Instead of planning for a war with China over Taiwan, the U.S. needs to implement a strategic retreat from Taiwan by removing the semiconductor industry from the island.
The island of Taiwan has always belonged to China. So it’s an astonishingly dumb idea to plan to defend Taiwan from China. Common sense says the U.S. is not going to win that war.
If the U.S. war against Russia in Ukraine has demonstrated anything, it should demonstrate that the U.S. is woefully unprepared for a war against China. The Russians are producing 155 mm shells for $400 while the U.S. is producing them for $2,400 a shell. The Russians are producing four million shells a year and the U.S. with its recent increased capacity is producing at most 600,000 a year.
And then there’s all the advances that Russia has made in defeating U.S. weapons in Ukraine. That technology, that know how will be shared with China.
The U.S. Navy is overstretched, undermanned, and the U.S. ship building industry is incapable of producing ships to replace the ships that will be sunk in a war with China.
Has anyone in The White House or the Pentagon’s thought carefully about all the things that China supplies to the U.S.? What’s going to happen when all that stuff gets cut off? How’s that going to cripple a U.S. war with China?
The U.S. cannot win a military war with China. But it can avoid a war by exporting the semiconductor industry.