How PLA military drills around Taiwan weaken the US’ Indo-Pacific strategy
- In simulating a blockade of Taiwan, Beijing took advantage of a rare strategic window of opportunity to seize the geopolitical upper hand, striking at the heart of US influence in the region
Breaking the opponent’s resistance without a fight and causing them to collapse on their own is an exceptional strategy, straight out of Sun Tzu’s Art of War. This is certainly a superior and more pragmatic tactic than unification by using military force.
However, achieving this would require certain conditions, resources and windows of opportunity.
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This is tantamount to installing gates around the island, which Beijing can open or close at will.
Such a blockade of Taiwan must have long been part of Beijing’s strategy, but there have been few opportunities to put it into practice before this.
In future, should the need arise, Beijing could well increase the duration and intensity of the blockade, and deploy more firepower. If that happens, Taiwan might just have all the geopolitical significance of an inner island, or a peninsula controlled by mainland China.
Geostrategy often comes down to windows, trends and dynamics. While Washington could respond to the situation created by Beijing during the military exercises, for now, China has seized the upper hand, and it will not be easy for the US to regain control.
Under such circumstances, Taiwan has been downplaying the impact of the military exercises. Taoyuan airport announced the cancellation of 51 flights for August 4, but denied that it was related to the PLA drills starting that day. Taipei said its crude oil reserves could last 146 days, and its natural gas reserves 11 days.
Even without war, the prospects for Taiwan’s people, economy look gloomy
At the same time, Taiwan said it would work with Japan and the Philippines to find alternative aviation routes. Taiwan is an isolated island economy that relies on foreign trade and external linkages, hence any blockade would pose a big challenge.
In terms of international relations and geopolitics, this is an out-and-out offensive. The US will need to reflect, and begin to seriously consider retreating to the front line of Hawaii, and returning to its circle of power before the second world war.
Otherwise, Washington will have to weigh the actual impact of long-range strategic conflict. Is it really ready for that? For now at least, the Biden administration and the Taiwanese authorities seem unprepared.
With the PLA’s military exercises, Beijing used a rare strategic window of opportunity to demonstrate a forceful geopolitical move that strikes Taiwan and weakens the US’ Indo-Pacific strategy. The world has to rethink many issues.
Chen Gong is the founder of Anbound, an independent think tank, and author