Second thoughts in China about attacking Taiwan?

 Washington Examiner:

China is deeply alarmed by the West's unified response to Russian President Vladimir Putin's war on Ukraine.

Actively contemplating its own conquest of a neighboring democracy, Taiwan, China wants to ensure that its aggression won't meet a similar Western response to that which has met Russia's aggression. Beijing's fear is that a People's Liberation Army assault on Taiwan will lead to China's isolation from the international community.

...

While China has always assumed that an invasion of Taiwan would result in a major U.S. sanctions response, it had also assumed that other global powers would react more cautiously. Alongside French President Emmanuel Macron's vision of "strategic autonomy," Beijing has been increasingly optimistic that it could separate the U.S. response to a Taiwan invasion from that of the European Union. This separation would feasibly allow Beijing to retain its global trade interests and weather the short-term condemnation that came with attacking the island democracy.

Yet with the EU and even longtime neutral nations such as Switzerland responding to Russia with wide-ranging sanctions, China has been forced to reconsider its assessment. Reflecting the growing concern in Beijing, Xi held a summit with Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Tuesday. Offering a cautious olive branch to the EU, Xi said he "deeply regretted" Russia's war (though he did not condemn Russia or Putin by name). In a telling example of China's concerns over Taiwan, however, Xi pressed the EU's two most powerful leaders to temper their sanctions on Russia. China's foreign ministry has repeatedly trumpeted this "sanctions are always bad" argument in recent days. On Thursday, spokesman Zhao Lijian argued, "It has been long proven that rather than addressing the problem, sanctions will create new problems."

...

I suspect the reaction to an invasion of Taiwan would be equal to, if not more violent, and China already has more to lose in the way of trade than Russia ever did. 

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