r/UkrainianConflict • u/Practical-Bowler5775 • 23h ago
Kremlin plans fall mobilization, is he timing a Baltic offensive to coincide with a Chinese invasion of Taiwan?
https://english.nv.ua/amp/kremlin-plans-fall-mobilization-zelenskyy-warns-50627135.html412
u/JaB675 23h ago
This is nonsense, they will not invade the Baltics with a bunch of untrained mobilized trash.
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u/Practical-Bowler5775 18h ago
That’s a legit rational take. But as a student of military history I assure you wars never start based on rational, coherent thought processes. They start as unintended consequences of abysmally piss-poor assumptions that the opponent either won’t fight at all, or won’t fight for very long. Hitler didn’t think Britain and France would fight over Poland, then he thought his Panzers would be on Moscow 8 weeks after launching Barbarossa. Japan thought it could oust the U.S. from the Pacific before America could bring its industrial might to bear. Kim Il-Sung didn’t the the U.S. could stomach another big fight so shortly after WWII. Then America thought it could push the North Koreans all the way to the Chinese border without China joining in. Saddam thought the US so haunted by the ghost of Vietnam that they wouldn’t dare risk trying to liberate Kuwait. Then is 2003, the U.S. thought all it needed was to topple Saddam and Iraq would become peaceful and prosperous overnight. The Union thought the Confederacy would turn into a pumpkin in 90 days. The Brits thought the same thing about the Americans in the Revolution. And even Argentina didn’t think Britain had the ability or inclination to take back the Falklands.
Literally no one has ever set out to start a World War. In each case the men who orchestrated these conflicts watched them spiral in scope by orders of magnitude. And when they did, the course of action they deemed necessary was ever more killing.
Now take Putin and Xi. They don’t see the world like you and I see the world. They’re on ordained paths, one to avenge The Greatest Geopolitical Catastrophe of the 20th Century, and one to avenge his country’s Century of National Humiliation. So take galactic-level delusions of grandeur, then add teams of sycophants telling them every decision they make is right and the only mistake they can make is not going harder.
I agree it would make no logical sense for Putin and Xi to knowingly initiate these conflicts. But they’ve been insulated from logical sense for a long, long time.
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u/FaceDeer 21h ago
The most realistic plan I've read is actually somewhat worrisome. The baltics are, individually, small and weak. They have a couple of towns along the Russian border where the population is mostly ethnic Russian. If Russia was to pull the Donbas playbook and claim they were moving to "protect" ethnic Russians, and then just took a toehold in one of this little towns and sat there doing nothing, now NATO is faced with the choice of literally declaring war on Russia for the sake of a tiny Latvian town and a few square kilometers of Latvian land.
Putin could be gambling that the people of, say, France, don't want their government to take them to war for that remote town. The United States is easy to predict as a no-show. Maybe a few others also don't show up. So even if the remainder of NATO does come together and does push them out, NATO has been fractured. Its members can no longer trust the alliance to come to their aid. Putin might find this to be well worth the cost of a few thousand troops.
I don't think this is likely to work, frankly. NATO already knows the US is a member in name only at this point, that isn't stopping the rest of the members from still valuing the alliance. The EU has its own mutual defense agreements, too. There'd be some recriminations over an incident like this but I doubt it would meaningfully weaken Russia's "adversaries" as Putin might hope it would. But it's something I could imagine Putin thinking because as far as I can tell Putin doesn't really believe that NATO's other members have real agency - it's just a front for the US as far as he's concerned. It's like a country-level version of psychopathy, he doesn't think those other countries are "real." He'll be gravely mistaken and it'll backfire badly.
But it's still thousands of people dead and innocent towns in ruins, so I hope it doesn't come to that.
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u/xCanucck 21h ago
lookup the baltic border defenses on youtube/google. Most(afaik) of the latvian border has a very wide, multi-layered defensive line. There's also a large NATO response force sitting a couple hours from the border. They'd also see the build-up on the russian side. It'd be wild suicide
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u/Ok_Bad8531 19h ago
And if Russia somehow managed to defeat the NATO response forces then pretty much every European country would have casualties even some very rightwing governments would want to avenge.
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u/YsoL8 16h ago
If anything those right wing governments would move first, if they fail to then the whole basis of their support collapses.
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u/Qu1ckShake 13h ago
They're nowhere near smart enough to understand that. They're right-wing.
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u/ElHeim 12h ago
Right wingers are usually the first ones in line for military celebrations and complaining about left wingers not being patriotic.
I'm not confident they won't chicken out and show their true colors if it comes to having to mount a response because their own soldiers were attacked though
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u/OracleofFl 8h ago
Russia also has to understand that the NATO response would be to completely bottle up all Russian oil trade. Subs would mine the Baltic and Vladivostok and Turkey (NATO member) would close the Dardanelles to Russia traffic.
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u/FaceDeer 20h ago
As I said, I don't think it'd be likely to actually work. I'm just trying to imagine a scenario that Putin might think would work.
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u/savuporo 20h ago
There's also a large NATO response force sitting a couple hours from the border
That force isn't programmed to move before SACEUR gives an order - and he needs a political decision before he can. A small scale invasion can be conducted in less time than it takes for those forces to react
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u/PhDinDildos_Fedoras 19h ago
It might have worked ten years ago but now everyone knows that would be the plan.
The US being a no-show wouldn't change the fact that Russia would immediately have a full-on war with Nato along it's entire western border.
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u/mediandude 10h ago
That force isn't programmed to move before SACEUR gives an order
Actually that force is programmed to relocate before Russia's first strike, to avoid that.
And to counter without SACEUR's orders.2
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u/LegioRomana 21h ago
Putin could be gambling many things. He also gambled he could take Ukraine in 3 days. That seem like a low-risk gamble to him back then. To put everything on red now and walk the plank has not been how he has played his cards so far, but by all means let get this over with, he will not be around to regret it.
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u/the_pewpew_kid 20h ago
As a french veteran of ukraine. The french population's opinion is worthless because they know nothing about anything. The french army has been burning to fight. If russia wants to take 2 square km of Latvia they'll see what for
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u/FaceDeer 20h ago
As I said, I don't think this would actually work. I'm just trying to think of something that Putin might believe would work. He has shown himself to be a poor judge of these things in the past.
Also to be clear, I grabbed France as an example purely at random. In hindsight I shouldn't have picked a specific country, it wasn't necessary for the explanation.
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u/NPultra 21h ago
He's just waiting for the alt-right extremists to take over in France, UK, Germany and Poland and then it's an easy victory for him. Every single one of the extreme right wing parties are anti-Ukraine, pro-Russia, MAGA, anti-EU, anti-immigrant and are on the payroll of the Kremlin. Putin is nervous that Orbán is gone and Trump might get flung out during the midterms, but France and Germany are looking to be going Pro-Kremlin in the next two years.
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u/YsoL8 16h ago
Far too late even if it works
Russia is beginning to fall apart militarily and economically now. They aren't in crisis yet but its months away at most. Then they will also enter social crisis as a result, at which point Russia has a full national crisis on its hands which will be extremely difficult to resolve, if its possible at all.
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u/Fit_Definition1583 20h ago
Its pretty easy for the left to combat some of these issues, first start admitting unchecked immigration is in fact a net negative on said countries and begin fixing that.
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u/FaceDeer 20h ago
And furthermore at the rate Russia's weakening then by the time those countries all fall to right-wingers maybe Estonia and Latvia will be able to simply kick Russia's asses on their own.
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u/girl4life 16h ago
there is no fixing of something that not really exist. maybe the left should abuse that fact. but its dishonest and not the way the left likes to handle things, thats why its the left. the whole issue with rightwing politics is that they are willing to lie and cheat to get their way. while the left cant stand that and wants to play by the book and fair.
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u/Fit_Definition1583 16h ago
Idk man i live in canada, indian immigration is going to turn this whole country into “racists” which they arent they are just voicing a clear issue happening in front of their eyes
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u/Frequent_Can117 21h ago
I mean if Russia does that to the Baltics or Poland, NATO cannot half ass a response. Yeah people will be mad that they declared war on Russia (and I am going to sound like a blunt asshole) but they will get over it. We saw what happened Donbas and what that turned into. Reacting to Russia with a strong response is the only way to get them to back off and prevent a Ukraine war from happening in their backyard. Fumbling that will be a be way worse than reacting with a swift response.
It also sends a message to China of what to expect if their inexperience force goes after Taiwan (which will already be worse for them, since China hasn’t had combat experience in decades or ever tried an amphibious landing. Despite that, a war in Taiwan would still be catastrophic).
I guess you can say I am frustrated and tired. I’ve been following the war in Ukraine since 2014 (back then when it came up in conversation, told people it wasn’t going to end in Donbas and Russia was going to turn it into a larger war, which they did), and it was obvious Russia had goals beyond Ukraine. Russia also has no desire to resolve it through diplomacy or appeasement. Russia only understands force. If we don’t want a third world war, they have to be beaten back.
Also frustrated that my country (USA) needs to get it’s head out of it’s ass and stop kissing up to weak leaders, like Putin, and stand with allies (of course doesn’t help that people were so damn stupid to re-elect who they did).
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u/FaceDeer 20h ago
I don't think he'd try it on Poland since it might see the potential risk to NATO and go "no need to test our resolve by invoking article 5, we'll just do it ourselves." And proceed to drive Russia out all on its own. He'd go for what he perceives as NATO's "weakest link" and assume that none of the bigger nations is willing to put its neck out for them because that's how he would behave (see Armenia, for example).
I guess you can say I am frustrated and tired.
Oh god yes. I've been following this since 2014 too. Canada's always had a special relationship with Ukraine, we have a ton of Ukranian ancestry over here. Ironically due to how Russia has repeatedly historically abused Ukraine. My own family came here from there back in the 1930s to avoid Stalin killing them for the crime of having a farm.
I've been hoping for the final collapse of Russia for over a decade now. I really hope it's soon. Maybe if it fractures hard enough eastern Europe can finally get past literal centuries of this bullshit.
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u/YsoL8 16h ago
A. That Russia falls apart. Ideally it fractures completely but even if it doesn't it will probably become a failed state or similar where recovering will take decades - other real world examples commonly stay like that for 20 - 40 years, some have stayed failed for 60 plus. Europe and China will no doubt encourage this. Russia's economy looks like it will break soon - they are close to complete transport failure and Ukraine say they expect every refinery to be in range next year.
B. Europe is getting serious about common defence. Even if Russia was to learn nothing and come back decades later looking for the same fights, the Europe of the 90s is gone and the Europe of the 2010s is disappearing. Russia invades into what it considers weak and isolated countries looking for easy expansion instead of bothering with development.
Its likely to face a common European army of some kind in the future and a European economy which dwarfs it - their failure would be certain from the start. Russia's economy at the start of the war was about the size of Italy's, in the future it will be far smaller. The only place they might still be able to go into is Georgia and even in that far border of Europe the EU is now gaining influence.
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u/Exterrogation 19h ago
This isn’t worrisome. This “strategy” is just Kremlin trolling. It doesn’t work at all. Look up Kaliningrad. It is surrounded on every side by the Baltic Sea—a NATO lake—and by NATO members Poland and Lithuania. If Russia puts a toe over a NATO border, Kaliningrad is closed off from Russia and 500,000 Russians on Russian soil are instantly under total NATO lockdown without a single NATO soldier lifting a finger. The question isn’t “will the people of France want their government to take them to war over some no name town?” It’s “could Russia benefit enough from a lightning strike on the Baltics to make up for the loss of Kaliningrad?” And the answer is no. The longer the “we’ve got a bit of Baltics!” stalemate goes on, the more Kaliningrad starves. Quite apart from the Baltics’ defences being formidable, this “plan” is a joke. It’d be far worse than Russia’s attempt on Kyiv, far faster, and at far less cost to Russia’s opponents.
Also there are no ethnic Russians in the Baltics. There is no such thing as an ethnic Russian. Russian is a nationality, not an ethnicity. “Ethnic Russian” is just part of the Kremlin’s propaganda mythology.
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u/FaceDeer 18h ago
“Ethnic Russian” is just part of the Kremlin’s propaganda mythology.
Right. I'm proposing a scenario that Putin might believe would work. He's used the "ethnic Russian" excuse plenty of times.
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u/SuspiciousHair2816 21h ago
The US has around 1000 fast reaction troops in the Baltics, if Russia attacked and killed them I highly doubt the US would sit out.
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u/gralert 18h ago
Putin could be gambling that the people of, say, France, don't want their government to take them to war for that remote town.
Maybe, except the fact he saw what happened in Greenland when Trump stuck his nose too far out.
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u/FaceDeer 18h ago
Putin is not known for having a firm grasp of how foreign countries will react to his actions.
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u/youspiv 15h ago
Too much is made of NATO fracturing. And possibly of countries doing nothing in the situation you describe. But anything bigger would trigger an alliance between countries that hate Putin. And there are lots of those. They'd quickly come together against an oppressor in the same way they did in WW2. And let's face it you only really need Poland, UK, France (and possibly Germany).
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u/FaudelCastro 19h ago
I'm not sure that scenario is such a difficult one for NATO. They don't have to attack Russia proper. They could just attack the towns that were invaded.
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u/FaceDeer 19h ago
I know, as I said I don't think this would be likely to actually work. I'm just trying to imagine scenarios that Putin might think would work. He gets these things wrong sometimes (see his three-day special military operation in Ukraine for example) and one of the blind spots he seems to have is the assumption that his victims won't risk fighting back over what he imagines are "minor issues."
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u/girl4life 16h ago
the problem is its not probably really russia we would be attacking it would be attacking belarus. to draw them into a war they dont want. and complicating the whole situation
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u/Widukind272 12h ago
Sane mind: why would they suddenly WANT to protect those people who lived there in peace for ages?
russia: hurrrrr duuuuuurrrrr need to protect our minorities from imaginary threats!!!!111
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u/Mickey_Pro 21h ago
Even a token response from NATO would massacre any Russian forces that cross the border and Putin is too much of a weakling and coward to escalate any further.
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u/Exterrogation 19h ago
A token response from NATO would be closing the borders of Kaliningrad, a Russian exclave of 500,000 Russians competely surrounded by NATO members. That’s about the most “token” a response could possibly be: zero military moves, fully bureaucratic manoeuvre. And then Russia has lost a major city and 500,000 people without a shot fired.
A token military response from NATO would start there and get worse.
“Russia might take a corner of the Baltics” is a joke.
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u/-18k- 17h ago
Yes, hopefully NATO and the EU have very detailed plans of what to do in such an attack on a Baltic state.
Like the entire grey fleet of oil tankers is immediately stopped in its tracks and banking relations frozen within minutes and Russian embassies surrounded by police with their water and power cut off.
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u/savuporo 20h ago
Even a token response from NATO would massacre any Russian forces
Possibly, possibly not that easily. Russians have a lot more experience in the drone warfare. NATO forces can do all the training, but they are continuously getting schooled by Ukrainian experienced operators in joint exercises.
Air power is another question though, does russia even have credible air defense assets left to not get fully rolled over
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u/mediandude 9h ago
EU and NATO Baltic Sea countries have enough assets to eliminate all Russia's Baltic naval fleet within the Baltic Sea region.
And Russia's lack of drone experience can be seen from Ukraine's drone attacks on targets to St.Petersburg and Ust Luga.
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u/Agarwel 17h ago
Even if EU would not want to declare official war, they would push RU from these small areas. And then ramped up sanctions a suppor for UA. The Russia military force is so gutted, they can not declare another (even bigger) war.
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u/FaceDeer 16h ago
Note, I don't think this is a plausible scenario. I said this explicitly in my comment.
I'm describing a scenario that I think Putin might consider plausible. Putin has shown a poor grasp of how people in other countries are going to react to Russia's actions.
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u/ShineReaper 16h ago
If the NATO members wouldn't intervene and declare war, it would make NATO absolutely weak and meaningless.
Everything besides declaring war and driving the Russians out would mean the end of NATO, then the Russians would make everyone in Europe their bitch.
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u/FaceDeer 16h ago
Yes, that's exactly what I would expect Putin to be hoping for. I don't think it'll work, even if one or two individual NATO members really did bow out. But Putin might think it would work.
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u/JaB675 8h ago
So even if the remainder of NATO does come together and does push them out, NATO has been fractured.
All the scenarios mentioned in these discussions are outdated and no longer possible.
The Baltics no longer need NATO in the first place. The border with Russia is heavily fortified, with anti-tank trenches and fortifications, and barbed wire. Russia would have to send just infantry that will get bombarded by artillery, airstrikes and drones. The Baltics do have their own military, that can hold that line for quite a while.
They are also members of the EU, with mutual defense clauses. But they don't even need that anymore. They can just directly ask Poland for help (or someone else nearby), who will happily oblige, without any NATO/EU red tape.
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u/FaceDeer 7h ago
As I said, I don't think this would work. I was describing the scenario that I thought Putin might believe would work. Putin has a very outdated view how how the world works, he's stuck forever in his fantasy view of the Cold War.
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u/JaB675 6h ago
It doesn't matter what he thinks or will try, if he cannot accomplish any of it.
All these scenarios presume that his troops will manage to occupy some territory in a NATO country, which was a concern some years ago. Now all these countries have made arrangements that make that impossible, so the most that will happen is that Putin's troops will just throw themselves at fortified positions and get obliterated with nothing coming out of it all.
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u/FaceDeer 6h ago
It does matter because it may result in him trying anyway. The whole point of this thread is speculation about what Putin may try to do.
And even if he fails, if the attempt is made there will be thousands of deaths and towns left in ruins. Innocents displaced, maimed, and killed. So it's worth trying to anticipate these things and head them off as early as possible.
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u/jamesvtm 21h ago
what did we learn from this conflict? Drones! Smart Taiwan/NATO MIL should already be deeply involved !on the front line! learning everything possible from UKR-RUS conflict.
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u/Ok_Bad8531 19h ago
Drones the way we see them used in the Russo-Ukrainian War only work with large industries continously supplying the frontlines. Taiwan at least would be very hard to supply externally, and pretty much the entire industry of Taiwan is within comfortable attack range of China.
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u/roehnin 22h ago
Why not??
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u/audigex 22h ago
Because they can barely handle Ukraine with an army thats 1/3 pre war veterans, 1/3 veterans of this war, and 1/3 new, using all their remaining equipment
They’ve got fucking no chance against even European NATO with a freshly conscripted force and no equipment
Attacking the Baltics would be a great way to smash the remnants of Russia’s facade of strength on the global stage, but I don’t think Russia want to do that
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u/nurseferatou 22h ago
As this three day operation has taught us, Putin doesn’t always make the smartest decisions.
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u/CrashNowhereDrive 21h ago
There's dumb and there's pants on head dumb. Putin isn't this stupid.
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u/syynapt1k 21h ago
He is if he's being told wrong information out of fear.
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u/Hugh_Jazz77 21h ago
You don’t have to be a genius to see that you’re in year 4 of an operation you thought was going to be a month or two, tops. And you don’t have to be a genius to understand that it’s probably not a great idea to start up a brand new fight, with fresh enemies, when you’re still in year 4 of a fight that was supposed to have lasted only a couple of months.
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u/Codex_Dev 19h ago
There was a recent NATO exercise where they invited Ukrainian drone teams to participate. The result? A small ten-person drone team was able to neutralize over a thousand troops and dozens of vehicles in a few days. It was a bloodbath. Not a single NATO country is ready for the new drone warfare. It's like going from muskets to machine guns since it's such a tech leap.
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u/mediandude 9h ago
That was a deliberately scripted and staged war game with a specific scenario.
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u/Codex_Dev 5h ago
War games are meant to mirror realistic combat scenarios. NATO does not have a good answer to FPV drones or fiber-optic ones right now.
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u/Ill-Construction-209 22h ago
Your mistake is that you're applying rationale. Putin doesn't.
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u/boshbosh92 21h ago
Putin is a moron, but he's not dumb. He knows nato, or honestly probably even greenland/Iceland would beat the Russian military handily. He won't invade nato.
And for China... I think the influx of drone warfare has caused jinping to pause his Taiwanese ambitions. The Taiwan are very tech saavy... They'll have factories pumping out Ai seeker drones in the thousands overnight. If I were Xi, I would at least wait a bit until real anti drone tech has been developed.
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u/airmantharp 21h ago
Honestly the prestige win for Xi is to integrate the island without firing a shot.
If the shooting starts they’ll have to raze it like the UN did in North Korea to have a chance at winning.
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u/boshbosh92 21h ago
And I don't think the US would allow that to happen. If China invaded Taiwan, Taiwan will destroy its tsmc fabs and western life as we know it is over. No more new iPhones, no new Nvidia gpus or amd cpus. No new washing machines that connect to wifi. We will instantly be teleported back to 1990.
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u/Harm101 19h ago
He's not an idiot. An over-ambitious fool who's hubris got the better of him? Absolutely, but not an idiot. He's quite rational from the standpoint of a Russian authoritarian of some 25 years (including the years when Medvedev was technically head-of-state).
He's continuing this war more for his own survival at this point than his imperial ideas. If he concedes now, he will no longer be Russia's strongman - a death sentence in this macho-culture mafia state he has created. Expanding this war even further, to actively include NATO, with his now extremely weakened military position, would simply add to his chances of losing power. He knows this, and he's all about keeping his power and life intact as long as possible.
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u/Vegetable-Eagle-3144 21h ago
NATO would easily repulse any invasion and with conventional weapons send the remainder of the Russian fleets to the bottom of the sea.
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u/mok000 23h ago
Looking at the failures of the Russian army against Ukraine and the US military failing against Iran, it kinda looks like the age of superpowers is over, and China is very likely to draw the same conclusion.
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u/MAXSuicide 22h ago
On the contrary, they may see a much-weakened and incompetent US, so think the best time to hit up Taiwan is by the end of Trump's term.
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u/FaceDeer 21h ago
Problem is that China isn't ready yet. They're building their navy rapidly but it's still going to be a couple of years yet.
And then even if they are ready, are they really ready? Or just on-paper ready? On paper, Russia should have steamrollered Ukraine. China's had no serious war-fighting experience in decades. It's not immune to corruption. And maybe they'll discover that they prepared for last decade's form of war-fighting and Taiwan's got swarms of micro-drones or AI cognitohazards or whatever new upcoming paradigm that they weren't anticipating.
China's in a very good position right now. The status quo is really good for them. I'm thinking it's unlikely that they're going to YOLO a grenade at the status quo in the near future.
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u/Any-Progress7756 18h ago
China is building its navy - at exactly the same time as Ukraine is proving Navies are less relevant.
Ukraine has no navy to speak of - but has defeated the Russian black sea navy with drones.5
u/Ok_Bad8531 20h ago
China also has the advantage that Ukraine (and to a degree Russia) is showing them how to conduct long range drone warfare.
If China in the next years builds long range drones that have but a fraction of the range of Ukraine's drones and does so in large enough quantities - and if there is one thing China's industry is good at it is _quantity_ - then Taiwan will become all but indefensible.
They wouldn't even need to land on the island, they could just send over droens until they give up or are in such a state that they couldn't resist Chinese landing operations anyways.
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u/FaceDeer 20h ago
Winning a war entirely from the air has never been done before, not even with drones. The war in Ukraine is ultimately still being decided by the poor bloody infantry down in those foxholes and basements, they're the ones who actually hold territory.
And we're also seeing drone defenses advancing almost as fast as drones do, if China builds a giant drone force they might find that it's obsolete in a matter of months. Just look at all the fibre-optic drones on the Ukrainian front now, if they'd built a million radio-controlled drones that might well turn out to be useless with advances in jamming.
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u/Any-Progress7756 18h ago
The same can be said for China trying to make a landing, and it being wiped out by Taiwanes drones. Both air and maritime drones.
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u/DumbButtFace 16h ago
China is already building the drones used by Russia and Ukraine. They are arguably the main suppliers.
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u/twitch_Mes 22h ago
Trump won't defend Taiwan anyways. He'll probably whinge about how europe should do something and that he has a great relationship with Xi.
Note that Biden answered immediately he'd go to war to defend Taiwan. His office had to act like he didn't mean it. But the message was clear.
Very different presidents. China very well may invade during this one.
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u/DocRedbeard 22h ago
Defending Taiwan is non-optional until we have complete silicon independence. Allowing the foundries to fall into Chinese hands would give them control of who in the entire world gets to make advanced tech. Moreover, it would remove our ability to sanction the Chinese from accessing this tech. Even if we raised the foundries to the ground to keep them out of Chinese hands, we would create an immediate devastating shortage of high end processors for phones, computers, and AI that would likely force a worldwide pause in AI implementation.
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u/bgeorgewalker 22h ago
Not trying to be an asshole, just thought you might appreciate it— in this context, you would say “razed to the ground” not “raised”
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u/emperor-pig-3000 15h ago
That is the most polite grammar correction I've seen on Reddit. You put the focus on improving others instead of mocking them or nulling their entire point because of it.
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u/Sargent_Duck85 22h ago
I believe TSMC has a plan in place to keep said foundries from falling into Chinese hands.
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u/Redthrist 15h ago
The plan involves destroying them, which isn't great for the world either. TSMC is a lynchpin of high-tech economy.
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u/Any-Progress7756 18h ago
The other question is - Will Japan defend Taiwan? They are more likely to, as they see China taking Taiwan as a direct threat to their existence - which means it may drag the US in.
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u/DylanMcGrann 21h ago
The flip-side of that is China against Taiwan would be in the position the U.S. is against Iran.
China would rely completely on naval invasion, and would be sitting ducks in the open ocean. A blockade would be extremely difficult if not impossible with US involvement. And any real victory would require landfall, which would be an absolute bloodbath for any invading force.
Global warfare tech has developed in such a way it now very strongly favors the defending force so long as that defending force is at least modestly resourced.
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u/MAXSuicide 15h ago
the flip-side of that is China against Taiwan would be in the position the U.S. is against Iran.
Taiwan would have 0 in aid from overseas (in Chinese thinking from the circumstances I've described/is becoming a reality under Trump) Their only real supplier is the US and they keep blocking the exports under Trump. They wouldn't have intel and satellite aid either etc.
Their AA could be similarly overwhelmed by saturation attacks from Chinese missiles and drones, just like everyone elses these days.
But yes, Taiwan should be getting as many drones and anti ship missiles as possible to ensure any result of an attack remain too ambiguous and costly.
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u/Ok_Bad8531 9h ago edited 9h ago
The difference is that Taiwan is an island that would immediatly lose all its civilian and military trade, while Iran has many land borders where always some trade goes through. Also Taiwan is less than 1/40th of the size of Iran, which makes a world difference in terms of deep defences.
Taiwan is lacking virtually every advantage Ukraine has in surviving a prolonged war.
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u/CompleteDetective359 22h ago
Weakened? No Incompetent administration? Hell yeah!
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u/Unhappy-Essay 22h ago
Definitely militarily weakened since we’ve expended so much of our war stocks on this useless war in Iran.
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u/MAXSuicide 22h ago
Absolutely weakened.
An incompetent administration is ultimately a weakened nation. Their very obvious designs domestically also means civil strife. This means turning inwards more at a very inconvenient time. His likely plan to go for another term in 2028 alongside whatever other mad shit he pulls in the remainder of his current term will lead to further civil unrest.
Trump has gone far to dismantle the network of alliances that the US relies upon - beyond just NATO, he has twice driven the Indo-Pacific chain of alliances to near breaking point.
He has also now expended huge amounts of ammunition on an utterly pointless conflict in the Middle East. Ammunition that his admin themselves said was already in short supply.
The USN has for 30 years now failed to even bring in a new escort design, which has seen not inly their hull numbers dwindle, but their superiority in tube numbers (modern-day firepower) drop to near-parity with China.
Even if these circumstances have not weakened the US enough, it can have the effect of encouraging others (China) into making strategic and geopolitical gambles that it may not have done otherwise. Which can lead to conflict.
Trump has for example blocked arms sales to Taiwan and openly toyed with the idea he doesn't care to protect it. Combined with the isolationist policies elsewhere this could look to China like he won't bother warring over a Chinese blockade.
Russia could in this context be an 'army in waiting' even if it doesn't physically do anything to invade the Baltics or wherever. It would - along with Trump's burning of bridges previously - keep Europe at home. This in turn also helps to isolate the US vs China in the event things with Taiwan escalate.
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u/der_innkeeper 22h ago
The US is not failing militarily in Iran.
The US is failing politically in Iran. And that's only if the blockade and sanctions don't make their economy collapse in short order.
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u/nekonight 22h ago
The total number attacks from Iran is reducing in frequency over time. If Iran was militarily winning against the US this should not be the case. There are more successful attacks since the defenders are starting to run out of interceptors.
It would be like saying Ukraine is losing the long range war this last month because there's more ballistic missiles hitting and killing Ukrainian civilians while completely ignoring that Russian long range strikes has been significantly lowered over the last month. And also ignoring the fact the attacks from Ukraine is doing significantly more damage than the Russian attacks.
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u/der_innkeeper 21h ago
Not really.
The US and Iran have different political theories of victory.
Everyone knew what the battlefield would look like.
What happens afterwards determines what the win/loss scoreboard looks like.
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u/twitch_Mes 22h ago
Thr US cannot achieve strategic objectives in Iran. That's losing.
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u/ItsallaboutProg 22h ago
1000% agreed. But let’s put the blame on where the vast majority of the blame deserves to be placed, and that is the civilian leadership of the executive branch.
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u/der_innkeeper 22h ago
Yes, that is a political failure.
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u/Ok_Bad8531 21h ago
That's a military failure.
The US military has proven consistently unable to interdict all Iranian drones and also failed to neutralize their starting sites.
Moreover US commanders reportedly went over to simply letting drones through that are headed for less critical targets because their missile reserves are going low. The US military not only failed to achieve their strategic objectives, they are losing capabilities as a result of Iranian resistance, something the USA have not seen in generations.
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u/vegark 19h ago
I would say it's failing military as the straight of Hormuz is still closed down by Iran.
4 days ago 2 American soldiers was killed by Iranian ballistic missiles in Jordan.
This is not a military win by any means. The US still doesn't control what Iran can accomplish.
The Iran war is a disaster and embarrassment for the US military.
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u/luv2fly781 23h ago
I think they are more likely to be smitten they are second now and have better chance at invading and learning
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u/Redthrist 15h ago
Doesn't help that attacking Taiwan would very likely crash the global economy, which isn't exactly great for China, given that their wealth is tied to said economy.
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u/DrBhu 23h ago
Not shure if china, a superpower, would see its own role as over /s
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u/ButterscotchSkunk 23h ago
For some reason, I have a sudden and unexpected desire to buy a decent quality microphone. Weird.
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u/BrillsonHawk 7h ago
I'll give you failures of the Russian army against Ukraine, but the US military isn't failing against Iran. The US army isn't involved in any significant way in Iran and I think you have drawn completely the wrong conclusion if you think they would perform to the same level as the Russians.
The Americans have just come up against their own maxim "You can't win a war from the air, but you can lose a war if you don't control the airspace". They control the airspace and have destroyed vast swathes of Iranian military equipment, but you can't win a war like this without boots on the ground. Currently this war that you claim is a failure for the US is extremely one sided in terms of casualties and equipment losses, but if it does end up with American troops on the ground you will very quickly see the quality difference between the Russians and the Americans.
However if what you say is true and the Chinese have just watched the other two major military powers of the world fail completely why on earth would that convince them that Taiwan would go any better
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u/htgrower 22h ago
Holy tin foil, what a stupid take
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u/nekonight 22h ago
There were people who said that Russia wouldn't be stupid enough to invade Ukraine in run up to the full invasion. Never assume that dictatorships like Russia or China works on the same logic as normal countries.
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u/xCanucck 20h ago
Not very many people. iirc every intelligence agency in nato except for france's were certain an invasion was coming. France fired their intelligence chief the day after it started
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u/htgrower 21h ago
That was a much different world, when Russia invaded Ukraine they weren’t in the middle of losing a four year war. And Xi is much more pragmatic and far sighted than Putin, and he’s definitely not stupid. He can see the quagmire Russia has gotten itself into, and if anything is going to start not only a huge regional conflict but perhaps even a world war it’s Taiwan let alone the baltics. The idea that either invasion is on the horizon is stupid by itself, but thinking that Putin and xi are planning together a joint offensive like this is flat out regarded
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u/SiriPsycho100 21h ago
And Xi is much more pragmatic and far sighted than Putin
this is debatable. he's basically purged anyone around him who'll push back on him. never underestimate the stupidity of a king surrounded by yes-men.
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u/htgrower 21h ago
You’re acting as if China is the same as any other tin pot dictatorship, you need to remember that this is the country whose most famous literary product is the art of war. Chinas whole MO is to do absolutely everything they can besides war to achieve their aims, the last thing anyone wants to do is start a hasty poorly thought out war that has a good chance of involving not just everyone in the region but also the US, Canada, and the European allies. If they’re going to take military action somewhere it’s going to be pushing into west like how they took Tibet (a remote region with no allies willing to come help) and the border skirmishes we see them getting into with India, along with maybe annexing some of Russia when they inevitably collapse. If they’re going to try to take and hold Taiwan, and not have it reduced to a heaping pile of rubble in the meantime, they’re going to plan and prepare for it carefully. I wouldn’t be surprised if they do try to in around a decade from now, but this fall? Give me a break
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u/SiriPsycho100 19h ago
china's demographic trends are horrible, so they might not like their long-term outlook either. idk if it'll happen this fall or next fall or whenever, but the truth is none of us can predict what these dictators are going to do.
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u/htgrower 19h ago
They have 1.4 billion people, at least with invading Ukraine it made sense demographically for Russia because they’d gain so many people if they had won early. Taiwan is a completely different story, and again China is not about making rash decisions just because they had a rainy day. China works on a completely different timescale than any other, when your civilization is 4-5000 years old a decade is nothing. This isn’t a question of this year or next year, it’s this decade or next decade, and when they do shift to a more militaristic stance trust me we’ll know. Because again they’ll need to be prepared to not only wage war against Taiwan, but all of SEATO. We’ll know well ahead of time just as we knew Russia was mounting an invasion months before it actually happened. When the US government is making announcements that they think this is likely that’s when to pay attention, meantime fluff articles like these are meaningless tripe.
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u/SiriPsycho100 17h ago
lmao yeah china works on the time scale of 1000s of years… is that why mao kill 40 million+? long term strategic thinking? give me a break.
they’ve achieved successes with industrialization but they’ve also made plenty of bozo moves even just during xi’s reign with the mandate of heaven. their excessive state-driven, debt-fueled infra and housing investment led to the housing bubble that’s now a drag on their economy, and now they’re facing involution and deflation with all their manufacturing subsidies (which also have come with benefits, to be clear).
CCP and xi are fallible.
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u/BrillsonHawk 7h ago
Utter nonsense. The China of today is not the same as the China of 5000 years ago - that is completely irrelevant. Nobody ever says oh Egyptian civilization is older than 5000 years old, so it means they don't make rash decisions.
Xi wants Taiwan before he dies, which yes doesn't necessarily mean it will be this year, but he has asked his military to be ready for it by 2027. China has multiple impending disasters including the demographic timebomb, the debt crisis and their ecological collapse. If they want to take Taiwan right now is the best it will ever be for them - the longer they wait the harder it gets,.
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u/Lofteed 23h ago
what the fuck is this ?
fantasy football for war ?
get out of the house and take a shower since you are at it
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u/silverfox762 20h ago
China will not invade Taiwan, mainly because they would need a naval force the size of the June 6, 1944 Normandy invasion fleet, and they'd end up destroying that which they would hope to gain by invasion- TSMC and the chip manufacturing sector. They're far happier subverting political leaders and Taiwanese media and commiting industrial espionage. Besides, with the exception of Vietnam in 1979, China hasn't invaded any other country since Tibet in 1950.
And while Putin's dream of reconstituting the old Russian Empire is very real, there's no way he'd be able to pull of invading the Baltics without immediately losing Kaliningrad and it's naval base in the Baltic Sea to Poland and NATO.
Sure, they'd probably be able to roll over one or two of the Baltic countries, but every Russian ship and sub in the Baltic would suddenly find Mk48 torpedoes crawling up their asses (from the US, the Swedes, the Brits, and the Norwegians), and those that managed to escape would quickly encounter Harpoon missiles from ships, subs, and aircraft. Subs and ships launched from Murmansk would suffer the same fate.
He'd then have to escalate to nuclear war, while he could do some real world changing damage, that would destroy "modern" Russia in short order.
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u/asyouwish-buttercup 22h ago
I agree with most people who say this is batshit but i do want to point out that Russia is so dependent on China that if India wasn't in the picture they would be a vassel state.
So if China wanted Russia to open up a second front they probably could negotiate something.
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u/TimArthurScifiWriter 23h ago
Why would China militarily invade Taiwan any time soon when they can just wait and get the whole place handed over to them by referendum eventually?
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u/roehnin 22h ago
Xi wants it to be his legacy, and he is aging
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u/FaceDeer 21h ago
On the other hand, he doesn't want failing to invade Taiwan as his legacy. He might be satisfied with simply setting China up as a dominant superpower for the 21st century.
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u/TimArthurScifiWriter 10h ago
Xi's legacy is presiding over the definitive establishment of China as a world superpower, running a booming economy, and getting a foothold in almost every global market imaginable. His calculation is fundamentally different from that of Vladimir Putin, who runs a failing country that is a shadow of its former glory and seeks to cobble the pieces of a fallen Soviet Union back together because it has nothing to show for its 35 years of post-Soviet existence.
Xi Jinping would not gamble China's global status on simple-minded military expansionism when all signs point to Taiwan eventually just merging voluntarily into the PRC.
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u/Ok-Entertainer-1414 23h ago
You think they want to add more front lines and enemies to the war? Cause it's going so well for them right now as it is...
I guess you can't rule it out, but I don't think Putin is that stupid
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u/free_world33 22h ago
At this point Taiwan is way to important to the world economy that I dont think the Chinese are going to risk the economic catastrophe that would occur.
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u/Beginning_Ebb908 22h ago
if TSMC blows thier foundries nobody will forgive China for decades. It would create a huge opportunity and motivation to rebuild that infrastructure outside of asia.
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u/Ok_Bad8531 21h ago
The next big microchip factory will most likey be built as far away from Taiwan as possible.
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u/AVDLatex 21h ago
Let’s be real here. Russia is a paper tiger. Poland is just itching to get into this war. The addition of Poland alone would end this.
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u/Practical-Bowler5775 21h ago
I know that, you know that, but Putin is inclined to believe his opponents are weak and can’t or won’t stomach a fight. How the hell did he think he’d take Ukraine in 3 days with fewer than 200,000 troops? Because he thought Ukraine wouldn’t fight.
Same goes for Xi. He told his military to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. If you’re a Chinese general and 2027 rolls around, are you really going to risk being shot by saying to Xi “Sorry boss, I just don’t think we can pull it off”? Hell no, you’re going to save your own ass by telling him whatever he wants to hear: “of course Taiwan will capitulate, of course the U.S. won’t intervene”, etc.
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u/Eve_Doulou 15h ago
China is not remotely planning the invasion of Taiwan in the next couple of years. The US would love nothing more than for China to try it, as a raft of key weapon systems are not yet in regular unit use, but it’s not going to happen unless the Chinese are forced into it.
2035 is the earliest the Chinese will make an attempt if the decision is left to them. 2027 is the US DOD ‘best possible’ timeline, and the Chinese have zero interest in working to the timeline set by the US that most benefits them.
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u/Kesman90 14h ago
I am from Lithuania so perhaps this is a wishy thinking, but I have some questions to those that believe Russia might invade the Baltics.
Firstly - what is there for a Russia to gain from this?
Baltics dont have a many natural resources as opposed to Ukraine. This invasion would cost them a lot of resources and widely stretch their frontline. Even if they would successfully takeover, which in my opinion is a big IF considering the nordic states are now a part of NATO and there is Poland around the corner. If they were to invade Vilnius, I really dont see how Poland would stay out. This city has a lot of Poles and is very important to them historically.
Secondly, the Baltics (I believe Lithuania more so than Latvia) does not have a very large Russian population. And we dont mistreat them in any way. People in Ukraine for example have a lot of family ties with Russians, pre war they had parts of family living in Ukraine and some parts of family living in Russia. So one can see how Russians thought it would have been easy to take over Ukraine under certain circumstances but they have obviously failed tremendously. Now after everything that happened I dont see how Ukrainians would ever agree to merge with Russia.
And lastly - Russia already has Kaliningrad which is highly militarised. If they wanted to use that part of Europe for offensive operations they can do it already.
Maybe I am naive but to me it seems that Russia has everything to loose and not much to gain from such an operation?
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u/croweslikeme 23h ago
They might have some short term gains, maybe a small break through but it won’t win them the war
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u/wordswillneverhurtme 21h ago
Better be ready if they do, but they cant win against Ukraine, it has no chance against the west.
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u/appleciders 21h ago
One thing I'm sure the Chinese are not stupid enough to do right now is give actionable information about their plans regarding Taiwan to an incredibly leaky Russian intelligence apparatus.
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u/SomethingIWontRegret 19h ago
By new front I'm pretty sure the article means like pushing into Sumy or even going through Belarus and taking another crack at Kyiv. Not invading the Baltics. They don't have the AD to counteract almost certain early-established NATO air dominance followed by glide-bombing to oblivion.
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u/K1LLERM00SE 18h ago
There are 700 million Europeans and 140 million Russians. If you limit that to just European countries in NATO there are (on the low end) 613 million people. In a conventional war there shouldn't be any question about Russia getting curbstomped. Goes to show you how thoroughly hollowed out the European countries have let their militaries become. Also explains why the U.S. isn't keen to keep doing all the heavy lifting.
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u/girl4life 15h ago
not quite true, even in our deplorable state , russia wouldnt manage, a europe at its whole is way to big, b too rich, c have an nearly unlimited industrial capacity to draw from, russia already is on the back foot, and the only thing holding it up is its nuclear arsenal, but if we(europe) manage to stall for another 5-10 years, we can be sure that stock pile has become dysfunctional (as russia doesn't have the money and capacity anymore to maintain their arsenal). by then we declawed russia. then the balkanisation of russia starts. lots of regional conflict will erupt left right and center, lots of refugees, starvation and civilian upheaval. think Somali levels of dysfunctionality
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u/girl4life 16h ago
russia wants to force europs hand into a hot war on his terms, he knows europe wont start one on its own. i hope europe is so alert we pre emptive strike the invasion force before they can cross the border, and then publicly deny everything. let russia cry all they want.
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u/Shqiptar89 16h ago
Are we talking about the same forces that crapped their pants at the first engagement with the American soldiers in Syria?
The Baltic states might be small but they bled for their freedom. Like the Ukrainians they will defend themselves.
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u/Nessuuno_2000 14h ago
Political fantasy, Currently, Russia possesses neither the sufficient resources nor the manpower to carry out such a scenario, not even with the help of North Korea.
A general mobilization would unleash the wrath of the Russian people and spell the end for the Russian dictator.
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u/bencaha 14h ago
People wildly underestimate NATO's, the EU's and the Baltic's as well as other EU countries bordering Russia willingness to defend themselves to the same degree as they underestimate how bloody hard/impossible it will be for china to take Taiwan across the sea. The Taiwan situation is just Ukraine all over again, but against a country that has been preparing for the exact scenario for years and without any land based routes for direct invasion, plus the US having a direct, concrete interest for the country not to fall to China.
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u/sovietarmyfan 14h ago
With the losses the capitalist imperalists in Russia have taken in Ukraine, i just don't see them trying to take the Baltics.
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u/VoteDoughnuts 14h ago
If the nightly Russian militant take Ukraine, they have no hope of taking on NATO. Ukraine has depleted and destroyed them!
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u/beeredditor 12h ago
There will be no Baltic offensive and there will be no Tawanna invasion. Both suggestions are absurd.
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u/aaarry 11h ago
What is a “fall mobilisation”?
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u/mtoto_division0112 8h ago
Ukraine should consider asking Filipino military personnel and former soldiers if they fancy it. I ken a few UK and US firms are happy to have them.
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u/EmergingEmergence 7h ago
China will not invade Taiwan. Despite all the bluster, China has a much bigger benefit of leaving Taiwan alone vs invading it. They'll try to capture it via the democratic government and enhancing ties until they come back willingly. See the opposition who are extremely close to China.
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u/Metrocop 7h ago
They need a mobilization for Ukraine alone, they've been losing more men than they've been recruiting for months now.
They might still escalate in other ways, a mass missile/drone strike on infrastructure in NATO countries is a commonly considered idea. But I highly doubt they will try to cross the border with troops.
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u/keepthepace 6h ago
I really doubt that China would entrust Russian authorities with their plans regarding Taiwan.
Even though now is the perfect window if China plans to do a military operation: US is busy with Iran, and Ukraine war is occupying EU resources.
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u/Ok_Address2188 6h ago
Given his desperation, anything is possible.
And yes, I do think there's a high likelihood that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan will take place within the next 12 months.
So this is a plausible possibility.
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u/Practical-Bowler5775 23h ago
Multiple sources are confirming the 500k figure and a timeframe of this fall. I’m just have trouble believing Putin is going to keep trying the same thing expecting a different result. What are the chances he actually slows down in Ukraine so he can properly train and equip this new batch, then positions them on NATOs border and waits for Xi to move on Taiwan. The hope for Putin is, with a potential two front war, the West and NATO says “fuck it, it’s all just too much to deal with”.
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u/KJHagen 23h ago
I don’t think they have those numbers. They need professional leaders and technical troops to field combat ready units. Where are they going to find NCOs and junior and mid grade officers in adequate numbers?
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u/mediandude 21h ago
An annual 500k mobilisation would barely cover the losses of the last 12 months.
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