Paul Huang, interviewed over at Steve Hsu's Manifold (sidebar, but transcript here) believes that the Taiwanese at all levels - the politicians, the academics, the military, and the general populace - are completely unrealistic about what their true situation is vis. China. They believe their chip capability, a legitimate but single card to play, insulates them from all danger. They draw inspiration from Ukraine fending off Russia but are do not discuss that A) Russia is not China and Ukraine is not Taiwan; B) Whatever results from the current war, Ukraine has had an enormous exodus of people, has had much of its economy destroyed, and has had large areas simply destroyed. The Taiwanese are not aware of this at any level. They believe they can hold off China militarily (they can't, not close) for long enough that the US will rescue it (not likely, and likely not even possible, as evidenced by the rapid depletion of help for Ukraine). Politicians buy overpriced American military equipment in order to be re-elected, but it does not meet their needs. Everyone talks about how difficult it will be for China to actually take over Taiwan because of the superiority of Taiwanese character and the general determination to resist.
Paul Huang: Yes. If you look at the history, no, no country, no nation ever actually fought till the last man or woman. It just never happened. Usually you surrender, you capitulate at a threshold of say, something like 20 to 30%. After you lose 20 to 30% of your population, you're going to surrender.
This is just what's going to happen, right? There's like, no matter how brave, how, how ferociously you, you, you, you think you are, that's, you're just going to, your country, your nation, your, your tribe, it's not going to fight till the very last person, right? And you look at the history, like, it's like Imperial Japan in World War II, right?
All their major cities were burned to the ground. Millions of civilians died in the firebombing and the atomic bombing. And they surrendered. That's Japan. That's, that's like, we're talking about a militarist society at that point. They surrendered. As well as any other cases in history, but this is not something that Taiwan in Taiwan's defense that people talk about.
"What happens after the first day of a war?" Is not discussed, and to even bring it up brands you as a Chinese propagandist. The Lesson of Cowslip's Warren is forgotten. The only things that need to be said are the only things that are not being said.
China does not need a strategy except to wait until the moment is right. They keep improving and upgrading their military at all levels, Taiwan does not, and so the gap increases every year. There is no bright line that Taiwan could cross to provoke them. They can ignore it all until their moment is right. There is no need to hurry. The US, perhaps, could cross a bright line.
It is true that once a nation has a capability they find it hard to resist using it, and so China might be impatient and unwise. But that will not change things much.
At the end they discuss US interference in elections, and compare to Ukraine 2014. Both noted that the US did put effort into influencing the outcome, but such things always have to start from a baseline of balance and uncertain outcome. Nations and factions within them have an inertia, and even massive intervention can only move the dial a little. As for the upcoming elections...
Paul Huang: course. Yeah, of course. They, they, they, like, you know, within Taiwan, like, people always, like, speculate, you know, the United States favors Lai Ching-te, you know, the United States favors who. Nah, this is just not going to be the case, okay? The Biden administration's policy toward Taiwan is so passive, so reactive, so, like, I don't think they even care.
Right.
Steve Hsu: Okay. So, there's no CIA, not going to be any CIA intervention in the election in favor of one candidate over the other.
Paul Huang: Oh, I know that. I know the kind of guy that they send to Taiwan, right? They're not going to, they don't even speak Chinese. How can they influence elections there? I'm
Steve Hsu: Well, okay. Let me ask you a related question. Do you think the color revolution in Hong Kong was at all, even in part, stimulated by U.S. intelligence services?
Paul Huang: No, there's no evidence of that. The U.S. intelligence community, the CIA, that is just never, it's not capable of organizing anything of that sort. See, they're just not, sorry to say. (Italics mine.)
Read 'em and weep, as they used to say.
7 comments:
“…so the gap increases every year.”
Yes, until it doesn’t. China is up against a demographic cliff that is steeper than most imagine. That may mean they’ll act because not acting means losing the ability to act. But if they are motivated to delay — by Ukraine, by the Japanese recent military expansion into border islands near Taiwan, by economic concerns, whatever — time will soon run out.
When did we start subscribing to the notion that we could fix everything in the world, and create systems that would make everybody cooperate? It seems to pop up in cults through the centuries, but one whale of a lot of people bought into that dogma this past century.
Maybe we should try building a tower to reach heaven instead--it might be easier and safer.
Book group is reading Easterly's The Tyranny of Experts which discusses this exact problem. The Hayek vs Myrdal foundational argument that smart, technical people can devise solutions that will work across a variety of cultures and solve the problems of the poor. Except they don't and enabling individual rights seems to work much better, but has not been US policy since 1949.
Wars and rumors of wars. Nation rising against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. Howsomedever... https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+46&version=NIV
Morris Chang, founder of Taiwan Semiconductor, keeps talking about how difficult & expensive it will be to make high-end chips in the US..costs too high, skills lacking, people don't want to work hard enough, etc. I get the impression he'd really rather not be doing this (the Arizona plant).."But Chang said he can’t understand why Washington wants to move so much manufacturing from efficient Asian sites to the United States"
While Biden's subsidies may be shipping a lot of money TSM's way due to their Arizona plant, I believe that some of the provisions in the bill actually *raise* costs thru their wage requirements, on-site daycare requirements, etc.
https://apnews.com/article/taiwan-tsmc-processor-chip-china-chang-smartphone-f4831293c2c9a528cab0958ba6dad0ff
I suggest you listen to retired Colonel Douglas MacGregor on this. There are people walking the planet telling us that Ukraine can beat and is beating Russia. The facts really don't sustain that at all but it's hard to believe how thoroughly the military industrial complex is pulling the wool over people's eyes.
Have a listen to his youtube or bitchute analyses of Ukraine and the possibilities about a war with China.
http://www.douglasmacgregor.com/
Can anyone name a war in which a country lost 30% of its population?
WWII had the highest casualty rate; the Allies lost more in population. Even so, the death rate did not reach 20 to 30%. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties#/media/File:World_War_II_Casualties.svg
A death rate on that scale would be unprecedented. It would make the aggressor an international pariah.
The world has seen multiple instances of determined countries repelling invaders. Afghanistan. Vietnam. Attempting to invade another country often leads to significant political changes for the invader.
Can anyone name a journalist that is a supporter of his/her country's military, who isn't a military employee?
The Taiwan Strait is roughly analogous to the English Channel. I don't think naval technology has advanced all that much since WWII in terms of moving armies from point A to point B. It is, however, nearly impossible, I would think, to pull off a feint these days, given satellite surveillance, night vision capacity, etc.
Drones change the equation. Ukrainians have been damaging Russian battleships with drones. You don't need to sink a battleship or carrier to reduce its contribution to a battle.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/14/asia/taiwan-china-military-drones-unveiled-hnk-intl/index.html
Nagorno-Karabakh demonstrated that drones can take out heavy machinery, such as tanks: https://www.csis.org/analysis/air-and-missile-war-nagorno-karabakh-lessons-future-strike-and-defense
When was the last time the Chinese army fought a war? There's a huge difference between training and fighting.
All of which is to say, no one knows what the outcome would be. However, I can think of a number of terrible wars which were started by aggressors who mistakenly thought it would be over quickly.
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