Could this be the weapon that pushes China to an invasion of Taiwan? (along with all of the ICBM silos being constructed). Personally, I feel all that China would need to do, at this point in history, is to threaten nukes on any nation who might intervene after a first strike, in order to thwart them.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/4 ... Xd959Y3F_g

Great, just great. Mao's speech about the acceptability of nuclear war which scared both the Soviets and the US still haunts us.

Buckeyetech wrote:

Could this be the weapon that pushes China to an invasion of Taiwan? (along with all of the ICBM silos being constructed). Personally, I feel all that China would need to do, at this point in history, is to threaten nukes on any nation who might intervene after a first strike, in order to thwart them.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/4 ... Xd959Y3F_g

Threaten nukes against the US who currently has 10 times as many and that are a hell of a lot more protected from Chinese attack? Millions of Americans, Aussies and Japanese might die but closer to a billion Chinese would in the counterstrike... Perhaps that doesn't matter to Chinese politicians...

I love how the word hypersonic is thrown around to make it seem superior. Hitler's V2 rocket was also a hypersonic orbital weapon.

The US has thousands of "hypersonic" interceptor weapons. Most of the long range SAM missiles reach hypersonic speeds and can reach the altitude to qualify as space.

ICBM missiles from the US and Russia have had MIRV or Multiple Independent Reentry Vehicle for many decades. These can maneuver and hit multiple targets.

I could see 99% of the weapons launched at the continental US being shot down. I could see 99% of the weapons launched at mainland China hitting their target.

There is no way to stop China from taking Taiwan if they decided to absolutely do it. The USA is committed to protect them so any such strike by China would need to be over whleming and complete such that there was no ability t assist and defend any remaining Taiwanese forces. I don't even know if the USA would fulfill its obligation but hope it would.

In my mind the mistake was made decades ago in Nixon's time to not recognize Taiwan's independence and now any such independence is doomed without he utter collapse of the current Chinese government.

The ONLY thing stopping China from forcibly taking Taiwan is that it would instantly become a public and international pariah. Dooming it economically as nation after nation cut off trade with it. It would greatly impact the world of course but the nations would react and have no choice in doing so. Chine instead is trying to "encourathreaten" Taiwan so its people elect a government that will allow it to assume control legitimately. But honestly that will not happen with how everyone on the island can see their neighbor is.

RJMAZ wrote:

I love how the word hypersonic is thrown around to make it seem superior. .

Yeah, I have to admit the more I didn't think they were that big a deal but apparently the key thing is the maneuverability and lower altitude they can operate at.
This and interesting article that decently introduces their "benefits" (I swear the next world war will be over in twenty minutes and no one will know it started or ended.)
https://www.forbes.com/sites/sebastienr ... -big-deal/

Tugg

Tugger wrote:

There is no way to stop China from taking Taiwan if they decided to absolutely do it. The USA is committed to protect them so any such strike by China would need to be over whleming and complete such that there was no ability t assist and defend any remaining Taiwanese forces. I don't even know if the USA would fulfill its obligation but hope it would.

The US has spent decades with defense budgets at multiples of what was required. The US spends more each year on black programs than what countries such as France, Germany, UK, Japan and Australia spend on their entire yearly defense budget.

These countries purchase, maintain and crew so much equipment with their yearly budgets. To think the US spends that much just on black programs should be scary to most people. The Chinese by comparison can't even manufacturer a computer or phone CPU as powerful as a 10 year old intel CPU. People do not realise they import every CPU to assemble phones. China has effectively had sanctions on them for decades in terms of high end technology. Some things you can not reverse engineer.

This is the war that the US has spent the last 70 years preparing for.

The US black programs bring up an interesting aspect of preparation. The fact is that most countries are generally pretty straightforward about their militaries. You might not know exactly how capable they are, but you’ve got an idea.

The US…not quite.

For example, we all saw the wreckage of an unknown stealth helicopter in the Bin Laden raid. More than a decade later, still no such helicopter actually “exists”

Or the F117, the retired stealth aircraft. Except for all those sightings in the desert. And that alleged sighting in the Middle East. Oh and of course that time just last month when 2 of the “retired” aircraft landed at an airport that gets airline service.

Whenever I see reports like this one, I can’t help but wonder how surprised US intelligence really is.

Tugger wrote:

In my mind the mistake was made decades ago in Nixon's time to not recognize Taiwan's independence and now any such independence is doomed without he utter collapse of the current Chinese government.

The problem was that in the 70's, Taiwan had an authoritarian government and was not a democracy. After WW2, there was a civil war in China and the winner got mainland China and the loser got Taiwan. Neither were interested in democracy. My father-in-law fought for the loser in that war.

RJMAZ wrote:

The US has spent decades with defense budgets at multiples of what was required. The US spends more each year on black programs than what countries such as France, Germany, UK, Japan and Australia spend on their entire yearly defense budget.

...

This is the war that the US has spent the last 70 years preparing for.

Why does everyone think this will be great war which is easy to win? It did not work in Korea, Vietnam and the Middle East as well as with the trade war. Nobody is interested in a US-China war because the casualties at all sides will be enormous and the side effects catastrophic, including for US multinationals like Apple, Tesla, GM. On top of that allies like Japan, France and Germany will stay out of the conflict, the UK will be all show and no go (they had to borrow US F-35 aircraft for their aircraft carrier as they have a carrier but no planes) while Australia will provide some cannon fodder as they don't have much else.

Anyway, this weapon is under test. If it works, deployment will be in 15-20 years and by that time the world will look completely different. And on top of that, a weapon like this makes no sense in a conflict involving Taiwan. Cheaper weapons will do the job. Remember: Communist Russia lost the Cold War because they went broke, not because of any direct diplomacy nor military conflict.

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

Perhaps that doesn't matter to Chinese politicians...

of course not
There is a reason why some 40 million died between 1959 and 1961.
Khrushchev offered help but the great chairman turned him down while millions were dying.

AngMoh wrote:

Why does everyone think this will be great war which is easy to win? It did not work in Korea, Vietnam and the Middle East as well as with the trade war.

Because there isn't a land border where tanks and soldiers can just cross the border like in every war you mentioned. Every Chinese ship will be sunk and every aircraft shot down as soon as it nears Taiwan. Like shooting fish in a barrel. It boggles my mind how people think the Chinese can just send a million soldiers across 100km of water.

Are they building a secret tunnel? Do they have a fleet of giant submarines that can fit thousands soldiers each?

It take hours to load a ship with soldiers and a few hours to cross the strait. All of the autonomous underwear tech the US Navy has will create an impenetrable minefield. Not to mention the US could easily maintain hundreds of aircraft over Taiwan at any moment for 24 hours a day for months on end.

AngMoh wrote:

Tugger wrote:

In my mind the mistake was made decades ago in Nixon's time to not recognize Taiwan's independence and now any such independence is doomed without he utter collapse of the current Chinese government.

The problem was that in the 70's, Taiwan had an authoritarian government and was not a democracy. After WW2, there was a civil war in China and the winner got mainland China and the loser got Taiwan. Neither were interested in democracy. My father-in-law fought for the loser in that war.

RJMAZ wrote:

The US has spent decades with defense budgets at multiples of what was required. The US spends more each year on black programs than what countries such as France, Germany, UK, Japan and Australia spend on their entire yearly defense budget.

...

This is the war that the US has spent the last 70 years preparing for.

Why does everyone think this will be great war which is easy to win? It did not work in Korea, Vietnam and the Middle East as well as with the trade war. Nobody is interested in a US-China war because the casualties at all sides will be enormous and the side effects catastrophic, including for US multinationals like Apple, Tesla, GM. On top of that allies like Japan, France and Germany will stay out of the conflict, the UK will be all show and no go (they had to borrow US F-35 aircraft for their aircraft carrier as they have a carrier but no planes) while Australia will provide some cannon fodder as they don't have much else.

Anyway, this weapon is under test. If it works, deployment will be in 15-20 years and by that time the world will look completely different. And on top of that, a weapon like this makes no sense in a conflict involving Taiwan. Cheaper weapons will do the job. Remember: Communist Russia lost the Cold War because they went broke, not because of any direct diplomacy nor military conflict.

You do know that not all of the initial batch of F-35’s for the UK have not been delivered yet? Not cancelled, just not delivered yet, plus joint ops with allies is one of the carriers roles, hence recent trials with V-22’s with the second one as it had been commissioned, yes more than one of them, not that the UK has any plans to buy that particular type. Same as saying the US won’t get involved either because no Ford Class, or F-35C’s etc. ‘A carrier but no planes’ is what very ill informed people here in the UK, usually on the pacifist and/or hard left have still sneered as if it’s 5 or more years ago.

Truth is we have no idea how the US would respond if the PRC really went for it and invaded Taiwan, if they felt compelled to, by their logic or even to distract from serious internal problems.
Well we in the UK saw that happen nearly 40 years ago and responded militarily, despite many writing off the idea that was even possible. Including most of the US DoD.
But with China and Taiwan it’s very different since for all the military power of the US, there is the strategic nuclear dimension, China, after years of maintaining for their size a small strategic nuclear force even relative to the post Cold War US, has more recently been expanding it, particularly with SSBN’s.

Getting beyond the stated minimum deterrent posture, to presumably deter, make more uncertain, the US from intervening in an invasion, rather like the issue in the Cold War, or question, ‘would any US President really risk Chicago for Hamburg, or In particular major cities on the West Coast with any US threat to China’. This is not like any of the other post Cold War US led interventions, this time the potential enemy does have WMDs and not just some chemicals or primitive old shorter range rockets but yes, the hypersonics that do exist, MIRV’s reentering.

Mao was as usual talking nonsense when he proclaimed nuclear weapons to be a ‘paper Tiger’, for someone who thought that it was he who started their program and the USSR starting to limit help in this area was a factor in the Sino-Soviet split.
Then the likely unacceptability for the public to accept heavy US casualties, quite apart from the nuclear dimension, the last time PRC and US and Allied forces fought was Korea, a war that became very unpopular in the US, not to the extent of Vietnam but it was a factor in Truman losing to Eisenhower.
Ironically in the PRC domestic opposition, for all the surveillance society and mass political incarceration camps, the regime do fear the population, the distraction option might become a reason to go after Taiwan.

Still, the much more aggressive PRC leader now does seem more prepared than even his predecessors to threaten Taiwan, this could lead to unintended consequences, misunderstandings that see a war between Taiwan and the PRC, all those large scale recent flights by the PLAAF towards Taiwan, could create a mistake and then a pretext for a conflict for example. It’s being done now to intimidate Taiwan, the method the PRC likely think will in the foreseeable future lead to in their mind, bring this renegade province to heel.

The US defense black budget in the trillions per year in my opinion proves its superiority. Not saying that's a good thing; just saying it's true.

GDB wrote:

Ironically in the PRC domestic opposition, for all the surveillance society and mass political incarceration camps, the regime do fear the population, the distraction option might become a reason to go after Taiwan.

If Taiwan does get support by the US or other allies, it would lead to international isolation of China, with resulting effects on its economy and, more critically, on its ability to keep the people fed.
I doubt that the new middle class in Beijing and other large cities would be willing to starve purely for the sake of an invasion of Taiwan. China is not Vietnam or Afghanistan, where people were used to a very simple lifestyle prior to the outbreak of war. The economic effects on the US would be bad, but it would be ten times worse in China.

USTraveler wrote:

The US defense black budget in the trillions per year in my opinion proves its superiority. Not saying that's a good thing; just saying it's true.

It is about $60-70 billion per year.

To put that into perspective, in just one year the black budget is large enough to fully develop the Eurofighter Typhoon and pay for nearly 300 aircraft.

Then in the next year there is enough money to pay for the entire F-22 development and 100 aircraft.

Then the third year is it enough money to buy 20 Virginia class submarines.

Then in the forth year it is enough money to development the B-2 bomber and produce 20 aircraft.

Then in the fifth year it can buy four Nimitz class aircraft carriers and 200 super Hornets on the flight deck.

Then in the sixth year the black budget could pay for the entire development of the space shuttle and four shuttles.

For instance in the Gulf War the USAF surprised the world with the F-117. A black program. Such a small number of aircraft completed dominated and made the existing US aircraft look out of date. I expect the USAF has black program aircraft that is vastly superior to the F-22 and F-35. I think undersea warfare is where a huge portion of the budget is being spent. Imagine hundreds of autonomous torpedo/submarines unleashed along the Chinese coast. Nothing could get through.

Please remember to provide links to credible sources when stating facts or make it clear you are expressing your opinion, thanks.

RJMAZ wrote:

USTraveler wrote:

The US defense black budget in the trillions per year in my opinion proves its superiority. Not saying that's a good thing; just saying it's true.

It is about $60-70 billion per year.

To put that into perspective, in just one year the black budget is large enough to fully develop the Eurofighter Typhoon and pay for nearly 300 aircraft.

Then in the next year there is enough money to pay for the entire F-22 development and 100 aircraft.

Then the third year is it enough money to buy 20 Virginia class submarines.

Then in the forth year it is enough money to development the B-2 bomber and produce 20 aircraft.

Then in the fifth year it can buy four Nimitz class aircraft carriers and 200 super Hornets on the flight deck.

Then in the sixth year the black budget could pay for the entire development of the space shuttle and four shuttles.

For instance in the Gulf War the USAF surprised the world with the F-117. A black program. Such a small number of aircraft completed dominated and made the existing US aircraft look out of date. I expect the USAF has black program aircraft that is vastly superior to the F-22 and F-35. I think undersea warfare is where a huge portion of the budget is being spent. Imagine hundreds of autonomous torpedo/submarines unleashed along the Chinese coast. Nothing could get through.

You couldn't be more correct...Everyone knows that's what's up ... It's all declassified now anyways...

Boringly some F-117 Blackhawks were seen just recently flying around Fresno CA.

TR3B style craft usually gets the most attention

RJMAZ wrote:

AngMoh wrote:

Why does everyone think this will be great war which is easy to win? It did not work in Korea, Vietnam and the Middle East as well as with the trade war.

Because there isn't a land border where tanks and soldiers can just cross the border like in every war you mentioned. Every Chinese ship will be sunk and every aircraft shot down as soon as it nears Taiwan. Like shooting fish in a barrel. It boggles my mind how people think the Chinese can just send a million soldiers across 100km of water.

Are they building a secret tunnel? Do they have a fleet of giant submarines that can fit thousands soldiers each?

It take hours to load a ship with soldiers and a few hours to cross the strait. All of the autonomous underwear tech the US Navy has will create an impenetrable minefield. Not to mention the US could easily maintain hundreds of aircraft over Taiwan at any moment for 24 hours a day for months on end.

You're operating under the assumption we will see the build up with ample time to react, the Chinese aren't that stupid. China is hoping to mitigate some of that preparation time by constantly running large scale drills aimed at the island.

Look at the dramatic increase in sorties aimed at Taiwan. If China makes it a standard to launch a hundred armed aircraft a day to fly through Taiwanese airspace, how much warning will anyone have when we find out one day its not a training mission?

Or if China decides to escalate Amphibious ops training off the coast with landing craft? One day those boats could be headed straight for Taiwan instead of being just another exercise.

Or what about the Naval traffic in the Straight of Taiwan? Make it a standard to keep 100+ vessels in the region, and one day they can flip on a dime be directed to support an invasion of Taiwan.

TLDR: They will keep a high drill ops tempo, so when an invasion of Taiwan finally does happen, no one will be in a good position to do anything to stop it.

Put a 30% tariff on the export of US coal and LNG to them. Call it a carbon tax. They are already rationing electricity and it's not yet winter.
It's not a ban it's just US being Green. Give them a hint that their behavior is tied to that tariff.
Since they banned Australian coal, I guess it'd be up to the Columbians to make up the differnce.


EXCLUSIVE China looks to lock in U.S. liquefied natural gas in energy crunch - Reuters.com

DigitalSea wrote:

RJMAZ wrote:

AngMoh wrote:

Why does everyone think this will be great war which is easy to win? It did not work in Korea, Vietnam and the Middle East as well as with the trade war.

Because there isn't a land border where tanks and soldiers can just cross the border like in every war you mentioned. Every Chinese ship will be sunk and every aircraft shot down as soon as it nears Taiwan. Like shooting fish in a barrel. It boggles my mind how people think the Chinese can just send a million soldiers across 100km of water.

Are they building a secret tunnel? Do they have a fleet of giant submarines that can fit thousands soldiers each?

It take hours to load a ship with soldiers and a few hours to cross the strait. All of the autonomous underwear tech the US Navy has will create an impenetrable minefield. Not to mention the US could easily maintain hundreds of aircraft over Taiwan at any moment for 24 hours a day for months on end.

You're operating under the assumption we will see the build up with ample time to react, the Chinese aren't that stupid. China is hoping to mitigate some of that preparation time by constantly running large scale drills aimed at the island.

Look at the dramatic increase in sorties aimed at Taiwan. If China makes it a standard to launch a hundred armed aircraft a day to fly through Taiwanese airspace, how much warning will anyone have when we find out one day its not a training mission?

Or if China decides to escalate Amphibious ops training off the coast with landing craft? One day those boats could be headed straight for Taiwan instead of being just another exercise.

Or what about the Naval traffic in the Straight of Taiwan? Make it a standard to keep 100+ vessels in the region, and one day they can flip on a dime be directed to support an invasion of Taiwan.

TLDR: They will keep a high drill ops tempo, so when an invasion of Taiwan finally does happen, no one will be in a good position to do anything to stop it.

That is what are well trained and equipped Taiwanese defence force is for, to meet that initial wave of attacks for the first 24 to 48 hours, before foreign help arrives. I truly doubt there is anyone who thinks that an invasion of Taiwan wouldn't ultimately be successful, but the damage to Taiwan and any Chinese cities within range would be devastating. The human cost would be higher still, China wouldn't play war by rules like western nations do, they will use everything and everything short of nukes, at least initially, to get a victory. The CCP will not care of the civilian or military casualties. Chinese dead will be martyrs, Taiwanese dead will mean nothing.

The only thing that stops China from doing it, as previously mentioned, is the utter devastation it will have the chinese economy when it gets cutoff from most of the rest of the world. The CCP fears it's population now in relatively good times, if truly hard times were to fall upon China, those fears may well be recognised.

LTEN11 wrote:

That is what are well trained and equipped Taiwanese defence force is for, to meet that initial wave of attacks for the first 24 to 48 hours, before foreign help arrives. I truly doubt there is anyone who thinks that an invasion of Taiwan wouldn't ultimately be successful, but the damage to Taiwan and any Chinese cities within range would be devastating. The human cost would be higher still, China wouldn't play war by rules like western nations do, they will use everything and everything short of nukes, at least initially, to get a victory. The CCP will not care of the civilian or military casualties. Chinese dead will be martyrs, Taiwanese dead will mean nothing.

The only thing that stops China from doing it, as previously mentioned, is the utter devastation it will have the chinese economy when it gets cutoff from most of the rest of the world. The CCP fears it's population now in relatively good times, if truly hard times were to fall upon China, those fears may well be recognised.

That's the real question, when does Beijing consider themselves economically insulated enough to launch such an attack? Countries don't always act out of rationally, especially rapidly growing ones that haven't had their power checked.

DigitalSea wrote:

LTEN11 wrote:

That is what are well trained and equipped Taiwanese defence force is for, to meet that initial wave of attacks for the first 24 to 48 hours, before foreign help arrives. I truly doubt there is anyone who thinks that an invasion of Taiwan wouldn't ultimately be successful, but the damage to Taiwan and any Chinese cities within range would be devastating. The human cost would be higher still, China wouldn't play war by rules like western nations do, they will use everything and everything short of nukes, at least initially, to get a victory. The CCP will not care of the civilian or military casualties. Chinese dead will be martyrs, Taiwanese dead will mean nothing.

The only thing that stops China from doing it, as previously mentioned, is the utter devastation it will have the chinese economy when it gets cutoff from most of the rest of the world. The CCP fears it's population now in relatively good times, if truly hard times were to fall upon China, those fears may well be recognised.

That's the real question, when does Beijing consider themselves economically insulated enough to launch such an attack? Countries don't always act out of rationally, especially rapidly growing ones that haven't had their power checked.

Can China feed it's population if no one is trading with them ? Their rogue fishing fleets may suddenly find themselves being fired upon by nations whose territorial waters they've invaded, instead of the threat coming from the fleets and their escorts. Can they supply enough energy to their grid without fuel imports ? They struggle to do that now without Australian coal, how will they cope when there aren't alternative suppliers. There are so many what ifs with China and for all the rhetoric they flood the world with, it's hard to know what to believe, or what the chinese population would think if they actually had a balanced view of the world instead of the one flooded with Chinese propoganda.

What does hypersonic actually mean? It seems to be the current buzzword.

LTEN11 wrote:

DigitalSea wrote:

LTEN11 wrote:

That is what are well trained and equipped Taiwanese defence force is for, to meet that initial wave of attacks for the first 24 to 48 hours, before foreign help arrives. I truly doubt there is anyone who thinks that an invasion of Taiwan wouldn't ultimately be successful, but the damage to Taiwan and any Chinese cities within range would be devastating. The human cost would be higher still, China wouldn't play war by rules like western nations do, they will use everything and everything short of nukes, at least initially, to get a victory. The CCP will not care of the civilian or military casualties. Chinese dead will be martyrs, Taiwanese dead will mean nothing.

The only thing that stops China from doing it, as previously mentioned, is the utter devastation it will have the chinese economy when it gets cutoff from most of the rest of the world. The CCP fears it's population now in relatively good times, if truly hard times were to fall upon China, those fears may well be recognised.

That's the real question, when does Beijing consider themselves economically insulated enough to launch such an attack? Countries don't always act out of rationally, especially rapidly growing ones that haven't had their power checked.

Can China feed it's population if no one is trading with them ? Their rogue fishing fleets may suddenly find themselves being fired upon by nations whose territorial waters they've invaded, instead of the threat coming from the fleets and their escorts. Can they supply enough energy to their grid without fuel imports ? They struggle to do that now without Australian coal, how will they cope when there aren't alternative suppliers. There are so many what ifs with China and for all the rhetoric they flood the world with, it's hard to know what to believe, or what the chinese population would think if they actually had a balanced view of the world instead of the one flooded with Chinese propoganda.

That’s the million dollar question. Would the US just look the other way if China were to invade à la the Russian annexation/invasion of Crimea? After all the US is much more dependent on Chinese goods than they are of theirs. (And yes, I’m aware of the Truman era doctrine of the defense of Taiwan).

Buckeyetech wrote:

LTEN11 wrote:

DigitalSea wrote:

That's the real question, when does Beijing consider themselves economically insulated enough to launch such an attack? Countries don't always act out of rationally, especially rapidly growing ones that haven't had their power checked.

Can China feed it's population if no one is trading with them ? Their rogue fishing fleets may suddenly find themselves being fired upon by nations whose territorial waters they've invaded, instead of the threat coming from the fleets and their escorts. Can they supply enough energy to their grid without fuel imports ? They struggle to do that now without Australian coal, how will they cope when there aren't alternative suppliers. There are so many what ifs with China and for all the rhetoric they flood the world with, it's hard to know what to believe, or what the chinese population would think if they actually had a balanced view of the world instead of the one flooded with Chinese propoganda.

That’s the million dollar question. Would the US just look the other way if China were to invade à la the Russian annexation/invasion of Crimea? After all the US is much more dependent on Chinese goods than they are of theirs. (And yes, I’m aware of the Truman era doctrine of the defense of Taiwan).

It's a lot easier to intervene in Taiwan than it would be in Ukraine. Taiwan is also more economically important to us than Ukraine is.

Buckeyetech wrote:

LTEN11 wrote:

DigitalSea wrote:

That's the real question, when does Beijing consider themselves economically insulated enough to launch such an attack? Countries don't always act out of rationally, especially rapidly growing ones that haven't had their power checked.

Can China feed it's population if no one is trading with them ? Their rogue fishing fleets may suddenly find themselves being fired upon by nations whose territorial waters they've invaded, instead of the threat coming from the fleets and their escorts. Can they supply enough energy to their grid without fuel imports ? They struggle to do that now without Australian coal, how will they cope when there aren't alternative suppliers. There are so many what ifs with China and for all the rhetoric they flood the world with, it's hard to know what to believe, or what the chinese population would think if they actually had a balanced view of the world instead of the one flooded with Chinese propoganda.

That’s the million dollar question. Would the US just look the other way if China were to invade à la the Russian annexation/invasion of Crimea? After all the US is much more dependent on Chinese goods than they are of theirs. (And yes, I’m aware of the Truman era doctrine of the defense of Taiwan).

Perhaps the old US can do without chinese spades, shovels, lawn mowers, trinkets and even iphones. What they cannot do without are the microchips coming out of Taiwan. China kills the fabs in an invasion and everyone globally loses, no new electronic goods for the next 5 to 10 years in a lot of industries.

johns624 wrote:

What does hypersonic actually mean? It seems to be the current buzzword.

Just above Mach 5. Doesn't matter how you get there and you don't have to be powered once you pass it for it to be still classed as hypersonic. That is why the Russkies and chinese have glide vehicles, just boost above atmosphere above M5 and then glide around the globe until you drop into dense atmosphere again.

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

Perhaps the old US can do without chinese spades, shovels, lawn mowers, trinkets and even iphones. What they cannot do without are the microchips coming out of Taiwan. China kills the fabs in an invasion and everyone globally loses, no new electronic goods for the next 5 to 10 years in a lot of industries.

I don't think so. China buys nearly 100% of their CPU and GPU chips from overseas. After a war they get nothing chips. That is a huge portion of the global demand that disappears overnight. Intel and Samsung foundries would be able to comfortably handle the rest of the global demand.

The biggest risk would be companies that get their phones and computers assembled in China using these non Chinese chips. They would have to get them assembled outside China. You can see that the smart companies have already eliminated this risk. Samsung stopped all phone assembly in China.

I always found is weird why companies have all the complex electronic parts made outside China and then sent it all to China just for assembled and packaging. The final product is then shipped to a western country for sale. It would surely be easier to just get the final product assembled in the country that also makes the complex parts.

RJMAZ wrote:

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

Perhaps the old US can do without chinese spades, shovels, lawn mowers, trinkets and even iphones. What they cannot do without are the microchips coming out of Taiwan. China kills the fabs in an invasion and everyone globally loses, no new electronic goods for the next 5 to 10 years in a lot of industries.

I don't think so. China buys nearly 100% of their CPU and GPU chips from overseas. After a war they get nothing chips. That is a huge portion of the global demand that disappears overnight. Intel and Samsung foundries would be able to comfortably handle the rest of the global demand.

Same issue happening again dude, you actually need to research some of this before you barf trash.


Image from here, https://www.trendforce.com/presscenter/ ... 10693.html

Even with full Taiwan production there is a global shortage. What happens to the industry and global demand if TSMC wasn't producing anymore even without Chinese market. No Bosch washing machines, no new logic boards for central air, no new Teslas blah blah. Would take years to recover.

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

No Bosch washing machines, no new logic boards for central air, no new Teslas blah blah. Would take years to recover.

I can probably last a long time without a working washing machine, I would not last two weeks with out food.

Everything would be more expensive if war arise. But the fundamentals of life is food and energy, both of items China needs to import.

bt

bikerthai wrote:

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

No Bosch washing machines, no new logic boards for central air, no new Teslas blah blah. Would take years to recover.

I can probably last a long time without a working washing machine, I would not last two weeks with out food.

Everything would be more expensive if war arise. But the fundamentals of life is food and energy, both of items China needs to import.

bt

My argument isn't about what China wants or needs, it is about the flow on of a Taiwan invasion. It may cripple China economically but it would also cripple the rest of the globe, no one wins...

Now that I thought about it, this would be my weapon of choice to neutralize Taiwan's Air defense, radar and airfields.

China will not be able to hide any build up for an invasion, so they will have to brute force the initial landing. These weapons will be useless in an insurgency situation which would most likely be drag on.

I do not see the US sending troops but I do see the US sending as much weapons as it can until organized resistance finally collapse and supporting the insurgency with small arms after that.

bt

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

Same issue happening again dude, you actually need to research some of this before you barf trash.

Save the insults but you are actually 100% incorrect. Don't feel bad as I have seen this mistake made many times before.

The pie charts you posted is cherry picking. It is only for making advanced chips and only for making chips other customers. It is not total wafer capacity. TSMC represents a single digit percentage of total global wafer capacity. That is why Intel doesn't even appear on the pie chart despite having the highest revenue of any chip manufacturer. Intel keeps their huge capacity to make their own chips. The same applies with Samsung, their percentage of 17% in the pie represents approximately a third of their total capacity.

China imported $380 billion worth of chips in 2020. TSMC only had a revenue of US$47.95 billion in 2020. This shows just how small TSMC is. More than 90% of the global chips are made outside of Taiwan.
If you remove China's huge chip demand and remove TSMCs small supply you will actually have MORE wafers available for the rest of the world. China has been the largest importer of chips since 2005. Not to mention China sucks up high tech chips as they had previous had 65-75% of the global crypto mining capacity.

https://www.gizmochina.com/2021/02/03/c ... n-in-2020/

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSMC

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/15/chinas- ... odus-.html

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

No Bosch washing machines, no new logic boards for central air, no new Teslas blah blah. Would take years to recover.

Wrong chips.. TSMC chips are used in luxury devices such as gaming phones, gaming consoles and graphic cards. TSMC also make normal Chinese phone chips for Chinese domestic. You will find all the basic chips used in applicances that are made in Vietnam, Maylasia etc they all use chips made in Vietnam, Malaysia. In terms of Tesla, their newest full self driving chip is made by Samsung. Nvidia swapped from TSMC to Samsung fabs in under a month. Intel has just opened up their fabs to other customers. Production will quickly be spread out between available fabs with a slight price change due to supply and demand.

You need to do research before telling people to do research.

Has anyone actually mentioned the fact that the glide vehicle is paired with a FOBS?
A concept that was developed by the Soviets in the 60s and could potentially violate the Outer Space Treaty, I guess depending on if it completes an orbit around the earth or not.

https://www.unoosa.org/oosa/en/ourwork/ ... reaty.html

Parties to the Treaty undertake not to place in orbit around the Earth any objects carrying nuclear weapons or any other kinds of weapons of mass destruction, install such weapons on celestial bodies, or station such weapons in outer space in any other manner.

Anyone knows if FOBS is allowed in the new START?

It seems many of the treaties signed at the end of the previous cold war are going to be abandoned just like the INF.
They are pretty much like the Washing Naval Treaty and the London Naval Treaty of the early 20th century and eventually abandoned in the 30s.
I wonder what happened after that...

RJMAZ wrote:

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

Same issue happening again dude, you actually need to research some of this before you barf trash.

Save the insults but you are actually 100% incorrect. Don't feel bad as I have seen this mistake made many times before.

The pie charts you posted is cherry picking. It is only for making advanced chips and only for making chips other customers. It is not total wafer capacity. TSMC represents a single digit percentage of total global wafer capacity. That is why Intel doesn't even appear on the pie chart despite having the highest revenue of any chip manufacturer. Intel keeps their huge capacity to make their own chips. The same applies with Samsung, their percentage of 17% in the pie represents approximately a third of their total capacity.

China imported $380 billion worth of chips in 2020. TSMC only had a revenue of US$47.95 billion in 2020. This shows just how small TSMC is. More than 90% of the global chips are made outside of Taiwan.
If you remove China's huge chip demand and remove TSMCs small supply you will actually have MORE wafers available for the rest of the world. China has been the largest importer of chips since 2005. Not to mention China sucks up high tech chips as they had previous had 65-75% of the global crypto mining capacity.

https://www.gizmochina.com/2021/02/03/c ... n-in-2020/

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/TSMC

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/15/chinas- ... odus-.html

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

No Bosch washing machines, no new logic boards for central air, no new Teslas blah blah. Would take years to recover.

Wrong chips.. TSMC chips are used in luxury devices such as gaming phones, gaming consoles and graphic cards. TSMC also make normal Chinese phone chips for Chinese domestic. You will find all the basic chips used in applicances that are made in Vietnam, Maylasia etc they all use chips made in Vietnam, Malaysia. In terms of Tesla, their newest full self driving chip is made by Samsung. Nvidia swapped from TSMC to Samsung fabs in under a month. Intel has just opened up their fabs to other customers. Production will quickly be spread out between available fabs with a slight price change due to supply and demand.

You need to do research before telling people to do research.

You're off dude, closer than you usually are but still off. I don't claim to know everything about the microchips, perhaps just enough to be dangerous.

For example yes TSMC makes most of the high end chips but also large volumes of lower end chips as well,

Its technology is so advanced, Capital Economics said, that it now makes around 92% of the world’s most sophisticated chips, which have transistors that are less than one-thousandth the width of a human hair. Samsung Electronics Co. makes the rest. Most of the roughly 1.4 billion smartphone processors world-wide are made by TSMC.

It makes as much as 60% of the less-sophisticated microcontrollers that car makers need as their vehicles become more automated, according to IHS Markit, a consulting firm.

TSMC said it believes its market share for those microcontrollers is about 35%.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-world- ... 1624075400

But my point still stands, anything happening to TSMC's Taiwan based fabs is akin to a global catastrophe. The industry would take years to compensate and shortages in all downstream industries would be widespread.

Taiwanese chip aside. If these FOBS are so great, wouldn't the US or Russia be working on a similar system?

bt

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

But my point still stands, anything happening to TSMC's Taiwan based fabs is akin to a global catastrophe. The industry would take years to compensate and shortages in all downstream industries would be widespread.

New fab factories can be built within a few years, for just a few billion dollars. We'd have to go without new vehicles, washing machines or iphones for that period, but I suppose that's an acceptable price to pay. Who needs those things anyway?

mxaxai wrote:

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

But my point still stands, anything happening to TSMC's Taiwan based fabs is akin to a global catastrophe. The industry would take years to compensate and shortages in all downstream industries would be widespread.

New fab factories can be built within a few years, for just a few billion dollars. We'd have to go without new vehicles, washing machines or iphones for that period, but I suppose that's an acceptable price to pay. Who needs those things anyway?

Not a few billion dollars, Intel is spending 10 to 15 billionarios per fab over the next 10 years and that is a lower end estimate, TSMC has said its 3nm fab will possibly cost 20. They also really take 3 to 5 years to build.

The problem isn't iphones and washing machines, that is the low end impact on consumers. If AI dominates future conflict the national AIs with the fastest server farms is a massive advantage. A 10 or 20% advantage over a year or five is huge and supplying and expanding those becomes extremely difficult.

bajs11 wrote:

Anyone knows if FOBS is allowed in the new START?

While New START is supposed to "reduce and limit [...] strategic arms" (article 1), the remaining treaty explicitly covers only ICBMs, SLBMs and strategic bombers.

I think the only treaty ratified by both Russia and the US that prohibits orbital nuclear weapons is the outer space treaty. Though neither country has really cared much about UNO treaties, especially not in recent times.

The inter-war naval treaties are perhaps a good comparison. Even though, with hindsight, we can easily see that all of their signatories regularly violated the treaties, on paper, they actually stayed within their limits. In some cases they had to lie about displacement and capabilities, but still.

Certain states never appeared at the large naval conferences, though. Coincidentally, modern day China also prefers to play without being bound by treaties and diplomacy.

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

The problem isn't iphones and washing machines, that is the low end impact on consumers.

Of course the problem isn't iphones and household appliances. The problem is that our entire modern industry directly or indirectly relies on the availability of these chips. From cattle farms and tractors over automated manufacturing lines up to the entire transport industry. Hospitals, electricity networks, gas stations and whatnot.

Losing TSMC wouldn't be the end of the world but the economic effects would be worse than a few nukes (or a minor pandemic).

mxaxai wrote:

Losing TSMC wouldn't be the end of the world but the economic effects would be worse than a few nukes (or a minor pandemic).

and why I said,

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

But my point still stands, anything happening to TSMC's Taiwan based fabs is akin to a global catastrophe. The industry would take years to compensate and shortages in all downstream industries would be widespread.

Y'all are making me think that Taiwan may be important enough for the US to fight a war over.

bt

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

I don't claim to know everything about the microchips, perhaps just enough to be dangerous.

You know just enough to act confident but also enough to give a real expert a very good laugh.

Any report saying TSMC makes "92% of the world’s most sophisticated chips" is clearly designed to sell stock market shares. Intel holds 90+% of the operational global internet server market. These server chips are so massive in die size they could have produced 50+ of the most powerful phone chips. Intel simply goes where the profit is and is not interested in low margin luxury gaming consoles.

People do not realise that Intel markets their fab density using a more realistic average transistor density across the entire chip while TSMC uses minimum transistor density which can only be used in the most simplest part of chip. Making RAM chips and SSD NAND is much easier than producing server CPUs.

While TSMC might say they make 35% of the car microcontrollers but you do no realise that 32.5% of the cars sold in the entire world last year were for Chinese domestic use. China is transitioning to a middle class society. The majority of Chinese have just bought or are about to buy their first car, washing machine, air conditioner etc. All of the electronics that are made in say Vietnam and cross the border for Chinese domestic use could instead flood the western market.


https://www.statista.com/statistics/276 ... registered.

RJMAZ wrote:

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

I don't claim to know everything about the microchips, perhaps just enough to be dangerous.

You know just enough to act confident but also enough to give a real expert a very good laugh.

Any report saying TSMC makes "92% of the world’s most sophisticated chips" is clearly designed to sell stock market shares. Intel holds 90+% of the operational global internet server market. These server chips are so massive in die size they could have produced 50+ of the most powerful phone chips. Intel simply goes where the profit is and is not interested in low margin luxury gaming consoles.

People do not realise that Intel markets their fab density using a more realistic average transistor density across the entire chip while TSMC uses minimum transistor density which can only be used in the most simplest part of chip. Making RAM chips and SSD NAND is much easier than producing server CPUs.

While TSMC might say they make 35% of the car microcontrollers but you do no realise that 32.5% of the cars sold in the entire world last year were for Chinese domestic use. China is transitioning to a middle class society. The majority of Chinese have just bought or are about to buy their first car, washing machine, air conditioner etc. All of the electronics that are made in say Vietnam and cross the border for Chinese domestic use could instead flood the western market.


https://www.statista.com/statistics/276 ... registered.

Intel:

Part of Intel's answer involves tapping rivals like TSMC for subcomponents of chips called "tiles" and stitching those together in Intel's own factories with packaging technology. Intel on Thursday said its new "Ponte Vecchio" chip will use key tiles made with TMSC's "N5" and "N7" chipmaking technologies, placed on top of an Intel-made base.

https://www.reuters.com/business/intel- ... 021-08-19/

Intel, America's biggest chipmaker, is working with TSMC on at least two 3-nm projects to design central processing units for notebooks and data center servers in an attempt to regain market share it has lost to Advanced Micro Devices and Nvidia over the past few years. Mass production of these chips is expected to begin by the end of 2022 at the earliest.

https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Tech/S ... -chip-tech

Amazing, Intel also using TSMC...

As for cars,

German Economic Minister writes to Taiwan not about TSMC chips but for a holiday?

As German auto makers began furloughing workers and slashing production late last year with chip shortages deepening, they lobbied the German government to pressure Taiwan. Germany’s economy minister, Peter Altmaier, wrote a letter to Taiwanese officials urging them to ensure TSMC expanded supply and warning that the chip shortage could derail the global economic recovery.

Mr. Altmaier recently told a meeting of foreign correspondents in Berlin that talks were continuing, but declined to share details.

In May, luxury car maker Audi furloughed around 10,000 workers as it idled production of some of its bestselling models at two factories.

Dimitris Dotis, the Audi brand specialist at Audi Tysons Corner dealership in Virginia, summed up the situation to customers. “Almost all microchips that go into all new vehicles including Audi come from TSMC in Taiwan,” he wrote. “They expect bottlenecks in the supply chain to last through 2022.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-world- ... 1624075400

Major Taiwanese semiconductor makers said they are making efforts to help ease global shortage in automotive chips, an unforeseen crisis that has crippled car production around the world.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), United Microelectronics Corp. (UMC), Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp. and Vanguard International Semiconductor Corp. have said they would boost chip production as much as they could to support car industries in the United States, Japan, and Europe after they voiced their pleas for help.

https://english.nna.jp/articles/25642

Two and two make ten, or fifteen or even 20.

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

Amazing, Intel also using TSMC...

Intel is buying wafer capacity at TSMC that would have been used to produce chips for competing companies like AMD and Nvidia.... This gives no indication of the capacity of any manufacturer. It simply allows intel to make even more profit and is a good business practice.

Samsung produces more wafers than TSMC contrary to what your cherry picked pie chart says. Samsung and Intel dwarf TSMC in terms of revenue.

You probably don't even realise that the automotive chip shortage was caused by the automotive OEMs cancelling their own chip orders and losing their place in the queue. Now they are being extra vocal about being at the back of the line.

Another problem is poor planning. During the second quarter of 2020 automotive OEMs "shut down, as did most of the world, but as they did that they canceled orders from a lot of the supply chain,'' Morales said. "So a lot of disgruntled suppliers found other markets that were still doing well despite the pandemic."

These include the big eight cloud infrastructure providers, which saw demand skyrocket when people began working from home and children were attending school remotely, causing a massive spike in PCs, tablets and consumer electronics, he said.

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/th ... l-it-last/

At the end of the day China consumes an order of magnitude more semiconductors compared to what Taiwan produces. There will be a surplus of chips.

bikerthai wrote:

:ill: Y'all are making me think that Taiwan may be important enough for the US to fight a war over.

bt

The Republic of China is way more important than it's electronics manufacturing industry.

https://thediplomat.com/2015/05/taiwan- ... -security/

When Japan bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, it also simultaneously attacked the Philippines, triggering World War II in the Pacific. It was the opening salvo in the Japanese Empire’s campaign to invade and subjugate Southeast Asia in pursuit of its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. The bombers were launched from the island of Taiwan, which was then under Japanese military rule. It was the jumping-off point for the attacks on both the Philippines and the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia). Throughout the war, Taiwan served as the staging area and major supply base that sustained Japan’s armies in Southeast Asia and as the control point for all shipping through the Taiwan Strait.

It is possible that once they have occupied the RoC they could easily take the rest of South East Asia.
While they are at it they might as well finish the Korean war.
Pretty sure there is a reason why they made this expensive propaganda movie:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13462900/

mxaxai wrote:

bajs11 wrote:

Anyone knows if FOBS is allowed in the new START?

While New START is supposed to "reduce and limit [...] strategic arms" (article 1), the remaining treaty explicitly covers only ICBMs, SLBMs and strategic bombers.

I think the only treaty ratified by both Russia and the US that prohibits orbital nuclear weapons is the outer space treaty. Though neither country has really cared much about UNO treaties, especially not in recent times.

The inter-war naval treaties are perhaps a good comparison. Even though, with hindsight, we can easily see that all of their signatories regularly violated the treaties, on paper, they actually stayed within their limits. In some cases they had to lie about displacement and capabilities, but still.

Certain states never appeared at the large naval conferences, though. Coincidentally, modern day China also prefers to play without being bound by treaties and diplomacy.

The FOBS was actually included in the proposed SALT II agreement:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractiona ... ent_System

Unlike the Outer Space Treaty, the SALT II agreement of 1979 explicitly prohibited the pursuance and deployment of the FOBS:
Each Party undertakes not to develop, test, or deploy:
(c) systems for placing into Earth orbit nuclear weapons or any other kind of weapons of mass destruction, including fractional orbital missiles;

But of course it was never ratified and even if it was both US and Russia would eventually abandon or violate it just like what they did with the INF.
It was probably much easier for both signatories of the INF to hide their violations than for the signatories of the naval treaties to lie about the displacement of their battleships, cruisers, aircraft carriers etc.

bajs11 wrote:

is possible that once they have occupied the RoC they could easily take the rest of South East Asia.

This I'm not worried about. The only reason to take Taiwan is hubris. Why take the rest of SE Asia when you can take the oil without even having to spend blood to take land?

Taking the rest of Korea would definitely involve the US.

In a thousand years, they would not be able to pacify Vietnam (too many Viernamese diaspora funding an insurgency).

bt

In past wargames, a Chinese attack on Taiwan resulted in "a pyrrhic US victory".

“After the 2018 war game I distinctly remember one of our gurus of war gaming standing in front of the Air Force secretary and chief of staff, and telling them that we should never play this war game scenario [of a Chinese attack on Taiwan] again, because we know what is going to happen," Lieutenant General Hinote had told Yahoo News earlier this year. "The definitive answer if the U.S. military doesn’t change course is that we’re going to lose fast. In that case, an American president would likely be presented with almost a fait accompli."

At the same time, Hinote's comments about the F-35A are notable in their own right. “We wouldn’t even play the current version of the F-35," Hinote told Defense News.

“It wouldn’t be worth it," he continued. "Every fighter that rolls off the line today [2021] is a fighter that we wouldn’t even bother putting into these scenarios."

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/4 ... d-wargames

Though, if the US are really serious about supporting Taiwan, they should permit the sale of F-35 and comparable cutting-edge weapons. Even if they don't use them in their own wargames, the F-35 is still a formidable opponent; it would also be a clear political position.

mxaxai wrote:

should permit the sale of F-35 and comparable cutting-edge weapons.

Probably the STOVL version as it does not require long runway as these Chinese rocket will render runways useless soon enough.

Wouldn't you want aircrafts that are less dependent on external Radar guidance as those would also have been targeted?

As for the Taiwanese retired generals comment, I would put it as political posturing either domestically or goading the US to some reaction. Example: the second Biden "mis-spoke".

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2021/10/21/poli ... index.html

bt

bajs11 wrote:

bikerthai wrote:

:ill: Y'all are making me think that Taiwan may be important enough for the US to fight a war over.

bt

The Republic of China is way more important than it's electronics manufacturing industry.

https://thediplomat.com/2015/05/taiwan- ... -security/

When Japan bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, it also simultaneously attacked the Philippines, triggering World War II in the Pacific. It was the opening salvo in the Japanese Empire’s campaign to invade and subjugate Southeast Asia in pursuit of its Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. The bombers were launched from the island of Taiwan, which was then under Japanese military rule. It was the jumping-off point for the attacks on both the Philippines and the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia). Throughout the war, Taiwan served as the staging area and major supply base that sustained Japan’s armies in Southeast Asia and as the control point for all shipping through the Taiwan Strait.

It is possible that once they have occupied the RoC they could easily take the rest of South East Asia.
While they are at it they might as well finish the Korean war.
Pretty sure there is a reason why they made this expensive propaganda movie:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt13462900/

mxaxai wrote:

bajs11 wrote:

Anyone knows if FOBS is allowed in the new START?

While New START is supposed to "reduce and limit [...] strategic arms" (article 1), the remaining treaty explicitly covers only ICBMs, SLBMs and strategic bombers.

I think the only treaty ratified by both Russia and the US that prohibits orbital nuclear weapons is the outer space treaty. Though neither country has really cared much about UNO treaties, especially not in recent times.

The inter-war naval treaties are perhaps a good comparison. Even though, with hindsight, we can easily see that all of their signatories regularly violated the treaties, on paper, they actually stayed within their limits. In some cases they had to lie about displacement and capabilities, but still.

Certain states never appeared at the large naval conferences, though. Coincidentally, modern day China also prefers to play without being bound by treaties and diplomacy.

The FOBS was actually included in the proposed SALT II agreement:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fractiona ... ent_System

Unlike the Outer Space Treaty, the SALT II agreement of 1979 explicitly prohibited the pursuance and deployment of the FOBS:
Each Party undertakes not to develop, test, or deploy:
(c) systems for placing into Earth orbit nuclear weapons or any other kind of weapons of mass destruction, including fractional orbital missiles;

But of course it was never ratified and even if it was both US and Russia would eventually abandon or violate it just like what they did with the INF.
It was probably much easier for both signatories of the INF to hide their violations than for the signatories of the naval treaties to lie about the displacement of their battleships, cruisers, aircraft carriers etc.

Well done.
The narrative from so many above goes like ... "so US (and nobody remembers Japan, India Australia etc etc) loses Taiwan and everything stops there".

Phew!
War ALWAYS gets out of control.

The war will escalate from there (hopefully remaining sub-nuclear).

What comes next?

PRC seems to me to be basically short of resources.
Low grade coal.
Low grade iron-ore.
No oil.
Not much else (possibly excepting exotic materials in Mongolia. But which Mongolia?).
(For reference, many analysts believe that Hitler could never have won because he lost the logistical battle - Nazi Germany NEVER had enough oil).

I see a parallel with the dilemma that Japan faced in WW2 after the USN weathered the storm, recovered, fought on and steadily, inexorably began to prevail:
- Japan could not fight on without resources - especially oil - from Indonesia.
- So the IJN Navy HAD to base most of its strength in Singapore.
- But it was a nightmare to defend the transport of the critical resources from the Singapore region to the Japanese mainland.
- Long, long maritime journeys exposing a multitude of opportunities for the USN strike-carriers racing up over the "island-hopping" chain to hit these "sitting ducks".
- But then there also were the long-range USN subs which were devastating all by themselves.

So I see that the maritime supply-chains for China as also being "sitting ducks".
The USN - just for a start - will pick them off.
Sitting ducks.
Again.
Just like Japan in WW2.

So can China resupply overland?

I really don't see Putin & China as anything other than "allies of convenience":
- The fraternal Communist brothers the USSR and the PRC fought a war on the Amur river in the 1960s that most of the Western media were too busy to report ...
I will be amazed and gobsmacked if it actually eventuates that Russia & the PRC are anything other than the most fragile "allies of convenience".
- After all, when they were both Communist brethren, they still killed each other!

If it suits Putin, he will oblige.

If you were running the PRC, would you go to WAR on that vital asset, as being reliable?

My two cents?

We have already seen "Peak China".

The PRC has mounting problems - but "old Father Time" is the worst.

The latest Reproduction ratio that I have seen for the PRC (sorry - no link) is that the young Chinese ladies are having 1.3 babies.
(Of course, a stable population requires the young ladies to deliver 2.1 healthy babies each).
China has already started to follow Japan - except that Japan "got rich before it got old".
China hasn't.
The workforce is shrinking.
Old people are greatly increasing in number.





The PRC has a multitude of problems, right now.

Go to war with the USA (and allies).

So 2019, I think!



cheers

brindabella wrote:

The PRC has a multitude of problems, right now.

Go to war to disract from domestic problems? Seen that movie before.

brindabella wrote:

So I see that the maritime supply-chains for China as also being "sitting ducks".
The USN - just for a start - will pick them off.
Sitting ducks.

And those to be acquired AUS subs, which is relevant here as they are more or less not vulnerable to hypersonic weapons.

Even if the supplies could come from Russia, the logistic tail is long and vulnerable. Western China is not necessarily friendly once you pull out all the troops to invade Taiwan.

bt

bikerthai wrote:

:ill: Y'all are making me think that Taiwan may be important enough for the US to fight a war over.

bt

Looks like Biden agrees with you...

At a CNN town hall event, a participant referred to recent reports that China had tested a hypersonic missile. He asked Mr Biden if he could "vow to protect Taiwan", and what he would do to keep up with China's military development.

Mr Biden responded: "Yes and yes." He added there was no need to "worry about whether they're going to be more powerful", because "China, Russia and the rest of the world knows we're the most powerful military in the history of the world".

He was then queried a second time by CNN anchor Anderson Cooper if the US would come to Taiwan's defence in the event of an attack by China. Mr Biden replied: "Yes, we have a commitment to do that."

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-59005300

or he could just be old and gaffed again.

brindabella wrote:

Well done.
The narrative from so many above goes like ... "so US (and nobody remembers Japan, India Australia etc etc) loses Taiwan and everything stops there".

Some of us remember our brothers out west.

SeamanBeaumont wrote:

Millions of Americans, Aussies and Japanese might die but closer to a billion Chinese would in the counterstrike...