A Machiavellian view of the Russia-Ukraine war, and what it may mean for China-Taiwan

Sometimes when analyzing responses to a complex event, it is instructive to ask: who gains and who loses?

There are a few axes of power in the world: the West (NATO/EU/Five Eyes), Russia, China, India, Latin America, Islamic countries, etc.

In the foreseeable future, the main geopolitical competitors to Western hegemony was Russia and is China.

How do you bleed a competitor without directly incurring losses to yourself?

  1. Make them send their young people to fight and die in a war, preferably letting someone else do the defending and dying. Countries’ futures are tied to population growth - young people contribute taxes for the rest of their lives and (in theory) should be engaging in productive economic activity.
  2. Get the competitor to be stuck in a long, unpopular war of attrition
  3. Have a convenient, “moral” pretext for applying sanctions
  4. Get the competitor to mobilize their economy in support of the war which eliminates them as a competitor in the global market
  5. Supply the defender with just enough military aid to keep victory for the aggressor “just a few months” away. People keep on fighting wars for two reasons: either they think victory is possible, or they can not accept the alternative of stopping the war (which may mean Putin gets deposed).

The way Russia is now bogged down in Ukraine has removed Russia as a political, economic and demographic competitor to the West for generations to come.

As another example, the estimated cost of the US’ War on Terror has been estimated to be US$8T, and ultimately the Taliban remain while Osama and Zawahiri were killed by a special ops mission and a drone strike, respectively, not a 20 year long campaign. Of course the planners of the Sept 11 attacks deserved to pay. But who could imagine a bunch of desert-dwelling extremists could bleed the world’s sole superpower of trillions?

So, if we apply this view to China-Taiwan, what does it mean?
If China invades Taiwan, the rest of the world would, under the excuse of not wanting to provoke WW3, not get involved directly. The goal would be to bleed the Chinese dragon.

The West will probably be talking about freedom and democracy under threat, complaining at the UN and applying sanctions to China. Addicted to cheap Chinese goods and Chinese monopolies on some key goods (e.g. rare earth magnets), the West would face high inflation and recessions of their own. At least Taiwanese competition to Western silicon fabs would be eliminated.

Taiwan can probably expect some military hardware aid and behind-the-scenes intelligence assistance, but nothing that would shift the strategic balance and make the Chinese see that victory is impossible, or the cost of victory will be too painful. So things like anti-air missiles, anti-tank missiles, artillery and small arms would be supplied. Ballistic missiles, F35s or stealth fighter/bombers - no way.

So, in summary:

  1. The main determinant of a Taiwanese victory is lies in the hands of the Taiwanese themselves - by being able to both being too expensive to conquer, and to be able to inflict losses on an adversary beyond what they can bear
  2. The main determinant of a Taiwanese defeat also lies in the hands of the Taiwanese - by being ill-prepared, by relying on “allies” who just turn out to be cheerleaders
  3. The people that will suffer the most in a China-Taiwan war would be the Taiwanese. Therefore court the West but do not unnecessarily provoke the Chinese dragon.

Wouldn’t it be easier to provoke China into defending their assets in Africa?

I also wonder if your analysis considers austerity measures that the U.S. citizenry tend to accept and absorb throughout their history. Goods from China aren’t really the hammer over the head that it gets touted to be.

Maybe, I don’t know the Mainland Chinese mentality but I’m guessing it would be easier for the PRC to cut losses and/or disengage from a bad/lost investment in Africa.

If China begins an adventure in Taiwan, they either succeed or the CCP loses a lot of credibility at home, possibly even threatening their regime.

In the long term it may even be better for the West to be less reliant on cheap Chinese consumer goods. It would encourage re-investment in local industries. For example a US-based company touting itself as the only rare earth mining and production company in the Western Hemisphere.