It's in for a penny in for a pound time now!
By Rich Kozlovich
It makes sense that, in addition to testing missiles over Taiwanese airspace, the Chinese military would be practicing amphibious operations, given that these would be necessary to invade an island like Taiwan.
“As part of the exercise, wheeled amphibious armoured vehicles entered the dock of amphibious landing ships, which then sailed to a target sea area where the vehicles left the ship and steered towards a beach,” the Morning Post noted, based on footage provided by the Eastern Theatre Command of the People’s Liberation Army.
Additionally, China Central Television reported that “the 72nd Group Army explored the tactics of emergency loading, long-distance transport and beach assault under complicated sea situations, and boosted the troops’ amphibious combat support capabilities.” What is happening should be clear. China is emboldened.
Okay, that sounds scary. But it's all what the Soviets called "maskirovka". "The doctrine covers a broad range of measures for military deception, from camouflage to denial and deception." In this case it's also diplomatic maskirovka.
The Chinese know a few things:
- First, this landing they're practicing is just a big show. The greatest military force in the world for amphibious landings is the U.S. Marines, and it took more than practice to become good at it.
- Secondly,
they have to know their loses will be massive, in both men and
equipment if they attempt such a landing. Taiwan has a substantial
military that would devastate such a landing force.
- Third, they have to know even the Biden administration, as stupid as they are, will have to jump in to save Taiwan, even if it's just involving U.S. air power, and that alone will devastate the Chinese Air Force, their Marine landing force, and any ships they may employ. U.S. Naval aviators are the finest in the world. That's why they're called Top Gun!
- Fourth,
they know if they launch a landing and are repelled their military
credibility throughout all of S. E. Asia will tumble like a house of
cards, and they can't afford that since their attempting to impose an
economic hegemony throughout all of Asia via military intimidation, declaring vast areas of international waters belong to China.
- Fifth, such an action will trigger economic retaliation the CCP can ill afford. China is actually broke, and I wish more people read the book Khrushchev's Cold War: The Inside Story of an American Adversary. as it outlines just how devastating all that military buildup was to their economy, and that was from the early 1950's, hence the need for maskirovka to make them bigger than they were. China has the exact same problem.
- Sixth, the Chinese military leadership reminds me of what went on in Imperial times. They bribe their way to the top, and they've never fought a war.
This is all show. China is great at object lesson wars, such as the Sino-Indian war of 1962,
and their latest dust up with India, their challenge of Philippine
territorial waters, etc. All show, all long range intimidation. But
they've not fought a real war since Korea, and they lost massive amounts
of soldiers there. Soldiers they just threw away with their tactics.
Will
they attack Taiwan? No! There are too many negatives and few
positives for such an action, even it they were to win there would have
to be long term political and economic consequences they can't afford.
What this will do is bring more American, Japanese, Indian, Australian, forces into the area, just as Soviet outrageous claims triggered an arms race that broke the Soviets back economically, this will trigger responses they won't like and can't handle.
Putin's aggression against Ukraine must present a clear picture for China if they act as stupidly as Putin. Putin force NATO to all of a sudden grow a backbone and started preparing for more Russian aggression and two new nations, Finland and Sweden joined NATO, both of which he wanted to keep out. He clearly thought this would intimidate Europe, but it backfired. Now he's facing a far more united front against Russia. He thought his military was unstoppable, and so too did most everyone else, it wasn't. Now Russia's failures have their political and military leadership look stupid and incompetent. Because they are, and that's going to resonate against Russia for some time.
Here are my Seven rules of Geopolitics:
- All
geopolitics is about four factors, geographics, demographics, economics,
and that most elusive factor of all, the happiness factor.
- Everything is about the basics. You have to be
able to see issues at their foundational root levels in order to
understand and fix complex problems.
- History is everything since historical events lay the
foundation for the social paradigms of nations, which have been in
effect for centuries in most areas of the world.
- People are like nations, and will act in their own best interests, unless they don't.
- Nothing is ever as it appears. Look behind the curtain, there's always something hidden.
- The patterns of life keep repeating over and over again.
- Everyone lies.
China Won't Attack Taiwan
First, as a practical matter, every geopolitical issue is defined by rule one. Geographics, demographics and economics. Secondly, we have to understand nothing about China is ever as it appears. We can start with the myth of Communist Hegemony in China. As Daniel Greenfield notes:
The scenes from China show that there is a spectrum of opposition from anger over financial fraud and Zero COVID to traditional calls for democracy and an end to Communist rule. I don’t believe that they will succeed, but the regime has been rattled badly. Zero COVID was to show that people would jump through any hoop and instead it showed that there is a sizable undercurrent of public anger and despite a generation of indoctrination and total media and social media censorship, outrage lurks below the surface.
China is a huge country, but the vast majority of their population, of 1.4 billion (Which is a big drop over recent years) and they live in an area no larger than the land mass East of the Mississippi River in America, and are mostly ethnic Han. The rest of China is either very mountainous or very arid, and is sparsely populated with different ethnic groups, not that productive agriculturally or industrially, and these other ethnic groups hate the Han, and view the central government as illegitimate, and that's particularly true of Tibet, which is an unending source of resistance to the Chinese Communist Party, which is stunningly corrupt.
Interestingly
many of the Han also consider the Chinese government to be
illegitimate, and the communist's handling of the economy and the covid
tyranny has enhanced that view. China's economy is a myth, and finally many geopolitical analysts are finally acknowledging that, and Xi is a true believer in Maoist economics and is driving their economy down the drain.
They're
now provoking India in the Himalayas, for reasons I fail to understand
other than they think they will intimate them into believing China will
invade India from the North if they interfere with their activity in the
South China Sea and Taiwan. They're unendingly interfering in
governments all over the world, which includes their Belt and Road Initiatives, and picking fights with Japan along with the Philippine Islands, Vietnam and other South East Asian countries involving the Spratly Islands, Paracel Islands, Scarborough Shoal, and what's being called the nine-dash line area claimed by China and rejected by the rest of the world, which China is attempting to enforce with military intimidation.
India, Japan and the Philippines are reacting to that with military initiatives of their own, especially Japan, and Taiwan is working an international lifeline via what they're calling a Parliamentary Outreach. This is not going well for China, and it appears they're shocked. Imagine that.
India gave the Dalai Lama asylum after Tibet's 1959 uprising. China decided to launch what was in reality an "object lesson war" against India in 1962. That's an important event in understanding China's military policies. They love playing the biggest baddest bully boy on the block with their "object lesson military actions". They really don't like full scale wars, and for good reason, the last one was the Korean War with America, and they took a massive beating throwing away untold thousands of young men's lives with their tactics.
China
really doesn't have the capability to extend their power much beyond
their borders, which they're working to fix that by building aircraft
carriers, with 25 year old Russian technology, and technology they've
stolen from others, and a failed economy.
For
some time we've been hearing reports the Chinese Communists are going
to invade Taiwan and are practicing amphibious invasions, they're test
launching missiles and they provocatively keep invading Taiwan's air
space playing intimidation games. Well, there are some things, no
matter the rhetoric or provocations by Xi and his government, that
represent substance over illusion.
The Chinese know a few things:
- First, this landing they're practicing is just a big show. The greatest military force in the world for amphibious landings is the U.S. Marines, and it took more than practice to become good at it.
- Secondly,
they have to know their loses will be massive, in both men and
equipment if they attempt such a landing. Taiwan has a substantial
military that would devastate such a landing force, even if they've
never fought a real war, they'll be fighting for their homes.
- Third,
they have to know even the Biden administration, as stupid as they are,
will have to jump in to save Taiwan, even if it's just involving U.S.
air power, and that alone will devastate the Chinese Air Force, their
Marine landing force, and any ships they may employ. U.S. Naval
aviators are the finest in the world. That's why they're called Top
Gun! And currently there are three carrier task forces in South East
Asia, two East of the Philippine Islands and one East of Borneo.
- Fourth, they know if they launch a landing and are repelled their military credibility throughout all of S. E. Asia will tumble like a house of cards, and they can't afford that since their attempting to impose an economic hegemony throughout all of Asia via military intimidation.
- Fifth, such an action will trigger economic retaliation the CCP can ill afford. China is actually broke, and I wish more people read the book Khrushchev's Cold War: The Inside Story of an American Adversary. as it outlines just how devastating all that military buildup was to their economy, and that was from the early 1950's, hence the need for maskirovka to make them bigger than they were. China has the exact same problem, and they're now having a demographic pyramid problem.
Will
they attack Taiwan? No! There are too many negatives and few
positives for such an action, even it they were to win there would have
to be long term political and economic consequences they can't afford.
What this will do is bring more American, Japanese, Indian, Australian, forces into the area, just as Soviet outrageous claims triggered an arms race that broke the Soviets back economically, this will trigger responses they won't like and can't handle.
If
Xi really had the intention of invading Taiwan, the disaster Putin
created in his attack on Ukraine is a wake up call for Xi. China has
far more troubles than Taiwan. Xi is now facing a massive outbreak of
covid in his population and the reason for that was the massive
lockdowns.
Since their society was in effect quarantined they never were able to develop herd immunity to this virus, and I think combining that with these false vaccines, that are demonstrating they seem to make those vaccinated more susceptible to the virus, Xi has a lot of internal issues. The only resistance these lockdowns created was resistance and demonstrations against Xi in at least 17 cities all around the country, and they were clearly spontaneous, which many believe was the real reason for more and tighter lockdowns, because that spontaneity has to be frightening to the CCP. More lockdowns wasn't to stop this virus, but an effort to stop demonstrations against Xi and the Chinese Communist party.
Invading Taiwan may be great rhetoric for the population in order to divert attention from Xi's failures, but it's not a reality.
Nothing Is Ever As It Appears In China: Military Intimidation
First, we have to understand that whenever you read anything about China you must see past what's written. China is a complicated country, with a long and profound history. China's culture is considered the world's oldest culture by many, and China houses a huge population, in an area about the size of everything east of the Mississippi River in the United States, and they are ethnic Han. The rest of China is sparsely populated and mostly occupied by other ethnic groups that hate the Han and consider the central government illegitimate, and the general population has grown to doubt the legitimacy of the central government as a result of all the incompetence and corruption.
The government’s one child policy has created a large male/female imbalance in the population as a result there isn’t enough women to go around. This creates serious social consequences and dissatisfaction. Pollution is terrible and the government is spending huge amounts of money to keep everyone working, including building cities that no one occupies, and the banking system has troubles the government hides.
What is clear is the Chinese leadership is striving for two things. Social and economic stability, world dominance in both and continued central control of all things in the hands of the communist leadership.
Make no mistake about it, they’re still commies, and commies are dictators, and so what do dictatorships do to distract the population from their problems? They start a war! Only this is far more problematic than it was decades ago.
So who do you start a ruckus with? Taiwan, Japan, India or the maybe the Philippines?
There
are a handful of tiny Islands off the coast of China known as the
Diaoyu in China and the Senkaku in Japan which are barren and
uninhabited. These five islands “encompass a grand total of seven
square kilometers” and were won from the Chinese in the first
Sino-Japanese war of 1895. But after 1968 the Chinese decided that they
wanted them back; after it was discovered “the islands may be sitting
on top of huge oil and gas reserves”, which China has none. A lot of
coal, but no oil, or at best very little.
This gives the Chinese a potentially legitimate gripe, especially when you consider what the Japanese did to them in WWII and were then the losers of that war. By pushing this they then bring into play far more than these islands and its potential wealth. They create a Munich Moment. The real goal of the Chinese government is to be the big dog in the South China Sea and ultimately all of South East Asia.
If they push this and win; it seriously weakens American influence, militarily and economically. The rest of the countries in the area then can be much more easily bullied into falling into line, including India and the Philippines, and of course even Australia. But all these threats and seeming preparations for military action is triggering a backlash. Taiwan is now building their own submarine, bypassing China's successful efforts blocking Taiwan's efforts to acquire one from other countries.
Taiwan is also seeking "allies" in other non-neighboring nations like Lithuania:
Taiwan will set up its first office in Europe using the name
“Taiwan,” drawing a rebuke from China and praise from the U.S. as the
island democracy seeks to strengthen its diplomatic presence around the
globe in the face of pressure from Beijing............. Taiwan’s other diplomatic outposts on the continent are under the name
of “Taipei.” “Lithuania has firmly believed in universal
values such as democracy, freedom and human rights, and is a like-mined
partner of Taiwan,”.....Taiwan and Lithuania are both at the
strategic front line to safeguard democratic and free regimes.......Lithuania has firmly believed in universal values
such as democracy, freedom and human rights, and is a like-mined partner
of Taiwan.”
An outright war with these nations isn't going to happen, in spite of the threat to use nuclear weapons against Japan
if they oppose an attack on Taiwan, with China saying they will make an
exception in their first use policy in the case of Japan.
And of course everyone believes them when they say they have a first use policy. Right?
The result?
"Japan’s annual defense white paper issued on July 12, for the first time expressed concern for Taiwan’s stability, linking it to Japan’s national security."
Article 9 of their Constitution prohibits war as
a means to settle international disputes, however, they do have a Self
Defense Force, albeit with restrictions. Article 9 is being
reinterpreted to understand that self defense my require acting in
defense of allies, and they're building ships to do it. Their
conclusion?
“There are two sides … you can either join the West or you can join China,”
According to Geopolitical Futures:
"Japan, France and the U.S. held trilateral drills
on Japanese soil for the first time over the weekend. Australia joined
in on Saturday for naval drills. Among all European powers expressing renewed interest in Indo-Pacific military affairs lately, France has perhaps the biggest direct interests at stake."
While
that's caused some turmoil in Japan, this kind of rhetoric from China
gives impetus to such moves, and I've explained why I don't think there
will be an attack on Taiwan in this June 13th article, and the conclusions I state there are now playing out.
What they are doing is Waging Gray-Zone Warfare:
"......... gray-zone warfare can be divided into three
levels: low, medium, and high. He said that the ‘high’ level includes
nuclear posturing, military threats, large-scale clandestine operations
that ‘create fait accompli situations,’ the use of special forces to
deny mobilization of the target country’s military, and support of
large-scale proxy wars........... the CCP’s actions have reached
this highest level of gray-zone warfare.”............
“China’s deployment of maritime militia around Philippine-claimed
features in the West Philippine Sea and the rest of the South China Sea
is an example. But Bautista, who is also former executive director of
National Task Force West Philippine Sea, said gray zone tactics involved
other means. ‘Even as we speak, war is being fought in the gray zone.
In information and propaganda realm, economic and other areas.”
Infringement on the territorial waters of the Philippines,
even using naval vessels to force the Philippines to allow fishing in
their waters. This another example of how the CCP simply ignores
international law. Understand this: The CCP will honor no agreement or
treaty once they decide it's inconvenient, just as they've done regarding all their violations of the Sino-British Joint Declaration regarding Hong Kong, which I will address later.
They practice what's been called "object lesson wars", such as the 1962 Sino-Indian War, which they've reenacted, as explained in this piece from the Jamestown Institute: Expanding and Escalating the China-Bhutan Territorial Dispute, constantly claiming some piece of land or even an entire sea, as in the South China Sea, belongs to them.
("Himalayan squabbling. The end of winter in the Himalayas means the return of squabbling season along the Line of Actual Control, the Indian-Chinese disputed border. Both India and China appear to be positioning for another summer of skirmishes, reportedly doing drills and building out new infrastructure." From Geopolitical Futures)
The
lessons to be gleaned from the 1962 Sino-Indian War, is the Chinese
think they have a right to "punish" nations like India, Japan and the
Philippines when those nations stand in their way or have something they
want. In the case regarding their invasion of India, the Indian
military was ill-equipped and unprepared to deal with the Chinese.
Being communists, they play the bully. China was the aggressor, as they
were in Tibet, which I will deal with this in another post. There was
no declaration of war. It was a sneak attack. The world isn't going to
be fooled now.
Their goal is to neuter America's military status, not only in South East Asia, but worldwide,
and it's a threefold attack. Military, diplomatic and economic, all of
which I will address later. Militarily that's not so easy. Below is a
map published by Geopolitical Futures defining America's assets in
South East Asia.
This whole thing is symptomatic of the problem with the Chinese government.
-
They have a huge economy that may not be real.
- They have a banking system that's an illusion.
- They have a huge national debt.
- They absolutely need trade with world to maintain their economy.
- They don't have oil reserves.
- They have a huge military that may not be effective.
- They have competent economic neighbors in Japan, India and the Philippines, to whom China has made threatening moves. Economies they don’t really want to compete with because they may not be capable.
- They have a central planning system that is clueless, and an economy predicated on total employment, not profitability. They were smart enough to leave Hong Kong alone because it was a huge money machine for the government, but they won't allow the nation to go down that path because it would destroy the elitists that run the country. A course of action they've now abandoned because they fear that kind of freedom Hong Kong had would spread to the mainland.
- They have serious internal problems with the general population, many of whom consider the central government illegitimate and staggeringly corrupt.
The problem still remains that has been foundational of all of their problems since Mao. They’re still commies! They think like commies, they act like commies, ergo, they’re commies, and commies are now, and have always been, aggressive, unreasonable, murderous and failures at basic economics and human rights. Both of which I will address in other pieces. And they're staggeringly corrupt.
Pay attention to this whole South East Asia economic situation. There is a reason China is expanding it's navy, including air craft carriers. It's all an effort to instill an economic hegemony through Asia via military intimidation. There are serious internal and/or external events in the offing with China that will impact the whole world, and the world is taking notice and recognizing China is the world's biggest threat, and one thing all this military intimidation has done is make everyone aware of how dangerous they are, and the world is going to react.
China Reset
Recently in Canada's National Post Clive Hamilton posted the article, Time for a 'China reset,' before it's too late saying:
All this stuff about Iran is mind boggling, and much of it can be placed at the feet of the three Obama terms and the EU. Iran declared war on the west the minute the Shah left and Khomeini took over, 46 years ago, and have acted in that manner at a practical level ever since. The game playing should have ended long ago when Iran made members of the American embassy hostages, but then Carter was President,not Reagan or Trump. The minute Reagan was elected the mullahs decided it was a good idea to release them, after 444 days of Carter's incompetent policies of appeasement. Keep that in mind.
The minute Iran launched all those missiles at Israel, an outright undeclared act of war, that's when the line was crossed, and Israel had every right to retaliate in any way they saw fit.
I admire Trump’s ability to get adversaries to come to the table and make agreements, the Abrahamic Accords as an example. But you cannot make agreements with people who don’t want an agreement. Neither Russia or Ukraine wants the war to end, and most certainly Iran will not give up its desire to destroy Israel and do it with nuclear tipped missiles.
Iran has been found to have been lying about their nuclear program …. imagine that,and finally someone is telling the truth in the 11th hour. Make no mistake about this. The US has the intelligence that confirms all I’ve said, and I’m convinced this had to happen because Iran's domestic and international problems are so massive they fear they’re going to be kicked out of power, making this their last chance to destroy Israel, and they will not pass it up, no matter how suicidal it may be.
Operation ‘Rising Lion' has been launched, and it only took 46 years. Now five waves of Israeli fighters carried out hundreds of missions across distances thought to be impossible without refueling, but Israel proved the to be false before. On the first day they dropped over 330 munitions on about 100 targets, including the Natanz nuclear sight, which was just one of many. The top Iranian military commander for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and a number of nuclear experts were killed. How great the damage was isn't clear, but it's being called superficial, and Iran has launched missiles and drones in response, which in the past has been largely ineffective, and the attacks by Israel continue.
I really love these Muslim leaders who spout nonsense like Iraqi Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr who describes this a threat to the entire region and in infringement of Iraqi airspace to get to Iran. It's interesting you're not seeing the other nations of that region worrying about a threat to them since it's Iran whose been the threat to the region, not Israel.
It's also interesting how the people of Iran are viewing this attack. Understand this is an unusual kind of war. The Israelis are not practicing mass bombing, or targeting the civilian population. Don't you find it interesting they managed on the very first day to pretty much wipe out the leadership of the Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. They've selected targets that matter, and the Iraqi people are thrilled as the Iranian government has abused their people to the extreme for decades, including murder, rape, false imprisonment, rigged trials, etc., all in order to oppress their people.
I also have to believe the Iran government is now aware there must be a lot of spies giving information to Israel, up to date information. Otherwise how could they know where to strike so accurately?
If Iran falls it would be a good time to bring justice to all the victims of Iranian terror, including their vile actions against their own population. Hunt down all these murderous thugs, and let them stand trial and explain and justify their murderous actions.
More historical background and justification on why this was inevitable, here, here, and here, and finally, I think this eight point analysis by Andrea Widburg is excellent, The situation in the Israel-Iran war is kinetic, but we can discern a few things.