Taiwan is in the middle of 10 days of military and civilian exercises to prepare for a potential invasion from mainland China. But Beijing has other options.
War games around Taiwan
When mobile phone users across central Taiwan looked at their screens on Monday afternoon, they found they were unable to get online or use most of the apps they depend on every day. The Taiwanese government had “throttled” the Internet for 30 minutes, leaving traffic lights, ATMs and landlines for voice and data unaffected but slowing mobile phone speeds to a crawl.
This was part of the self-governing island’s annual Han Kuang exercises, a 10-day simulation of an invasion from the Chinese mainland. Drills included a simulated beach landing repelled with the help of low-flying attack drones, a chemical weapons decontamination drill and a decapitation scenario involving the attempted elimination of Taiwan’s political leadership.
The Internet throttling was part of a bigger focus this year on preparing the civilian population to adapt to the disruption of communications networks and other infrastructure. Before the drill, the authorities encouraged people to download offline maps and to locate the nearest air-raid shelter so they could go underground in the event of an air attack.
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Beijing regards Taiwan as an inalienable part of its territory and has identified reunification as a primary national goal, saying it wants to achieve this by peaceful means but not ruling out the use of force. Taiwan’s president, William Lai, is bolder than his predecessors in his embrace of the idea of formal independence for the island, a declaration of which would trigger some kind of action from mainland China.
Despite the emphasis on guns, beaches, drones and artillery in this week’s drills, most analysts view a conventional invasion as an unlikely choice for the Chinese leadership. Beijing could instead put pressure on Taipei with a maritime blockade or quarantine of the island, which imports almost all its energy and most of its food.
Beijing has demonstrated its capabilities in this regard during a number of recent military exercises that saw its forces encircle Taiwan. And during the past few months it has maintained permanent patrols not only in the Taiwan Strait but also on the east of the island.
A maritime blockade is an act of war, although Beijing would argue that any such action is a matter of internal security because Taiwan is part of its territory. But a blockade carries other risks too, not least the likelihood that its enforcement would bring Chinese forces into conflict with ships from other countries, such as Japan, South Korea and the United States.
Writing in Foreign Affairs magazine, Eugene Gholz and Kerby Davis suggest Beijing has another option, what they call “a blockade by fire”. This would see Chinese forces destroying Taiwan’s port infrastructure with missiles attacks, creating the effect of a blockade without having to interdict ships at sea.
“Under a blockade by fire, international commercial ships would still be free to sail around the island, meaning that other east Asian countries such as Japan and South Korea could continue the bulk of their trade essentially undisturbed. Ships could even sail to Taiwan, but they would be unable to load and unload cargo in the heavily damaged ports. Simulation models of attacks like this suggest that China could substantially interrupt Taiwan’s trade and keep it suppressed for an extended period, using only a few hundred ballistic missiles,” they write.
Much would depend on the response of the United States, which would almost certainly view a traditional maritime blockade as a threat to freedom of navigation and to its interests. Donald Trump has been ambiguous about his attitude to Taiwan, expressing some sympathy with Xi Jinping’s position when they met in Beijing this year.
During a speech in Manila this week, the Pentagon’s under-secretary for policy, Elbridge Colby, defended the Trump administration’s shift in approach towards China, which he described as flexible realism. He said Washington remained committed to maintaining strong military deterrence along the so-called first island chain that runs southwards from Japan through Taiwan and the Philippines into the South China Sea.
“But, to be clear, this strong and focused approach is fully consistent with an active and creative diplomacy aimed at promoting strategic stability and reducing pressures toward conflict. To many today in Washington and the elite commentariat, this seems hard to wrap their heads around,” he said.
“But it is simple common sense, and indeed in the best traditions of American foreign policy. Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, and, yes, Ronald Reagan all both sought to strengthen America’s military position while simultaneously engaging actively at the highest levels with our potential opponents. As Winston Churchill himself put it, ‘it is better to jaw jaw than war war’.”
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