Not Defending Taiwan

This post at RealClearPolicy by Ivan Eland is a sort of counterpoint to the article previously cited. In it the author argues that the United States should not overtly pledge to defend Taiwan:

The current deliberate policy ambiguity of what the American response would be in that event had the purpose of not encouraging Taiwan to recklessly declare its independence, thus triggering an apoplectic Chinese response. Yet on several occasions, President Joe Biden has gone off script and pledged or implied a US defense of Taiwan, with aides rushing to walk that back by saying that U.S. policy toward Taiwan had not changed.

In fact, the United States should be headed in the opposite direction: helping Taiwan to become strong enough to run a “porcupine strategy” against any possible Chinese attack. Taiwan would not need to be able to defeat a much larger Chinese military but merely to deter it from attacking by being able to inflict unacceptable damage to it. Even the policy of U.S. ambiguity has encouraged Taiwan over the years to buy too many sexy, high-tech weapons, such as fighter aircraft, at the expense of the glue that holds militaries together and makes them effective fighting forces. That glue would be better mobilization of Taiwanese society for defense and improvements in for example, military training, logistics, electronic warfare, cyber defense, and command, control, communications, and intelligence (C3I). In addition, Taiwan needs to be able to threaten vulnerable Chinese surface warships with more investment in mine warfare, anti-ship missiles, fast patrol ships, and diesel submarines.

Finally, instead of U.S. hysteria over a possible Chinese attack, Americans should realize that the Chinese military may have made the same mistake as the Russian and Taiwanese militaries by developing or buying high tech systems while neglecting more important “glue” items. After the Russian debacle in Ukraine, if Xi has any sense, he should be fearful that the formidable-looking Chinese military also could be a Potemkin village when the shooting starts — especially if it tried to conduct an amphibious assault, which is one of the most difficult military operations to master. Thus, the United States should not be hysterical about the Chinese threat to Taiwan and rush to pledge to defend the island. Instead, U.S. policy should concentrate on helping a military reform-minded Taiwanese leader, Tsai Ing-wen, to convince a stodgy Taiwanese military that it should prepare to actually fight a war instead of being mesmerized by high-tech toys. Ukraine’s success against Russia should be an inspiration.

I am wary of security pledges and alliances for the simple reason that I strongly suspect that our allies will subject any move on their part to cost-benefit analysis where I’m not sure that we will.