Taiwan Military News, Reports, Data, etc.

Brumby said:

I have already outlined the reasons in post #3010.

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But those were not reasons at all and that was pointed out and rebutted in 3014 (very popular post) and then you acknowledged that in 3020.

Brumby said:

If you chose to use that RAND report you should also note that report stated (page xviii) that under a sustained attack, Taiwan can operate its planes for a period of between 2 to 4 weeks. This is far different to your argument that it cannot get its planes off the ground.

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Oh man, oh man you need to read much more carefully. The section you are quoting is under the preface of:

"In the Air Sovereignty vignette, we explore the relative air-to-air capabilities of Taiwan’s fighter force against the PLA’s J-10, J-11A FLANKER, and the J-11B modified FLANKER in a relatively fair fight, consisting of multiple encounters of four PLA aircraft against two defenders. The vignette features Taiwan’s fighters operating in pairs to protect Taiwan’s airspace and SLOCs. These defenders encounter four PLA aggressors, and the vignette tests how many such incursions Taiwan can contest."

In this limited scenario where the PLAAF only "attacks" by sending 4 jets to test 2 ROCAF defenders, they estimate that the ROCAF has about 2-4 weeks before the losses pile up and they are toast. This is not the scenario of full out missile assault. You are confusing the different scenarios that RAND explored with each other.

Max Demian said:

How's that latecomer advantage working out for COMAC? Once they finally debug the C919 they will have a jet that's a good 15 years behind the competition and that's with most of the critical systems supplied by US or EU companies.

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Of all the comparisons you could make this is likely one of the worst. How old are the A320 and 737 designs?

Gloire_bb said:

Modern tanks/helicopters are both very usable for coast defense/beachhead reduction purposes. I honestly don't see much propaganda in these purchases.
M60 as a platform is clearly beyond its limits. Taiwan isn't Turkey, sinking money into them is simply unjustifiable.

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the M1A2 comes in at 70 tons with all the bells and whistles. That limits where it can go ( driving a 70+ ton tank cross country near irrigation ditches is a very bad idea)

A M60 with an unmanned turrets will probably be 50 tons.

I think I have said this before, but Taiwan should spend every single dime they have in missiles.
Hence their purchase of the TOW and Javelin sounds like a decent idea.

But the first priority should be air defense missiles. Not anti-tank of which they have a reasonable stockpile as is.

However the M1 Abrams seems like a terrible idea to me. Now, I don't know about the status of the roads in Taiwan but it seems like the worst possible choice of tank for an island nation. Then again Taiwan does not have a lot of options in terms of weapons suppliers.

Still I would guess something like the M2 Bradley would in fact be a lot more useful. For one it would use their TOW missile stockpiles and for another if you look at what the PLA Marines are going to use, most of their vehicles are thinly armored. Something an autocannon could easily take care of.

Spending money on advanced fighters is a waste of treasure and resources. I suppose the F-16V shouldn't be that expensive. Emphasis on shouldn't be.

gelgoog said:

I think I have said this before, but Taiwan should spend every single dime they have in missiles.
Hence their purchase of the TOW and Javelin sounds like a decent idea.

But the first priority should be air defense missiles. Not anti-tank of which they have a reasonable stockpile as is.

However the M1 Abrams seems like a terrible idea to me. Now, I don't know about the status of the roads in Taiwan but it seems like the worst possible choice of tank for an island nation. Then again Taiwan does not have a lot of options in terms of weapons suppliers.

Spending money on advanced fighters is a waste of treasure and resources. I suppose the F-16V shouldn't be that expensive. Emphasis on shouldn't be.

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Come on, man, they don't wanna fight. They have a Defense Chief and an Air force Chief of Staff who, between the two of them, can't identify a J-20. They clearly don't spend their time thinking about fighting China because they don't want to fight, and they rightfully trust their lives that neither does the PRC. China's about peaceful reunification, and only if everything fails and the hounds of hell take over the ROC will the gloves have to come off. Chinese-on-Chinese war would be a huge shame and we all hope that the ROC comes to their senses and it never comes to that.

TerraN_EmpirE said:

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Hold on, I opened the link you provided for where you got your 12,000 feet figure. The article by Michael Cole says that the 12,000 feet minimum altitude for detection figure was obtained from a RAND eBook called "Shaking the Heavens and Splitting the Earth" which it cited. I previously thought it was for sale but now see it's free. I downloaded it and did a ctrl+f for "12,000 ft," and "12,000 feet." I found nothing. I did "12,000" and I found that there was only 1 in the document and it was talking about 12,000 mines in 1945. A search for "twelve thousand" came up with nothing. This got more curious so I searched for "S400" "SAM400" and "SAM 400" and all came up blank. I looked for "sea level" and it appeared twice, both in a discussion about AWACs and not about SAM. So in other words, the source is not verifying the claim. It looks like the 12,000 feet figure was adopted by Michael Cole in error because the study he cited does not say what he said it says... at all.

manqiangrexue said:

But those were not reasons at all and that was pointed out and rebutted in 3014 (very popular post) and then you acknowledged that in 3020.

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Seriously. The only thing I acknowledged was that you were making claims and in return you were demanding prove. You can't have the cake and eat it as well.

manqiangrexue said:

Oh man, oh man you need to read much more carefully. The section you are quoting is under the preface of:

"In the Air Sovereignty vignette, we explore the relative air-to-air capabilities of Taiwan’s fighter force against the PLA’s J-10, J-11A FLANKER, and the J-11B modified FLANKER in a relatively fair fight, consisting of multiple encounters of four PLA aircraft against two defenders. The vignette features Taiwan’s fighters operating in pairs to protect Taiwan’s airspace and SLOCs. These defenders encounter four PLA aggressors, and the vignette tests how many such incursions Taiwan can contest."

In this limited scenario where the PLAAF only "attacks" by sending 4 jets to test 2 ROCAF defenders, they estimate that the ROCAF has about 2-4 weeks before the losses pile up and they are toast. This is not the scenario of full out missile assault. You are confusing the different scenarios that RAND explored with each other.

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As you pointed out. They are scenarios evaluation and each has certain probability of outcome. Point out to me a scenario where the Taiwan airforce cannot get its planes off the ground on day 1.

Brumby said:

Seriously. The only thing I acknowledged was that you were making claims and in return you were demanding prove. You can't have the cake and eat it as well.

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We can revisit that if you like. I'll even let you change your answers and show me why what you said was not just conjecture if you like. But you acknowledge "sure" that all of what you wrote were just assumptions and guesses, which was actually in post 3010 itself that said it was your speculation of the unknown. Then you said that I'm assuming that a PL-15 works, so I said it's pretty absurd to think that an in-service missile doesn't work, and work better than all its predecessors. For the third time, the US intelligence community believes that it takes a missile beyond what can be done to the AIM-120 base to compete with the PL-15. Gonna take my cake and eat it too; that's what I do with cake.

Brumby said:

As you pointed out. They are scenarios evaluation and each has certain probability of outcome. Point out to me a scenario where the Taiwan airforce cannot get its planes off the ground on day 1.

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LOL Gonna just slide right by the embarrassment from your obvious reading comprehension mistake? Gonna keep going? Okey dokey

First of all, you interpreted that wrong again. These are not different scenarios of how things can unfold after a PLA attack; those different scenarios represent what's likely to happen if the PRC initiates hostilities in different ways. If the PLA decides to use slow pressure by PLAAF, the ROCAF is likely to sustain 2-4 weeks. I don't the PRC going this route at all and really neither does RAND; it was just to compare air-forces for comparison sake. If the PLA decides to initiate with missile bombardment, the following, from post 3067 occurs:


"China's procurement and development of fighter aircraft, surface-to-surface ballistic missiles, land-attack cruise missiles and bomber aircraft advancements are not slowing, and could pulverize Taiwan's air bases within hours of a war, the report says. None of Taiwan's fighter aircraft would survive or be deployable on runways turned into a lunar landscape."

Within hours is still day 1, right? I think so. Bold part's important too. Do you really want to continue this? LOL

gelgoog said:

I think I have said this before, but Taiwan should spend every single dime they have in missiles.
Hence their purchase of the TOW and Javelin sounds like a decent idea.

But the first priority should be air defense missiles. Not anti-tank of which they have a reasonable stockpile as is.

However the M1 Abrams seems like a terrible idea to me. Now, I don't know about the status of the roads in Taiwan but it seems like the worst possible choice of tank for an island nation. Then again Taiwan does not have a lot of options in terms of weapons suppliers.

Still I would guess something like the M2 Bradley would in fact be a lot more useful. For one it would use their TOW missile stockpiles and for another if you look at what the PLA Marines are going to use, most of their vehicles are thinly armored. Something an autocannon could easily take care of.

Spending money on advanced fighters is a waste of treasure and resources. I suppose the F-16V shouldn't be that expensive. Emphasis on shouldn't be.

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if they want to go down the MBT route, they're going to need at least 300 to have a decent fighting force in the beaches after accounting for the inevitable attrition from air strikes and artillery.

manqiangrexue said:

They can't disperse their fighters to anywhere except airports;

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Highways, not just airports.
For most US fighters it requires some additional headaches, but it is a completely normal and routine practice.

Let's say some do get up in the air somehow. China's HQ-9 SAM covers 200km, the whole distance across the straight so PLAAF fighters can fly through to shoot at ROCAF fighters (while maintaining a safe distance with PL-15) but they cannot chase back lest they enter Chinese SAM range. And that's just domestic options only. China's purchased S400 SAM covers the entirely of Taiwan island with a 400km range so anything non-stealth and in the air, especially carrying missiles is liable to be shot at as soon as its airborne.

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Earth is curved, as it is uneven(main Taiwanese bases are on the eastern coast, behind the mountains); furthermore, in case of such a shooting fest, the strait and Taiwan proper will be an extremely dense ECM environment with the most powerful countermeasures possible often placed in their most effective point: inbetween emitter and receiver/target.
Furthermore, it is often forgotten, but this is a game of two: long range Taiwanese SAMs cover portions of the mainland just as well.(as do their SRBMs, btw).

By no means this is a healthy situation(especially with the arrival of 40n6-armed s-400). But they have little choice there.

They want to waste money and show US support and the US is complaining they don't spend enough on defense.

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Taiwan isn't a gulf monarchy. Tribute alone won't save them(or they would had been pacified looong ago). Because, well, even if US will reacts asap, they have to survive long enough. It is by no means assured what everything will be thrown immediately to save them.

Furthermore, air dominance isn't their only role.

manqiangrexue said:

All a numbers game. ROC has small air defenses; PRC has huge missile force.

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Please take a second look.
ROC is actually one of the densest air defence bubbles in the world.
Furthermore, there is a limit to how much of its missile stock PRC can devote to Taiwan operation. Taiwan, as a rebellous province, is for sure the most itchy, but it isn't the only unfriendly country around China.
Others need to be kept in check just as well.