As China deploys the most warships around Taiwan in its largest maritime operation in three decades, scrutiny of the potential military operations Xi Jinping envisions is long overdue. This second part of a two-part series, based on the Naval War College’s China Maritime Studies Institute’s new edited conference volume, “Chinese Amphibious Warfare: Prospects for a Cross-Strait Invasion,” distills key findings from the book regarding scenario factors and policy recommendations, and highlights areas of ongoing research.
A comprehensive net assessment of the cross-strait military balance is beyond the scope of our unclassified project. We instead focused on China’s amphibious-related developments and identify key dynamics and trends. Part 4, “Scenario Factors,” therefore considers specific elements vital to the success of a Taiwan invasion. The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) is laser-focused on accounting for all relevant variables, but retains considerable challenges and shortcomings even as it builds and deploys forces at a rate unprecedented in the postwar era.
A large-scale amphibious invasion is one of the most complex, difficult military operations of all. It is extremely challenging to achieve. Success hinges on comprehensive planning, complex command and control architectures, massive force employment, and precise synchronization. It can be thwarted by factors ranging from inclement weather to enemy countermeasures to unexpected contingencies. There is no better acknowledgment of these inherent uncertainties than the “In case of failure” message drafted by U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower on June 5, 1944, the day before the monumentally successful D-Day Invasion.
As Lieutenant General Charles Hooper – formerly a U.S. defense attaché in Beijing – points out in his foreword to our volume, the last major opposed amphibious landing was the U.S. assault on Inchon, South Korea in 1950. Beijing is now contemplating one of history’s most ambitious amphibious operations, including the largest-ever civilian ship mobilization – greatly exceeding the Dunkirk evacuation in ship numbers and the Falklands War in tonnage. China lacks experience operating under wartime conditions at that scale. Its airborne forces, for example, have historically had a regime preservation role – as seen in suppressing the 1967 Wuhan uprising during the Cultural Revolution and in the 1989 Tiananmen Massacre. Under a variety of scenarios, Beijing might have to send some forces on a one-way mission.
Envisioning a PRC Invasion
As John Culver underscores, China is pursuing an “all of regime” approach to “unifying” Taiwan, but has not yet built – let alone integrated operationally and trained with – the complement of smaller amphibious vessels required to provide sufficient traditional sealift for a cross-strait amphibious operation. Meanwhile, the PLA Navy Marine Corps (PLANMC) is not optimizing itself for an amphibious invasion of Taiwan, but rather for a range of operations that might address China’s interests in the South China Sea, across the region, and even around the world. Later in our volume, Sam Tangredi describes this trajectory as “trading places” with the U.S. Marine Corps, which is controversially shifting from its previous full spectrum of traditional global operations to a more PRC-focused subset.
On the other hand, China’s determination and progress are formidable. It is rapidly improving in key areas. William Fox and Roderick Lee assess that PRC strategists regard air and sea supremacy as preconditions for a successful Joint Island Landing Campaign. Through a painstaking cataloging of sensors available for such an operation in the near term, they assess that China’s military likely has moderate confidence in its ability to seize and maintain control of the air and high confidence in its ability to achieve localized sea control. But key PRC sensors are far less numerous than key PRC shooters, and hence a logical single-point-failure target for limited U.S. and allied fires.
PLA logistics support would critically undergird any successful invasion; three chapters probe that vital subject. Kevin McCauley examines the assessments of PRC military experts themselves, particularly through an authoritative internal-circulation volume from the PLA’s logistics research center. Contributing PLA authors documented manifold weaknesses, particularly insufficient transportation capabilities and war reserves. While these have doubtless improved since the study’s publication in 2017, a successful invasion would require far greater preparations.
Many analysts contend that China would focus its invasion on a limited number of large beaches on Taiwan’s main island, where Taiwan could prepare defenses pre-conflict. In keeping with CMSI’s commitment to considering diverse, creative perspectives, Ian Easton challenges the conventional wisdom that China’s military would assault Taiwan only over the beach in a limited number of prime locations. He instead considers the possibility that the PLA might seek to avoid logistics bottlenecks and exposure by centering its amphibious assaults around Taiwanese ports, which is where he believes the majority of invading forces would likely disembark. Easton evaluates specific Taiwanese ports in relation to PLA requirements to establish lodgments with at least one working port.
J. Michael Dahm bookends Lonnie Henley’s consideration of militia and commercial vessels as providers of logistics over the shore with an in-depth study of related civil-military integration exercises. Despite clear progress, he assesses, China’s commercial fleet is not yet ready to furnish the requisite logistics support under realistic conditions.
In sum, our findings will shock the greatest of optimists with how little margin is left in this perilous situation, yet inspire even the most hardened pessimists with evidence that deterring an invasion of Taiwan is still completely feasible.
Possible U.S. Responses
While our volume focuses on offering dispassionate analysis over making policy recommendations, given the stakes at hand we felt duty bound to offer some targeted suggestions. Admiral Michael McDevitt anchors the concluding section – Part 5, “Implications” – in its operational context by considering in detail how a PRC attempt to invade Taiwan might play out, and how the United States and key allies such as Japan might respond. He offers recommendations for how the U.S. Navy should proceed if tasked by the National Command Authorities to help Taiwan frustrate a PRC invasion attempt.
Heretofore, the saving grace has been that Taiwan enjoys formidable defensive geography, and that a large-scale amphibious invasion is one of the most difficult military operations to accomplish. Taiwan’s most fundamental advantage is that its geophysical defenses offer formidable protection and a firm foundation for further fortification.
The “moated” Taiwan Strait, tides, currents, weather, mudflats, and coastal terrain and infrastructure make an amphibious invasion especially challenging. Imperial Japan built resolutely on these endowments to deter the United States from launching Operation Causeway as its ultimate island hop to wrap up World War II in the Pacific, a feat my colleague Ian Easton elucidates with fresh archival sources in a new CMSI China Maritime Report. Similarly, in a recent article, Dr. Scott Savitz of RAND explains how Chinese forces repulsed France’s attempted invasion of Taiwan in 1884–85 during the Sino-French War.
Many lessons linger, but time is running short. Under Xi’s concerted directives, China’s military is reforming relentlessly, bringing critical new capabilities to bear, and training tirelessly to improve its wherewithal to execute the operations on which it is laser-focused. For the United States to relentlessly prioritize safeguarding Taiwan in these critical times, Taiwan must relentlessly prioritize its defense where it matters most.
In our concluding chapter, based on principles of physics and operational realities, former CMSI researcher Gabriel Collins and I outline six concrete areas that Taiwan should prioritize above all else, including legacy systems: air defense, mines, antiship missiles and munitions, coastal artillery, information warfare, and critical infrastructure resilience. The situation is critical, and time is running out.
A Blockade Scenario
China’s latest in a series of Taiwan-focused military pressure exercises suggested that the types of operations for which the PLA is preparing include a significant maritime component. Increasingly, I believe that the most likely/worst consequence PRC military operations against Taiwan might be a blockade/quarantine campaign. It will be particularly dangerous if Xi comes to believe this sort of operation has reasonable prospects for success. Such an approach may tempt him as a lowest-barrier-to-entry “way-to-have-it-all.”
What might make this option attractive? From a PRC perspective, a blockade/quarantine could employ China’s numerically superlative world-leading sea forces and supporting assets and infrastructure to best advantage. It could draw on political-legal arguments, messaging, and information operations, in which the Chinese Communist Party has long been maximally invested and has deepest experience. It is scalable and could preserve greatest ambiguity and flexibility, at least in the early stages, and it could impose the burden of escalation on U.S. forces (and those of allies and partners that joined them).
Finally, whereas a Joint Island Landing Campaign would target Taiwan’s most dedicated, professional frontline forces, and a Joint Firepower Strike Campaign would likely target key military and political nodes precisely, a Joint Blockade Campaign would target Taiwan’s true Achilles’ Heel: the resilience and resolve of its society writ large under protracted stress and discord. Taiwan has complex social fissures and factions, including cohorts of postmodernist youth and elderly Sinophiles.
Conclusion
War represents the highest of stakes, and no one can confidently predict how events might unfold. Outcomes would hinge on the specific circumstances of the moment and unpredictable factors such as chance, weather conditions, leadership decisions, intelligence, and the combat capabilities of each side in what would undoubtedly be their greatest crisis and defining challenge. Missing the operational forest for the technical trees could generate grave miscalculations. While we can pinpoint the essential variables involved, we lack the key to conclusively decipher the mysteries of an uncertain future.
This book, therefore, provides readers with a framework to critically analyze a Taiwan invasion scenario and draw their own conclusions about what might transpire under what conditions. What is clear is that Beijing recognizes the inherent difficulty of a cross-strait invasion and is rapidly building combat power and capabilities that make such an action ever more feasible. However, the outcome would hinge on so many variables that it would be irresponsible to speculate beyond the parameters we offer.
One thing we did not cover in the conference and volume (because we did not know about them yet) is the proliferation in the commercial sector of what Conor Kennedy now terms “deck cargo ships” in his related research. These simple but practical platforms may partially substitute for the purpose-built small amphibious vessels (Landing Ship, Tank and Landing Ship, Medium vessels) that Jennifer Rice covers in her chapter. Along with the large roll-on/roll-off (RO-RO) vessels that Lonnie Henley and Michael Dahm discuss, these smaller but very numerous payload-delivery workhorses could very significantly augment any amphibious effort. They might contribute to mitigating the need for the greatly increased amphibious shipbuilding which would otherwise be required to support an operation of this magnitude.
Another particular area to watch moving forward is that China is increasingly exercising cross-strait capabilities at an ever-larger scale – as seen in the ongoing military drills. This represents an enormous dedication of resources, which suggests just how seriously PRC leadership views the issue. Joint exercises are growing larger and more complex every year.
It is, however, important to note that large-scale amphibious operations are exceeding difficult to execute successfully under even the most benign and permissive conditions. The defender gets a vote, and this is not a static problem but rather a very dynamic one, which Taiwan and its security partners have an opportunity to influence through wise investments in specific capabilities as well as proper, thorough preparation and resolve.
CMSI will endeavor to offer research-based insights regarding these and other critical areas while there is still time to deter disaster. Stay tuned!
This second part of a two-part series offered larger implications from the penultimate and concluding sections of “Chinese Amphibious Warfare,” as well as showcased areas of continuing related research. Part 1 summarizes key findings from this CMSI volume’s earlier sections: China’s amphibious history and doctrine, its current joint force, and its supporting enablers.