Invasion of Taiwan could lead to US intervention

 Dean Chang:

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is in its second month.  Pundits continue to debate the similarities and the differences between the Ukrainian incursion and a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

Rational thinking is prevailing as NATO and the US want to avoid escalating the conflict into a third World War and the Ukrainian issue has not risen to the level that threatens US national security interests.

However, if China apes Russia and invades Taiwan to return it “to the Motherland,” it is conceivable that direct Western military aid would descend upon Taiwan.  No longer would the US hide behind its outdated (and shameful) “strategic ambiguity” policy of whether it would commit militarily to defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese attack.

Unlike Ukraine, Taiwan is of great national security interest to both the US and the rest of the non-authoritarian and (mostly) democratic world.  The long history of US supplying Taiwan with defensive arms (the Taiwan Relations Act) also indicates a robust US-Taiwan relationship that is lacking in the Ukrainian scenario.

Two factors portend US and the West possibly aiding Taiwan’s defense: 

1. Taiwan’s geographical location and
2. Taiwan’s dominance of global semi-conductor chip manufacturing.

Geography favors Taiwan

Like Pennsylvania that served as the geographically central “Keystone State” that held together the first 13 states, Taiwan is the main and central cog of the First Island Chain that stretches from the Japanese archipelago to the Philippines. 

To control Taiwan is to anchor the defense of the First Island Chain and, subsequently, dictate security operations in the western Pacific.

The US expanded its line of defense to the coast of continental Asia after its victory in the Pacific in World War II.  In a then-top-secret June 14, 1950, memo, General Douglas MacArthur wrote:

…the western strategic frontier of the United States rests…on the littoral islands extending from the Aleutians through the Philippine Archipelago.  Geographically and strategically Formosa (Taiwan) is an integral part of this offshore position which in the event of hostilities…(the) essential capability…of the United States is dependent…upon the retention of Formosa (Taiwan) by a friendly…power.

MacArthur also saw the strategic significance of Taiwan:

I am satisfied, however, that the domination of Formosa (Taiwan) by an unfriendly power would be a disaster of utmost importance to the United States.”

And:

…the strategic interests of the United States will be in serious jeopardy if Formosa (Taiwan) is allowed to be dominated by a power hostile to the United States.

A 2014 US Naval Institute article by US Naval War College professor James R. Holmes echoed MacArthur’s sentiments when it re-affirmed that the First Island Chain is the most effective point to counter potential Chinese invasion of the western Pacific and beyond

Would the US risk losing Taiwan to China so its People’s Liberation Army Navy could use the island to sail unimpeded to Honolulu and on to California?  Would Asian countries tolerate being at the mercy of Chinese naval vessels that could either turn northward to Japan or southward toward the Philippines to link up with its fortified atolls in the South China Sea immediately after crossing the Taiwan Strait?

As the key linchpin in the First Island Chain, Taiwan’s strategic location and its historic significance will not and cannot be easily ceded by the US to any nation unfriendly to it without a significant amount of kinetic demonstrations of US firepower.

Taiwan’s strategic hold on global semiconductor chip capacity.

Semiconductor chips are a key to the 21st-century economy.  Everyone needs them.  Chips are ubiquitous and omnipresent in each person’s daily life and in nearly every industry and the military.

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The argument makes sense.  Whether it would stop a Chicom attempt is another matter.  For the Chicoms, it appears to be an emotional attachment.