There are growing concerns that China will be capable of carrying out an invasion of Taiwan by 2025. This concern is raised by Taiwan’s defence minister clarifying that the island could face the wrath of the dragon.
Chiu Kuo-cheng issued the warning after almost 150 Chinese warplanes operated in international airspace near Taiwan between Friday and Monday.
“The current situation is really the most dangerous I have seen in my more than 40 years in the military,” Chiu said in a question-and-answer session with lawmakers about a NT$240bn ($8.6bn) special defence budget for anti-ship missiles and warships.
“If they want to attack now, they are already capable. But they have to calculate at what cost it would come and what results it would have,” Chiu said. “From 2025, they will already have lowered the cost and the losses to the lowest possible level, so . . . they will have the complete capability.”
On Tuesday Tsai Ing-wen, the president, issued an urgent appeal to stand with Taiwan. Other democracies “should remember that if Taiwan were to fall, the consequences would be catastrophic for regional peace and the democratic alliance system. It would signal that in today’s global contest of values, authoritarianism has the upper hand over democracy,” she wrote in Foreign Affairs
Is a Chinese Invasion inevitable?
Recently an article published by Chinese website Sohu serialised wars China would likely engage in from 2020 to 2060.
The Sohu report maintains the country would first go to war with Taiwan between 2020 and 2025 to “unify” it with the mainland while sending the Taiwan government an “ultimatum” in 2020. It describes war with Taiwan as a “three-month ordeal” without the US and Japan’s intervention.
China’s President Xi Jinping had earlier threatened Taiwan with “consequences” amid its growing closeness with the United States and the repeated arms sale by the US government to the island nation. Xi had said Taiwan could be unified with China by force “if necessary”.
US – JAPAN Against China
A few months back US and Japan issued a joint statement in which it was stated that both nations “underscore the importance of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.”
Some analysts say the joint statement signals Tokyo’s willingness to help defend Taiwan against China if needed, but only in support of a U.S.-led campaign.
Taiwan quickly welcomed the joint statement.
“Our government is happy to see that the United States and Japan are concerned about the current situation of regional security,” the Foreign Affairs Ministry in Taipei said in a statement April 17.
“We will build on existing solid foundations and work closely with the United States, Japan and other countries with similar ideas to defend the democratic system, shared values and a rule-based international order and work together to maintain peace, stability and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific region,” the ministry’s statement said.
Dragon Domination?
Over the past year, Beijing has dramatically increased air and naval operations close to Taiwan. According to Taiwan’s defence ministry, 672 Chinese warplanes have flown into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone this year, far outpacing the 380 recorded in 2020.
However, some US officials and many experts have played down the significance of the People’s Liberation Army flights, saying that they were not the prelude to war but aimed instead at intimidating Taiwan.
General Mark Milley, chair of the US joint chiefs of staff, in June said the probability of a Chinese attack on Taiwan was “probably low, in the immediate, near-term future”.
Still the Sohu report, should be a seen as a sign of things to come given the rapid growth in China’s military prowess.
The report mentions how disintegration of India, “reconquest” of Southern Tibet, conflict over Outer Mongolia and an eventual war with Russia is the end game for China to establish its supremacy.
(Inputs Financial Times, VoA)
(Featured image Reuters)
