Can someone educate me on this issue? Like I know that China has strategic reserves and China can get energy from Russia and Middle East through land. But how reliant is China on the Strait of Malacca to get its energy? Also, couldn't China use its hypersonics to destroy any naval blockade?
Fourth Taiwan Strait Crisis
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Can someone educate me on this issue? Like I know that China has strategic reserves and China can get energy from Russia and Middle East through land. But how reliant is China on the Strait of Malacca to get its energy? Also, couldn't China use its hypersonics to destroy any naval blockade?
First minute in the video ‘Uyghur genocide’ and ‘21st century holocaust’ Why do you even bother?
Yea, I know those are fake. Just ignore them. But my point is about China's energy situation.
Then why the video?
A real weakness but quite misunderstood and exaggerated. It is true that China is quite vulnerable to an oil blockade. But there are a few things people miss.
1- Malacca isn't very important. It is used because of the infrastructure provided by Singapore and its closeness to the Asian mainland. There are many bodies of water there. In fact, the largest oil tankers already avoid Malacca because of its shallowness. The assets the US needs to blockade China are quite substantial in amount because of this. This means a lot fewer assets to deal with in China's periphery
2- It would have no effects on Chinese war making capability, heating and electricity production. China produces a lot of oil and heating is usually done using coal. Transportation would be hit. But that's about it.
3- Most people miss it but modern navies are not suited for either blockades or merchant escorts. They grew too small for that. Unless the US engages in unrestricted warfare against merchant marine I can't see how they could accomplish an effective blockade.
4- Blockading China equals blockading the entire world and a blanket blockade on SCS and the Persian gulf would break the global economy. It would have huge political costs for the USA.
5- Most US patrol assets, which would be spread thin because of the geography, would be vulnerable to Chinese surface groups and conventional subs. Yuan is not a coastal sub after all. Only American assets that are under aircraft carrier coverage would be safe.
I'm really looking forward episode 1. It's going to hit a lot of peopleHaha yeah I'll be back to posting soon enough. This whole hospital nonsense is pretty draining, and I've been putting a lot of my effort into that project with Tempest. The video portion alone is slated to have 23 episodes, some of which are probably gonna end up being over an hour long - and that's just one portion of the project (hopefully episode 0 will be released within the week). As such, I don't have a whole lot of time (or energy, tbh) to write the same amount I typically do.
(Don't tell Tempest about the attachment)
You made a lot of great points.
However, there is one key factor to consider: Submarines.
Submarines, thanks to their stealthiness, can make direct observation and interdiction very challenging simply by using the water blanket as cover.
Which is why submarines are so effective at hunting convoys during both Atlantic Wars. This is also why the Soviet Navy envisioned that their nuclear attack submarines be sent to the North Atlantic to intercept any NATO reinforcement convoys coming from the US to Europe in case a land war between NATO and Warsaw Pact broke out on Europe.
It is a well known fact that the US and her allies have the best submarines suited for long-range operations, which is absolutely perfect for stopping oil and gas shipping between the Middle East and China.
By distributing those attack submarines in the Indian Ocean and Western Pacific Ocean, I believe they have sufficient capabilities of not just facing off with the PLAN, but also interdicting shippings heading towards China.
Of course such actions would have global-scale consequences, but it's not like you can expect the US and her allies to be reasonable at this point, when their combined nuclear arsenal are the largest or 2nd largest. Just look at how arrogant and ignorant they are since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war.
(This is in light of reports where nuclear-armed countries in the West, especially in the US, vowed to even nuke countries like India, Brazil and Indonesia if they are getting nuked, just because of the "If I'm going down, I would rather take everyone down with me than leave anyone standing. And I mean EVERYONE." mentality.)
Hence, I believe that submarines are the utmost threat towards the shipping lanes between China and the Middle East. This needs to be look after and effectively countered in case of war.
B/c the video mainly talks about China's energy situation? Like what are trying to say here?
I understand now why the U.S. doing a naval blockade in the Strait of Malacca is extremely difficult, but what do you mean by this. Why would modern warships by too small to do a blockade?
Not ship sizes, the fleet sizes.
Moreover, if China wants to protect those shipping against interdiction by enemy submarines, some PLA warships and warplanes would have to be sent to the Indian Ocean to patrol and hunt for enemy submarines, plus providing shipping protection. This is certainly going to sap away considerable amount of PLA manpower and equipment, which by that time would already be facing significant pressure from the militaries of the US and her allies in the Pacific Ocean.
Speaking of the Indian Ocean, let me be honest with you all - Unless there is some sort of truce/peace deal between China and India during the war in the Pacific, there is no guarantee that India wouldn't join in the fray of interdicting those shipping that are heading to China. Just look at the Indian Navy and Air Force's frequent boasting about cutting off China ever since relations between China and India gone sour.
Despite how the Indian military is still a few leagues away from the Chinese military, the threats from them should never be discounted nor underestimated. To counter against the Indian military interference would require basically the same steps above, which could be detremental to China's overall war effort.
Pakistan (and to a lesser extent, Bangladesh) certainly can be called upon to distract India from messing with China, but at present, they aren't strong enough nor willing enough to stand up to India like how Russia and China are standing up to the US right now.
I believe that all of these have to be taken into account as well. Which makes me wonder as to why aren't people bringing these sort of points up but myself.
Although, it ain't all doom and gloom. Quantity itself is quality in its own right. Therefore IMHO, it would be better if China can rapidly pump up both the size AND capabilities of the PLAN, PLAAF and PLARF to be at least 1.5 times that of her adversarial counterparts in the Pacific and Indian Oceans.
Personal preferences would be 2.
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