainly not the Democrats. Don't have faith in the GOP, either; I see them as the "GO ALONG to GET ALONG with the DEMs" party.
China wants Taiwan back. This is true not merely of the CCP leadership but of the vast majority of the Chinese people, who believe that Taiwan’s separate existence is the last remaining vestige of the “Unequal Treaties” and the “Century of Humiliation” and is thus an affront to their nation.
This desire is irrespective of who’s ruling in Beijing; it is a question of China’s national identity, which is inseparable from its conception of its historic territorial integrity.
Somehow, an affront to the Chinese is the worst possible thing that can happen. What other country goes on and on about their "hurt feelings"?
The Han are perhaps the most racist, supremacist culture on the planet. They've virtually obliterated other ethnic groups in China, as they are doing to the Uyghurs. What we translate as "Middle Kingdom" could more accurately be termed as "Center of the Universe", the only civilization, surrounded by barbarians.
It's interesting that the Chinese take pride in being one of the oldest cultures on the planet and assert how great China is, yet they cling to the notion of a "Century of Humiliation". If they were so great, how did Europe humiliate them so?
By the way, the wealth that the opium trade transferred from China to Europe was about equal to the wealth that had previously been transferred from Europe to China for silks and spices.
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