I understand the historical significance since the nationalists retreated to Taiwan at the end of the Chinese Civil War.
Back then, and for perhaps the middle part of the 20th century, there was a threat of a government in exile claiming mainland China. Historically, then, there was your impetus for invasion.
However, China has since grown significantly, and Taiwan no longer claims to be the government of mainland China, so that reason goes away.
Another reason people give: control the supply of chips. Yet, wouldn’t the Fabs, given their sensitive nature, be likely to be significantly destroyed in the process of an invasion?
Even still, China now has its own academia and engineering, and is larger than Taiwan. Hence, even without the corporate espionage mainland China is known for, wouldn’t investing in their burgeoning semiconductor industry make more sense, rather than spending that money on war?
People mention that taking Taiwan would be a breakout from the “containment” imposed by the ring of U.S. allies in the region.
Yet while taking Taiwan would mean access to deep-water ports, it’s not as though Taiwan would ever pose a threat to Chinese power projection—their stance is wholly defensive. If China decided to pull an “America” and send a carrier to the Middle East or something, no one would stop them and risk a war.
So what is it then? Is it just for national pride and glory? Is it to create a legacy for their leadership? The gamble just doesn’t really seem worth it.
Anyway, appreciate your opinions thanks!
Even if taiwans technology manufacturing gets destroyed in the invasion, it’s still major part of western world’s component infrastructure. They can also just rebuild. China gaining control over that or even just denying it to west would make china internationally more powerful no matter how it goes.
Most likely that isnt the only reason they want taiwan, but i dont believe it isnt one of them.
Same thing they gained from invading Hong Kong, they think it belongs to them.
Or as one of my old friends told me while playing Final Fantasy 12; the only legitimate reason to wage war against another country - land.
Hong Kong is already part of the Chinese mainland and was already kinda part of China, but Taiwan is a geographically strategic location that puts both Koreas, the Philippines, & Japan in a tougher position. Even without war it would make trade and travel in the Pacific much harder.
Lots of good points, but one aspect that people haven’t mentioned yet is that Taiwan is part of the “first island chain”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_chain_strategy
If the PRC conquers Taiwan, then it makes it much harder for the west to blockade the PRC in future conflicts.
Though technically, it is much more important to control the strait of Malacca than Taiwan.
The island chain strategy is the exact reason why China desires Taiwan. If anything, it’s a desire not to be blockaded.
It’s also the reason why China has been trying to dominate the South China Sea because that’s its only outlet to open seas.
You are approaching this from the perspective of a rational peaceful person from the west, where usually the economy is number one in everything.
Xi has achieved unrivaled rule over the party. He has successfully established a police state that ensures that any domestic dissent is immediately crushed with brutal efficiency. He has subjugated the provinces that dared to think about self rule and cultural differences, and is in the process of ethnic cleansing without any significant opposition or consequences. He has gained colonial influence all over Africa through economic means. He has taken over Hong Kong. He has significantly modernized and expanded the military, including nuclear weapons. He had made China into a global economic superpower, which other countries, including rivals, depend on for a significant amount of manufactured goods and resources.
So what is left for him? Surely he is not a man who can be content with what he has.
The obvious next step is to make China into a military superpower. For that you need to exert power abroad. What better place to begin with than that small island just off your coast that has been a challenge to Chinese supremacy for decades?
Of course, Taiwan is kind of protected by the US, the dominant superpower of the time. But they are struggling, looking weak. If China manages to take Taiwan, they will not only have removed that thorn in their side, they will also have punched the biggest, meanest kid on the block on the nose and gotten away with it.
One, it completes one of their long standing policy of “one China”. They still view Taiwan as a rogue rebellion state to bring back into the fold, not an independent country to conquer.
Two, it would cripple a lot of the west’s high end silicon industry. TSMC is the only one that can make the worlds most advanced nodes, as well as Taiwan holds chip packaging infrastructure that any other nodes require on to be useful.
To that end it is a geopolitical chip that China can use to pressure the west, but likely will never act upon until a real hot war breaks out.
They still view Taiwan as a rogue rebellion state to bring back into the fold, not an independent country to conquer.
I think this should never be mentioned without also pointing out that the island of Taiwan has never been a part of China.
The PLA has never stepped foot on the island of Taiwan, correct.
But Qing Dynasty has ruled Taiwan, and now the Republic of China is currently on Taiwan
In what way…? Taiwan has been a part of all Chinese states for centuries.
It would cripple it now but TSMC has started building Fabs in North America— but it would certainly cripple its output in the short term— then again, the U.S governments current incompetence not withstanding, you would think that if that ever happened the U.S would be able to emergency build Fabs within a few (2-4?) years if necessary.
The fabs themselves aren’t the only limiting factor on modern lithography, skill is the bigger one; this stuff is probably more complicated than rocket science. We US engineers dont have the skills to run a competitive fab in the US, that takes many years of losing money to be developed. Intel has bigger better EUV machines than TSMC but they just cant compete and intel keeps laying off their engineers constantly which is a very bad signal.
Also, last time I was reading on the topic TSMC doesn’t plan to produce advanced chips on their US fabs to gatekeep their knowledge.
From what I know, it’s not that simple. Those are very complex and delicate processes, so the 2 to 4 years timeline sounds quite optimistic.
Also, it’s entirely possible TSMC doesn’t want to transfer the entirety of its knowledge to the US, as it basically guarantees the US would intervene in the case of an invasion to protect the supply of advanced chips.
Land and the sea surrounding Taiwan, which comes with resource that they can exploit, and controling people that they claim is theirs. It’s the same reason why europe sail across the sea to colonize others land, and why US doesn’t let Puerto Rico become independent. China never acknowledged that Taiwan is an independent country, they always believe that Taiwan is their territory. It’s imperialism.
Puerto Rico doesn’t want to be independent. They regularly have polls on this. About half want to be a state. About half want to keep the status quo. A small fraction favor independence. And it is obvious why - despite all the economic restrictions and lack of representation, the average Puerto Rican is far better off economically with a US passport. Just look at comparable Caribbean island nations - an independent Puerto Rico would have little going for it other than as a stopover for shipping boats and cruise ships. As part of the US, they draw an outsized portion of the Caribbean tourism market, can easily trade with US companies without the impediments of international borders, and can dream that their kids can go to the mainland and study in some of the best universities in the world.
That’s true, my bad. I meant to draw comparison on why US still have Puerto Rico as a territory but without any political representation
Doesn’t both Taiwan and China both officially recognize all of China and Taiwan as their own territory?
Maybe, but when is the last time you heard taiwan claiming china is their territory rather than talking about taiwan independent (台独)?
Yes and according to the CCP if Taiwan ever changes that it will trigger military action.
Huh I guess I might have been weong— Taiwan technically does claim the mainland? But also not its governance?
“The 1991 constitutional amendments and the 1992 Cross-Strait Relations Act marked a pivotal shift, as the ROC ceased actively claiming governance over the mainland, stopped treating the PRC as a rebellious group, and started treating it in practise, as an equal political entity effectively governing mainland China from ROC’s perspective, though the ROC constitution still technically includes the mainland as ROC territory.”
Yeah it’s one of those technically true things that gets trotted out a lot to paint a “both sides” type picture. Not sure if that was the other commenters intent or not, but when stated without context it often seems like that’s the intent.
I think the key word is “practical”. Both the mainland and Taiwanese governments are not stupid, they know they have to acknowledge the status quo for day to day business like customs and immigration.
stopped treating the PRC as a rebellious group
That was to lift martial law.
What does China achieve
The typical bully’s satisfaction.
Imo I think the biggest thing is it would be completing the revolution in the sense that the KMT fled to Taiwan and is a holdout, that would be a huge win for national pride and legitimacy for the government. The second biggest thing would be nothaving another country with an army so close to them that is “hostile” to their interests. And then after that there would be a lot of other benefits like absorbing their industry, economic zones, military bases, etc. They would much rather have the modern KMT party win an election and vote to become a part of China, than invade, which while very unlikely is not impossible by any means in the span of decades.
Taiwan is a fantastic launching point for an invasion of China and Taiwan has decent relations with the US and other capitalist states who have an interest in opposing China. Yk how people say Israel is an unsinkable aircraft carrier in the middle east? Taiwan could be like that for China if the western powers decided to use it as such. There is already a US military base there. Imagine how the US would react if Cuba had a Chinese military base? This is the main material reason.
Chip manufacturing could also play a role but it is a minor one compared to this.
lemmitors: They hate Taiwan for their freedom!
Extreme disdain for democracy. Some psychopaths want to bring us back before the age of enlightement, while using enlightement or (especially in case of China) post-enlightement ideas to do so, because we citizens are all like badly behaving 12 year olds, who need 24 hour supervision on every day on the week, every month of the year, or we might “go insane” from doing something a psychopathic madman does not want us.
it’s like Spain wanting Catalonia to be under control. Why would Spain want to lose control of a part of their own country?
Too bad Taiwan is not part of China.
Taiwan should be part of China. Taiwan has been ruled by China since the Qing Dynasty.
A Democratic China, that is, not this CCP infested bullshit.
Had the ROC won the Civil War, I doubt anyone would complain about China having HK, Macau, and Taiwan.
For most westerners, the support for Taiwan Independence is mostly a democracy vs autocracy issue, not a independence vs re-unification issue.
Sorry tankie. If a bunch of people leave a country they shouldn’t be considered property. Re-unification is Chinese propaganda. Most of Taiwan doesn’t want that.
It is though. Both countries claim the other part to be part of the other. Denying that is just western histeria.
Taiwan does not claim that over China.
And just because somebody claims something it doesn’t make it true.
Money, power, influence, prestige
The same Russia gained from invading Ukraine, I guess: securing themselves from future, final NATO aggression by proxy.
There is no NATO aggression. You’re spreading Kremlin propaganda
I mean, the Americans + European vassals literally couped, bombed and invaded several countries in the past few decades and only those with the military capacity to stand against them haven’t lost their sovereignty but okay. Nvm the shitton of American bases surprisingly placed in very geopolitically relevant spots, lol, they’re just for decoration I’m sure. Or how up until not that long ago there was a ‘United States Taiwan Defense Command’ 🤷🙄.
C’mon man, unless you’re aware and just getting paid for this (I doubt it), your ignorance is dangerous. And you better shake off that imperialist propaganda cause trust me it’s not gonna help when the empire runs out of easy foreign targets and comes home knocking…
Imperialism is good if the other team does it? Come on.
Besides, nobody was going to attack Russia. 1. they have nukes, 2. everyone who tried in the past has lost due to geographic and military realities, 3. they were supplying (and still are!) lots of fossil fuels to Europe, and 4. they have nukes.
All other recent conflicts near european Russia like Georgia, Moldova (both Russian imperialist aggressions) and Yugoslavia (it’s complicated) were limited, minor skirmishes on more or less neutral territory. Hardly a threat to Russia as a nation or even its role in Europe.
Hi, Eastern European here. We begged to join NATO. We kicked and screamed, wheeled and dealed, anything we could to get that coveted NATO membership.
You know why? Because we’ve been dealing with expansionist Russian imperialism for our entire histories. Different coats of paint in different time periods, but it’s all the same shit. The US is an empire, but at least here it’s preferable to Russia’s imperial ambitions.
Seems like you’re just talking about the USA and not NATO.
Yeah, Taiwan is going to be in NATO. 🙄
I don’t think you understand what I meant or you’re not arguing in good will. Or you and everyone frantically downvoting are just having a gut reaction because of your propagandised brains. Check what MacArthur said about Taiwan: the overall idea hasn’t changed, just the resources allocated to it and its organization…
You’re seriously using the guy who was removed for refusing to follow orders (orders to stand down and NOT escalate) half a century ago, to argue NATO’s current position on the defense of Taiwan?
Little yellow penis seems bigger somehow.
