A Great Idea: Give a Man a Nuclear Bomb and He Can Fish Forever. What? By James Reed

Something did not go right with the title … or did it? The idea is to give Taiwan nukes of their own to fire at the CCP if they look like invading, so fishing and making the world’s IT can go on its merry way. America has plenty of nukes to go around, and it should unload some down here in Australia to give us a fighting chance too. Anyway, here are some thoughts on the Taiwan crisis by Gordon G. Chang, author of The Coming Collapse of China, a Gatestone Institute distinguished senior fellow, and a member of its Advisory Board.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17864/defend-taiwan-nuclear-bomb

“"The island's society must be warned that they better not believe the 'rock solid' promise of the U.S. because Washington will never fight to the death with the Chinese mainland for the island's secession," the Chinese Communist Party's Global Times proclaimed on October 14, referring to Taiwan.

The words, contained in an editorial, reflects the Party's propaganda line, and that line almost certainly reflects the thinking of Chinese leaders.

There has in recent months been a dangerous erosion in deterrence. U.S. President Joe Biden can reestablish deterrence by offering Taiwan a mutual defense treaty. If he does not want to do that, he should either base American nuclear weapons in Taiwan or transfer such weapons to the island so it can defend itself.

It is clear Beijing no longer respects America, something especially evident in March when China's top two diplomats traveled to Anchorage to lecture, in derisive tones, America's secretary of state and national security advisor.

Moreover, in August, as Afghanistan was failing, Chinese propagandists went on the attack. On August 10, for instance, People's Daily, China's most authoritative publication, ran a piece titled "U.S. No Longer Has the Position of Strength for Its Arrogance and Impertinence."

At that time, Beijing propagated the notion that the U.S. could not hope to counter China because it could not deal with insurgents, the Taliban.

Moreover, Beijing wasted no time going after Taiwan's governing party, the Democratic Progressive Party. "The DPP authorities need to keep a sober head, and the secessionist forces should reserve the ability to wake up from their dreams," an editorial from Global Times, controlled by People's Daily, stated. "From what happened in Afghanistan, they should perceive that once a war breaks out in the Straits, the island's defense will collapse in hours and the U.S. military won't come to help."

China, in short, apparently believes it can run over America to make Taiwan its 34th province. To disabuse Chinese aggressors at this late date, the U.S. should ditch the decades-old "strategic ambiguity," the policy of not telling either Beijing or Taipei what it would do when conflict is imminent, and publicly offer Taipei a mutual defense treaty.

A treaty would be, of course, a sure sign of American will. Washington, when it switched diplomatic recognition to Beijing from Taipei in 1979, terminated the mutual defense treaty with Taiwan of 1954. The U.S. should admit the mistake and sign a new one, fast.

There is an alternative to a treaty: make sure Taiwan, one way or another, has nuclear weapons.

Such weapons are so fearsome that the mere possibility that a country has them is itself a deterrent. As RAND's Scott Harold told Gatestone, some believe Taiwan would not necessarily need many of these weapons. Just a few—and perhaps just one—could establish deterrence.

Some think the island already possesses an arsenal of such devices. Others, however, are not so sure. "Of course, you can't be completely certain, but most likely Taiwan does not have nuclear weapons after successive American efforts to end those programs," said Richard Fisher of the International Assessment and Strategy Center to Gatestone. At least twice—in the mid-1970s and late 1980s—Washington forced Taiwan to stop secret atomic bomb programs.

How would Taiwan get its hands on the world's most destructive weaponry now? Taiwan could restart its nuclear weapons program, but even though it may be close to assembling a device—it is, after all, a so-called bomb-in-the-basement country—it would take time to build an arsenal.

While building one, China could accelerate plans to invade. Many believe Chinese leaders consider that Taiwan's imminent acquisition of nuclear weapons would be an additional casus belli. So as RAND's Harold perceptively points out, "How one gets from 'could Taiwan deter if it had nuclear weapons' to 'now Taiwan has them' could be a dangerous road to walk."

The U.S. could shorten the period of risk by giving Taiwan an off-the-shelf bomb, an instant deterrent, or basing American nukes on the island. In the 1980s, the U.S. beefed up deterrence of the Soviet Union by basing nuclear-tipped Pershing missiles in Europe.

Taiwan has always been critically important to America. The island makes advanced chips for U.S. products, anchors America's western defense perimeter, and is a beacon of democracy. After the fall of Kabul, Taiwan is seen as the test of U.S. resolve. The U.S. should, therefore, be willing to go to extraordinary lengths to protect the island.

Taiwan is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, so it has no obligation to remain nuke-free. The U.S., however, is a party to the treaty and has an obligation not to proliferate.

Yet it is high time to reconsider compliance with that treaty. Treaty-member China has proliferated nuclear weapons technology and materials to various regimes, and Beijing was behind the Pakistani nuclear black-market ring of A. Q. Khan, who transferred Chinese nuke tech to, among others, Iran and North Korea. Because China has armed aggressors with nukes, America, to maintain deterrence and keep the peace, should arm potential victims with them.

Would the proliferation of nukes to Taiwan be dangerous? After watching—and not stopping—Communist China from proliferating for more than a half century, there are no un-dangerous options for Washington.

Sha Zukang, the former Chinese ambassador for disarmament to the U.N. in Geneva, last month suggested that China create large exceptions to its announced no-first-use policy, the promise not to be the first to use nuclear weapons in a conflict.

In 1996, when he was China's top arms negotiator, Sha told Newsweek that his country's policy of no-first-use did not apply to Taiwan. The foreign ministry subsequently said Sha was speaking out-of-turn, but many thought he had in fact revealed official thinking on the subject.

In any event, Taiwan and the U.S. need to do something now to deter an extraordinarily aggressive China. On the 4th of this month, the Global Times issued an editorial with this title: "Time to Warn Taiwan Secessionists and their Fomenters: War Is Real."”

https://amgreatness.com/2021/10/15/america-wont-save-taiwan/

“Whether it be 2022 or, more likely, sometime around 2025, the besieged democracy of Taiwan will face a brutal Chinese invasion of its territory. Already, Taiwan is struggling to maintain its fighting prowess as the tiny nation transitions into an all-volunteer force. Modeled on the advanced U.S. military, Taiwan’s military will be unable to withstand a full Chinese assault—not without a robust U.S. military intervention to resist the inevitable Chinese invasion. 

Yet, when China invades Taiwan, U.S. forces won’t come. The cost of waging war against China’s invasion of Taiwan will be too high for the United States.

At its core, the American support of Taiwan has always been more bluster than actual bite. Yes, Washington has sold billions of dollars of weapons and provided copious training to the Taiwanese—which has been a boon for defense contractors in both countries. But this doesn’t mean the Americans will come rushing to save Taiwan from China’s People’s Liberation Army. 

On the contrary, recent history should demonstrate how unreliable the Americans are for Taiwan. If a $1 trillion, 20-year American commitment to the “democratic” government of Afghanistan was insufficient to get Washington to protect its client in Kabul from a band of seventh century brigands, then Taiwan’s leaders really are screwed if they’re expecting Uncle Sam to risk a nuclear war with China on their behalf. 

What’s needed, therefore, is a realistic vision for the future from Taiwan’s honorable leadership. Clearly, most Taiwanese do not want to become part of China; they understandably value their democratic freedoms too much. Yet, being just across the Taiwan Strait from the Chinese juggernaut means, from a geopolitical perspective, the Taiwanese are undeniably in the hot seat: they are a tiny island and China is very large.

Without nuclear arms or U.S. Marines rushing ashore to save the day, what will the Taiwanese people do after China subjects their island to a 100-hour air war, devastating naval blockade, and capture of Taiwan’s capital of Taipei? 

Taipei should reimagine its military. Taiwan’s military should be conditioned to fight—and win—a brutal, long-term insurgency against a militarily superior China. 

Taiwan’s forces will have to fight in and among the civilian population without the accoutrements of modern military weaponry. Taiwanese forces should be compartmentalized into smaller cells of fighters trained to resist the more numerous Chinese invaders. 

Rather than hold out indefinitely against a Chinese invasion (which Taiwan cannot do for long), Taiwan’s forces ought to draw the unproven Chinese forces onto the island and ensnare them. The struggle will be brutal and will take time. But at the end of the long struggle, China will be far likelier to abandon their quest to recapture Taiwan. 

If Taiwan’s military were reformulated into an insurgency, it could effectively bleed the invading Chinese forces dry. In so doing, a Taiwanese force designed for insurgency would sap resources from the Chinese Communist Party, would likely weaken Chinese President Xi Jinping’s grip on power, and could completely humiliate China—depriving them of their pretensions of becoming the world’s dominant superpower.

While it is doubtful that Washington would overtly go to war with China over Taiwan’s independence, it is likely that America and its allies would engage in covert support of the Taiwanese insurgency—just as the West did for the mujahideen during the Soviet-Afghan War. Over time, the Taiwanese insurgency would be augmented by the covert aid of the West, and China’s attempted conquest of Taiwan could be rebuffed. 

One thing is clear, though: under present conditions Taiwan will lose to China when Beijing decides to invade. Yet Taiwan’s leaders continue making the wrong moves to prepare for a Chinese invasion of their island. A protracted insurgency is the only way Taiwan can ensure its long-term independence from Chinese irredentism”.

Yes, guerrilla warfare, but also nukes first!