As China prepares to invade Taiwan, a reality check: sitting on the sidelines won't help us
It was a point reinforced by US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth at the Shangri-La defence conference in Singapore in June. And it is a warning the Australian prime minister will have in the back of his mind: China is both a critical economic partner and an escalating security threat. If the People's Republic of China chooses to take Taiwan by force, it will not be a straightforward island invasion but one that is likely to lead to a wide-raging Indo-Pacific conflict with significant implications for Australia.
Xi's PRC views Taiwan as a 'a sacred and inseparable part of China's territory'. China's PLA has become one of the planet's most capable forces – with a growing nuclear arsenal, the world's largest standing army and navy, and a sophisticated rocket force. This rapid growth in military strength, which some could equate with China's growing economic and security weight globally as a superpower, has been coupled with a sharp deterioration in relations between Taiwan and the PRC. China has suspended official communications and restricted tourism.
China has also ramped up its military operations in and around Taiwan. Following then US speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan in August 2022, China launched its largest ever military exercises in the area, including ballistic missiles flying over Taiwan. These coercive demonstrations, paired with increasingly hostile rhetoric, have now become the norm.
Last year, China's military published a simulated graphic of missiles hitting Taiwan. At the Shangri-La dialogue that same year, China's current Defence Minister, Admiral Dong Jun, said Taiwan's ruling Democratic Progressive Party will be 'nailed to the pillar of shame in history' and that 'anyone who dares separate Taiwan from China will only end up in self-destruction'.
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It is within this context that Hegseth, at the Shangri-La dialogue, referred to the threat from China as 'imminent'. My recent trips to Taiwan indicate there is mixed sentiment in the security community as to the likelihood of a Chinese military invasion. In late 2023, then Democratic Progressive Party president Tsai Ing-wen said China's current economic and political challenges would probably hold it back from attempting an invasion in the near term.
In May this year, however, Taiwan's current president – while generally reticent to talk on the prospects of an invasion – compared Taiwan's present plight with 1930s Europe. A September 2024 poll of 1200 Taiwanese people conducted by the country's Institute for National Security and Defence Research showed that, while most saw China's 'territorial ambitions as a serious threat', they did not think this was likely to manifest in an attack on Taiwan.
This view is perhaps understandable. Taiwan's geography, shallow coastal waters, mountainous terrain and limited invasion windows due to weather make any military assault a monumental task. Such a challenge that the US abandoned plans to invade Taiwan during World War II under Operation Causeway.
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