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Dis
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Las Vegas, Nevada
Feb 2000
time: 21:32
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quote:
Originally posted by Mordoch
Right now China lacks the amphibious lift capabilities to actually take Taiwan right now, and an invasion would fail even without US intervention for the immediate future. When looking at the 2010+ timeframe, a sucessfuly Chinese invasion of Taiwan suceeding without US intervention becomes fairly plausible. Taiwan needs to agreesively modernize and otherwise improve their military in order to prevent that possibility.
I'll go ahead and post some points on this subject I made recently on another forum.
The major reason China can't simply take over Taiwan is due to the fact that Taiwan enjoys the defensive advantage of having a large streach of ocean between them. With regards to amphibious landing operations against Taiwan, Taiwan's small size actually works against China. If Taiwan were the size of England, there would be alot of coastline for Taiwan's army and navy to protect and defend, but Taiwan's coastline means that China has little chance of simply sneaking by Taiwan's defenses and pulling off a landing.
A Chinese invasion of Taiwan is even further complicated by the fact that the western coast of Taiwan is mostly covered by tidal mudflats that streach for miles off the coast and ensure that any transport crossing the area would get stuck, while much of the eastern part of Taiwan is cliffs rather than beaches. This leaves less than 20% of the coastline as viable for invasion and this is before you factor in that only a portion of these remaining beaches are going to be suitable for an amphibious landing. The Island of Taiwan itself has around 1,100 kilometers of coastline (its a little difficult to calculate exactly since the statistics I found included the outlying islands.) Since less than 20% of this coastline is usable for an invasion beachhead, this means that Taiwan's standing army of 200,000 could be deployed with over 910 soldier per every kilometer of Taiwan. If Taiwan's reserves are all mobilized, (which actually are 1.5 million troops) you are looking at more than 7730 soldier per every kilometer of usable invasion coastline.
This number gets alot higher when you consider that the Taiwanese army is aware that the most viable invasion targets are the parts of Taiwan closest to Mainland China and the defense of the most attractive invasion beaches are also prioritized. The small size of Taiwan as an island means that it doesn't take defensive forces that long to react to amphibious landings and move to reinforce other units.
As the following source notes ""China would take at least 48 hours, contingent on good weather, to make a round trip to fetch reinforcements, within which Taiwan would have successfully marshalled her troops to the battlefield."
http://www.mindef.gov.sg/safti/poin...3/Vol29_2/7.htm
This delay before reinforcements arrive means that in order to hold a beachhead, China would realisticly need at least 100,000 troops to sucessfully land on the invasion target on Taiwan, (this is assuming a surprise attack with most of Taiwan's reserves not mobilized yet) and getting them there safely is not that easy.
Taiwan's significantly sized navy and air force should certainly be able to launch some anti-shipping missiles and sink some transports early in the conflict. This is double whammy for China as not only are the troops and supplies on board lost, but that transport can't be used to provide future reinforcements.
Besides its airforce and navy, Taiwan can also launch anti-shipping missiles from land bases, and since missiles such as the Hsiung-Feng II has roughly an 80 kilometer range (I've seen more recent evidence suggesting this range may have been extended even for the ordinary missiles of this type), they can start attacking the invading armada from quite a distance. Taiwan also has the M110A2 Self-Propelled Howitzer which has a range of more than 18 miles, as well as the LT-2000 Rocket lauched artillerly system which has a range of 28 miles and can be very lethal against the sort of tighly concentrated armada necessary to overwhelm a beach's defenses. Taiwan can also stick sea minefields in front of the possible invasion beaches as well as have its helicopter use their Hellfire anti-tank missiles to lethal effect against the invasion forces. The mines are a particular problem as they will either delay the invasion while Chinese forces clear them, leaving the transports exposed at sea and giving Taiwan more time to react, or China will lose a huge number of ships with the "Russian penal battalion method" of clearing mines. When the force get close, Taiwan plans to utilize their tank's main gun to target landing craft before they get too close to the beach, and anti-tank missiles such as the Javelin could be used in this role as well.
The additional problem for China is that even if they accomplish the task of landing 100,000 men with the initial force, the transport force would have taken substancial attrition from Taiwan's defenses and many of the transports will need to carry additional supplies for the existing troops that had already landed. If China can't supply the beachhead with enough reinforcement, the invasion force would be overwhelmed by Taiwan's superior numbers that could be quickly deployed by this spot. If the invasion beachhead was destroyed, another fullscale invasion of Taiwan would not be a viable option for China for years untill all of the transport losses have been replaced. These are the sorts of problems China faces invading Taiwan. |
where did you find those stats on Taiwan's military strength? I admit I'm surprised they had so much. How can such a small island support such a large military. I take it they have mandatory service then.
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Lancer
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Oregon Coast, USA! or Bohol, Philippines!
Apr 1999
time: 05:32
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The Philippines is allied with Tiawan. If China attacks it will raise the ire of the Phil military, so they will never attack, they're scared...as well they should be.
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Mordoch
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Denver, Colorado
Jan 2002
time: 05:32
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quote:
Originally posted by Dissident
where did you find those stats on Taiwan's military strength? I admit I'm surprised they had so much. How can such a small island support such a large military. I take it they have mandatory service then. |
The info can be found in these two links.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/milit.../army-intro.htm
http://www.globalsecurity.org/milit...taiwan/afrc.htm
They do have manditory service. While they are a small island, they have a substancial population with their current numbers being over 22 million. When you consider they are in many ways in a similar position to Israel, and Taiwan has decent economy of its own, the fact they can support such a large military makes more sense.
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Lancer
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Oregon Coast, USA! or Bohol, Philippines!
Apr 1999
time: 05:32
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Having aged Philipine F5's puttering around over one's troops, ready to drop randomly from the sky at any moment, is enough to strike fear into any army!
The Phil AF has to turn their F5's slowly, less they fall to pieces in flight. No sharp turns allowed!
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Mordoch
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Denver, Colorado
Jan 2002
time: 05:32
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quote:
Originally posted by Dissident
Now if China had some airborne troops they would have some more options. Of course to use airborne it helps to have air superiority. They need to improve that. Just a straight beach invasion isn't going to work.
In fact, in light of this new info. I can't see much working without decimating the infrastructure of Taiwan, making an invasion worthless. |
Of course having sufficient airborne troops to make a difference is going to require one heck of alot of air transports. Besides the strong difficulties gaining total air superiority, the other big problem is a large number of anti-aircraft missile systems on a small island.
Transport planes are large planes with huge radar signatures that also move rather slowly, with the Chinese ILYUSHIN IL-76 CANDID having a speed of 560 miles per hour. The slow speed and lack of manuverability of these transports make them highly vulnerable to SAMs. Such a slow speed gives anti-aircraft missiles quite a bit of time to hit their targets. Air transports don't just need to worry about shorter ranged air defense systems such as the Avenger, but also longer ranged systems such as the I-Hawk. Each I-Hawk battery has 18 tripple launchers with a total of 54 missiles per battery.
http://www.periscope.ucg.com/mdb-sm...rmy/index.shtml
The I-Hawk has a range of over 20 nautical miles, an over 300 pound warhead, and the ability for a bettery to fire a missile every 3 seconds. Taiwan currently has 20 I-Hawk batteries. http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/hawk.htm
The PAC-2 200 missiles that are loaded onto the 6 launchers based near Tapei have a max range of 160 km when used in an anti-aircraft role. Taiwan currently has 3 batteries and is planning in the future to purchase an additional 3 PAC-3 Patriot Missile batteries while upgrading the existing ones to the PAC 3 standard. These missiles are capable of being used in an anti-aircraft role as well as their primary designation as an anti-missile defense system.
China also has to worry about air defense systems such as the Chaparral air defense system, and the Tien Kung I anti-aircraft missile with a range of 100 km. Taiwan also has the Sparrow enhanced Skyguard air defense system with a range of 11 miles. The Antelope Air defense system with a range of 18 kilometers is also likely to play a role. This is a recently deployed domesticly produced anti-air aircraft system armed with Tien Chien-I missiles. When you factor in the Tien Kung II missile with a max range range of 200 km, and the anti-aircraft guns Taiwan has, the question becomes whether any of the Chinese transports will even sucessfully reach their targets in Taiwan.
The basic problem is that Taiwan is a small island that doesn't give you that much room to drop troops. Given the trend is towards air defense missiles with longer and longer ranges, and I expect Taiwan to aquire plenty of additional anti-aircraft missile systems in the future, the odds of it becoming practical to move in troops by air don't look good. While China may be able to destroy some of these systems, destroying them all would certainly not be a simple task.
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Dis
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Las Vegas, Nevada
Feb 2000
time: 21:32
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quote:
Originally posted by Mordoch
Of course having sufficient airborne troops to make a difference is going to require one heck of alot of air transports. Besides the strong difficulties gaining total air superiority, the other big problem is a large number of anti-aircraft missile systems on a small island.
Transport planes are large planes with huge radar signatures that also move rather slowly, with the Chinese ILYUSHIN IL-76 CANDID having a speed of 560 miles per hour. The slow speed and lack of manuverability of these transports make them highly vulnerable to SAMs. Such a slow speed gives anti-aircraft missiles quite a bit of time to hit their targets. Air transports don't just need to worry about shorter ranged air defense systems such as the Avenger, but also longer ranged systems such as the I-Hawk. Each I-Hawk battery has 18 tripple launchers with a total of 54 missiles per battery.
http://www.periscope.ucg.com/mdb-sm...rmy/index.shtml
The I-Hawk has a range of over 20 nautical miles, an over 300 pound warhead, and the ability for a bettery to fire a missile every 3 seconds. Taiwan currently has 20 I-Hawk batteries. http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/hawk.htm
The PAC-2 200 missiles that are loaded onto the 6 launchers based near Tapei have a max range of 160 km when used in an anti-aircraft role. Taiwan currently has 3 batteries and is planning in the future to purchase an additional 3 PAC-3 Patriot Missile batteries while upgrading the existing ones to the PAC 3 standard. These missiles are capable of being used in an anti-aircraft role as well as their primary designation as an anti-missile defense system.
China also has to worry about air defense systems such as the Chaparral air defense system, and the Tien Kung I anti-aircraft missile with a range of 100 km. Taiwan also has the Sparrow enhanced Skyguard air defense system with a range of 11 miles. The Antelope Air defense system with a range of 18 kilometers is also likely to play a role. This is a recently deployed domesticly produced anti-air aircraft system armed with Tien Chien-I missiles. When you factor in the Tien Kung II missile with a max range range of 200 km, and the anti-aircraft guns Taiwan has, the question becomes whether any of the Chinese transports will even sucessfully reach their targets in Taiwan.
The basic problem is that Taiwan is a small island that doesn't give you that much room to drop troops. Given the trend is towards air defense missiles with longer and longer ranges, and I expect Taiwan to aquire plenty of additional anti-aircraft missile systems in the future, the odds of it becoming practical to move in troops by air don't look good. While China may be able to destroy some of these systems, destroying them all would certainly not be a simple task. |
If China only had the military the U.S. had. They could use intelligence (which I would hope is better than the U.S.'s  ) to locate these SAM and anti-air sites, and then use cruise missiles to destroy them. This is where China's lack of technology hurts them the most.
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Geronimo
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st cloud USA
Jan 1970
time: 05:32
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Mordoch's info makes a Taiwan invasion sound exactly as stupid as invading switzerland would be if it was scooped out of europe and dropped into the ocean as an island, except that Tiawan has a navy! Why is the threat of a chinese invasion taken so seriously when it sounds even less practical than do things like a U.S. invasion of Cuba which would seem to be a far simpler affair but which nobody really entertains as a plausible eventuality?
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Mordoch
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Denver, Colorado
Jan 2002
time: 05:32
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quote:
Originally posted by GePap
A single nuke of good power (lets say 300 kilotons), would hardly "destroy" Taiwan. Fine, lots of collateral damage would occur, but if that base if away from heavily populated areas, why, it is always a politically sensitive but viable option. |
If you read the article about that airbase under a mountain again, you'll note that the steel reinforced doors covering the entrance tunnel are supposed to withstand even a nuclear blast. Even if it can't withstand a direct blast, if the weapon is off even slightly, all its probably going to do is collapse that entrance. Taiwan has multiple entrances into each airbase. They actually have a total of two airbases build under mountains, which can't even be taken out easily through the use of nuclear weapons.
Last edited by Mordoch on 08-07-2004 at 10:44
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Mordoch
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Denver, Colorado
Jan 2002
time: 05:32
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quote:
Originally posted by Ted Striker
Again it's too hard.
Taiwan has way too many anti-ship missles that they could pick off any ship that gets close enough to enforce a blockade.
Attrition is the only way, and that's assuming the US and/or Japan doesn't resupply. If Taiwan gets a resupplier of antiship missles China can never beat them.
It is the equivalent of Constantinople and Switzerland. |
Actually Taiwan has a shitload of anti-shipping missiles. The current total is well over 2,000, and some of the major ones are domesticly produced, so Taiwan can almost certainly build more if need even with a blockade ongoing. Taiwan also recognizes the fact that with China as a threat, you can never have too many anti-shipping missiles to deal with an ampibious invasion. China is likely to run out of warships before Taiwan runs out of anti-shipping missiles. China can use their submarines, but Taiwan retains some ASW capabilities, which are being bolstered by the future aquisition of 4 Kidd Class Destroyers and some P3 Orion patrol planes. The other obvious problem with a blockade is it gives the US plenty of time to react, and if the US commits its sub and surface forces to ASW work, the mostly rather obsolete Chinese subfleet is going to be submerged permantly.
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