Why China Fear the Power of U.S. Navy Aircraft Carriers in a War This was China’s introduction to the power and flexibility of the aircraft carrier, something it obsesses about to this day. by Kyle Mizokami

 China is in the unique position of both seeing the value of carriers and building its own fleet while at the same time devoting a lot of time and resources to the subject of sinking them.

More than twenty years ago, a military confrontation in East Asia pushed the United States and China uncomfortably close to conflict. Largely unknown in America, the event made a lasting impression on China, especially Chinese military planners. The Third Taiwan Crisis, as historians call it, was China’s introduction to the power and flexibility of the aircraft carrier, something it obsesses about to this day.

The crisis began in 1995. Taiwan’s first-ever democratic elections for president were set for 1996, a major event that Beijing naturally opposed. The sitting president, Lee Teng-hui of the Kuomintang party, was invited to the United States to speak at his alma mater, Cornell University. Lee was already disliked by Beijing for his emphasis on “Taiwanization,” which favored home rule and established a separate Taiwanese identity away from mainland China. Now he was being asked to speak at Cornell on Taiwan’s democratization, and Beijing was furious.

The Clinton administration was reluctant to grant Lee a visa—he had been denied one for a similar talk at Cornell the year before—but near-unanimous support from Congress forced the White House’s hand. Lee was granted a visa and visited Cornell in June. The Xinhua state news agency warned, “The issue of Taiwan is as explosive as a barrel of gunpowder. It is extremely dangerous to warm it up, no matter whether the warming is done by the United States or by Lee Teng-hui. This wanton wound inflicted upon China will help the Chinese people more clearly realize what kind of a country the United States is.”

In August 1995, China announced a series of missiles exercises in the East China Sea. Although the exercises weren’t unusual, their announcement was, and there was speculation that this was the beginning of an intimidation campaign by China, both as retaliation against the Cornell visit and intimidation of Taiwan’s electorate ahead of the next year’s elections. The exercises involved the People’s Liberation Army’s Second Artillery Corps (now the PLA Rocket Forces) and the redeployment of Chinese F-7 fighters (China’s version of the MiG-21 Fishbed fighter) 250 miles from Taiwan. Also, in a move that would sound very familiar in 2017, up to one hundred Chinese civilian fishing boats entered territorial waters around the Taiwanese island of Matsu, just off the coast of the mainland.

According to Globalsecurity.org, redeployments of Chinese long-range missile forces continued into 1996, and the Chinese military actually prepared for military action. China drew up contingency plans for thirty days of missile strikes against Taiwan, one strike a day, shortly after the March 1996 presidential elections. These strikes were not carried out, but preparations were likely detected by U.S. intelligence.

In March 1996, China announced its fourth major military exercises since the Cornell visit. The country’s military announced a series of missile test zones off the Chinese coastline, which also put the missiles in the approximate direction of Taiwan. In reality, China fired three missiles, two of which splashed down just thirty miles from the Taiwanese capital of Taipei and one of which splashed down thirty-five miles from Kaohsiung. Together, the two cities handled most of the country’s commercial shipping traffic. For an export-driven country like Taiwan, the missile launches seemed like an ominous shot across the country’s economic bow.

American forces were already operating in the area. The USS Bunker Hill, a Ticonderoga-class Aegis cruiser, was stationed off southern Taiwan to monitor Chinese missile tests with its SPY-1 radar system. The Japan-based USS Independence, along with the destroyers Hewitt and O’Brien and frigate McClusky, took up position on the eastern side of the island.

After the missile tests, the carrier USS Nimitz left the Persian Gulf region and raced back to the western Pacific. This was an even more powerful carrier battle group, consisting of the Aegis cruiser Port Royal, guided missile destroyers Oldendorf and Callaghan (which would later be transferred to the Taiwanese Navy), guided missile frigate USS Ford, and nuclear attack submarine USS Portsmouth. Nimitz and its escorts took up station in the Philippine Sea, ready to assist Independence. Contrary to popular belief, neither carrier actually entered the Taiwan Strait.

The People’s Liberation Army, unable to do anything about the American aircraft carriers, was utterly humiliated. China, which was just beginning to show the consequences of rapid economic expansion, still did not have a military capable of posing a credible threat to American ships just a short distance from of its coastline.

While we might never know the discussions that later took place, we know what has happened since. Just two years later a Chinese businessman purchased the hulk of the unfinished Russian aircraft carrier Riga, with the stated intention of turning it into a resort and casino. We know this ship today as China’s first aircraft carrier, Liaoning, after it was transferred to the PLA Navy and underwent a fifteen-year refurbishment. At least one other carrier is under construction, and the ultimate goal may be as many as five Chinese carriers.

At the same time, the Second Artillery Corps leveraged its expertise in long-range rockets to create the DF-21D antiship ballistic missile. The DF-21 has obvious applications against large capital ships, such as aircraft carriers, and in a future crisis could force the U.S. Navy to operate eight to nine hundred miles off Taiwan and the rest of the so-called “First Island Chain.”

The Third Taiwan Crisis was a brutal lesson for a China that had long prepared to fight wars inside of its own borders. Still, the PLA Navy deserves credit for learning from the incident and now, twenty-two years later, it is quite possible that China could seriously damage or even sink an American carrier. Also unlike the United States, China is in the unique position of both seeing the value of carriers and building its own fleet while at the same time devoting a lot of time and resources to the subject of sinking them. The United States may soon find itself in the same position.

Why Chinese and Russia Missiles Could End the Age of the Aircraft Carrier The current situation should come as no surprise. by Michael Peck

The U.S. can't simply count on technological superiority to win the day.

Inexpensive Russian and Chinese weapons, such as cyberwar and antiship missiles, threaten the West’s reliance on expensive arms such as aircraft carriers.

“China and Russia appear to have focused many (but not all) their efforts on being able to put at risk the key Western assets that are large, few in number and expensive,” reads a recent study by the Royal United Services Institute, a British military think tank.

“Western governments have become acutely aware of the problems of this financial imbalance in the counterinsurgency context, when they found themselves using weapons costing $70,000, sometimes fired from aircraft that cost $30,000 an hour to fly, to destroy a Toyota pick-up vehicle that might be optimistically valued at $10,000,” the report went on. “Missiles costing (much) less than half a million pounds [$642,000] a unit could at least disable a British aircraft carrier that costs more than £3 billion [$3.9 billion]. Indeed, a salvo of ten such missiles would cost less than $5 million.”

The British report is in response to America’s Third Offset Strategy, the Pentagon’s search for ways to maintain U.S. military superiority amid the rise of asymmetric warfare. The ability of a missile or a computer virus to destroy or disable expensive Cold War–era weapons like aircraft carriers or tanks, or the satellites and computer networks that support them, has left U.S. planners grappling with how to devise new capabilities while rendering older weapons less vulnerable.

But what makes the RUSI report particularly interesting is the nation that authored it. With one-twelfth the defense budget of the United States, Britain can’t afford to lavish money on numerous projects like their cousins across the pond do. So, by necessity, the British study offers a particularly clear-eyed view of the situation.

For example, RUSI points out that the current situation should come as no surprise. The United States fielded stealth aircraft and cruise missiles more than twenty-five years ago. “It would be naive to expect that Russia and China are not where leading NATO states were three decades ago.”

Nor can the West count on technological superiority. American and British armed forces are configured to fight overseas, in expeditionary forces or in support of or allies. In contrast, Russia and China have chosen to focus on fighting near their home borders, such as eastern Europe or the South China Sea. “Thus, although the US spends much more on defence technology development than its potential adversaries, its better technology does not necessarily translate to proportionate military advantage in a specific theatre,” RUSI notes.

The RUSI study suggests that Britain—and implicitly the United States—adopt a four-pronged approach it calls Tolerate, Treat, Transform and Terminate. The first three refer to maintaining the capability of current weapons, upgrading current weapons to meet future threats and developing entirely new technologies.

However, the last option—what RUSI calls Terminate—is the most explosive. It essentially means getting rid of weapons that can no longer perform effectively in combat, yet can’t or are too expensive to upgrade. “The judgement here will be whether it is the most cost-effective means to deliver that effect, or whether a less sophisticated capability might be more appropriate,” RUSI says. “Second, while desirable, the capability could be rapidly reconstituted should the need arise.”

The RUSI report carefully refrains from naming specific weapons that might need to be eliminated. But given the study’s conclusion that Russian and Chinese weapons now threaten Western reliance on a small number of sophisticated and irreplaceable platforms, the large aircraft carriers beloved by the U.S. Navy would seem to be at the top of the list.

This option “is understandably the most difficult, requiring an alignment of stakeholder interests and decisive action,” RUSI admits. It’s also easier for Britain than the United States: the British are unlikely to confront an adversary such as Russia or China alone, without Western and especially U.S. forces that can provide capabilities that Britain can’t. It’s the Americans who need to be able to provide the muscle and the lift.

Nonetheless, perhaps it takes a former great power like Britain, fading gracefully from center stage in the global arena, to admit reality.

Yes, Turkey Purged Its Own Air Force Maybe not the best idea. by Michael Peck

 Perhaps it would have been easier not to get rid of those F-16 pilots.

Fighter pilots aren't cheap. The U.S. Air Force estimates that training a new pilot to fly a plane like the F-35 costs $11 million. And that doesn't count the priceless experience of a veteran pilot who has been flying for years. That's why the U.S. Air Force is willing to offer half-million-dollar bonuses to retain experienced fighter pilots.

So a nation that throws its fighter pilots in jail is not just wasting money, but also an extremely valuable resource. Yet in the name of politics, Turkey's government has purged its air force so badly that it can barely fly its F-16 fighters.

The trouble began on July 15, 2016, when members of Turkey’s military “allegedly” launched a coup to topple the Islamist government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The word allegedly is used for a reason. Despite being pros at overthrowing civilian governments (with four successful coups between 1960 and 1997), the 2016 effort was laughable. Soldiers attempted to isolate Istanbul by erecting roadblocks on the Bosporus Bridge—but only blocked the lanes in one direction. Youtube video showed soldiers with Leopard tanks surrendering to police and civilians. As Erdogan was flying back to Istanbul from vacation, two Turkish Air Force F-16s had his aircraft in their sights—but failed to shoot it down.

And the vaunted Turkish military was supposed to be NATO's Cold War southern bulwark against the Soviets? If so, it's a wonder that the Kremlin never seized the Bosporus.

All of which had skeptics wondering whether the coup was actually a false-flag operation by the Turkish government, aimed at providing (or provoking) an excuse to quash secular Turkish generals and covert followers of exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen. Either way, the coup fizzled in less than an hour, and then Erdogan's government took its revenge.

Numerous senior and field-grade officers were purged. More than 300 F-16 pilots were dismissed. This defanged the Turkish military as a political threat, and strengthened the increasingly authoritarian rule of Erdogan and his neo-Ottoman Justice and Development Party, which has imprisoned many journalists. But it left a gaping question: who would be left to fly Turkey's jet fighters?

With war raging in Syria, and Turkish forces grabbing parts of northern Syria, Turkey's military is keeping busy (including an F-16 that shot down a Russian plane over Syria—the Turkish pilot who did it was one of those purged). It hardly seems a propitious time to decimate your pilot cadre.

The Turkish government has been looking overseas to make up the shortfall. However, the Washington has rebuffed a request to send over U.S. flight instructors, though Turkish pilots are receiving basic flight training in the United States. Turkey has also sought assistance from Pakistan—which also flies F-16s—though training Turkish pilots could violate U.S. arms export rules. In a sign of desperation, "the Turkish government has issued a decree that threatens 330 former pilots with the revocation of their civil pilot license, unless they return to Air Force duty for four years," notes an Atlantic Council report.

"It is unclear how the decision to compel a return to service will impact unit morale," the report added.

Now, enter Russia—a traditional enemy of Turkey for centuries, and one of whose jets was shot down by the Turks over Syria. Yet Turkey is seeking to buy Russia's S-400 long-range anti-aircraft missiles, which only ratchets up tensions between Washington and Ankara over Syria and other issues.

Turkey has also signed an agreement with Franco-Italian missile maker Eurosam to develop a long-range anti-aircraft missile. And why is Turkey suddenly so interested in surface-to-air missiles? "In aftermath of 15 July, with the operations against the Turkish Armed Forces, there was a reduction in the number of F-16 pilots, creating a need to develop our air defense," said Turkish analyst Verda Ozer. "This is the reason for the S-400 purchase."

But even the S-400 wouldn't totally solve Turkey's air defense travails. "Since the Russian S-400 system cannot be integrated into NATO infrastructure, it cannot be used to protect against missile defense," Ozer notes. Hence, Turkey needs two systems: the S-400 to shoot down hostile aircraft, and a Eurosam weapon to intercept ballistic missiles.

Perhaps it would have been easier not to get rid of those F-16 pilots.

This Is the United States’ Most Important Island in the Pacific Ocean Wake Island is possibly one of the most important American territories in the Pacific and would be the lynchpin of American strategy there, should a war with China or North Korea break out. by Caleb Larson

Wake Island is not particularly impressive. Made of coral, the atoll is a mere twelve feet or so above sea level at its lowest point. It is remote, too. It is twenty-three hundred miles or about thirty-seven hundred kilometers west of Honolulu, and about two thousand miles, or thirty-two hundred kilometers, southeast of Tokyo. Wake Island’s remote location is what makes the speck of rock so important to the United State’s presence in the Pacific Ocean region.

Wake Island was claimed by the United States in 1899, though European contact with the island had been made multiple times before then. The island remained mostly uninhabited, minus the occasional castaway or stranded ship’s crew until the late 1930s, when the United States placed a small Marine garrison on the coral outpost. During World War II, Wake Island was the scene of intense fighting between Marine elements defending the island against the Japanese, simultaneously with the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941.

Wake Island Now

Today, Wake Island remains one of the most remote islands in the world, protected by miles and miles of open ocean. The rocky outpost has been modified extensively since World War II and hosts a nearly ten-thousand-foot-long runway, which can accommodate all aircraft currently in United States service.

In the event of a war in the Pacific, American bases on remote outposts like Guam or Okinawa would likely have a very difficult time fending off hostile missile attacks, partly because of their proximity to Asia. Okinawa in particular is only around five hundred miles or so from the Chinese coast.

Even though both islands have missile defense systems—the Patriot surface-to-air missile system and Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system—both could be overwhelmed by a large enough missile salvo. Losses at islands nearer to Asia at the outset of a conflict could be immense and next to impossible to prevent. Wake Island however is harder to hit—and it might just be out of reach.

Another factor besides sheer distance that would keep Wake Island better protected is the United States’ Ground-Based Midcourse Defense (GBMD), a missile intercept system. Whereas missile defense systems like THAAD or the Patriot missile defense system are shorter range and provide regional protection, the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense missile system has a much, much larger flight envelope.

The GBMD system is deployed in both Alaska and California and is specifically designed to counter longer-range missile threats against the entire United States and Canada. Wake Island is likely just inside the interceptor’s defense umbrella. 

Postscript

In the event of a Pacific war, American bombers would have to carry out a high number of sorties against enemy missile and air defense outposts in the Western Pacific. In that conflict, Wake Island would be the last American outpost in the Pacific able to get bombers into the air and keep fighters alongside them fueled up and ready to go. Bombs away!

Yes, Israel Now Owns Stealth F-35s (The Middle East Won't Be the Same) Iran or Syria have no way to match it. by Michael Peck

An Israeli F-35 doesn't just carry bombs. It also sows doubt.

Israel is locked in a perpetual state of deterrence with its neighbors, all of whom are enemies now or could easily become enemies again. In particular, Israel is threatened by rockets and ballistic missiles from Iran and Hezbollah, who in turn are threatened by the prospect of Israeli retaliation. Israel's F-35s add uncertainty to the mix. That Israeli aircraft could reach Iran, and routinely strike Hezbollah and Syria, is no secret. But Iran now has to wonder whether Israeli F-35s can stealthily penetrate Iranian defenses (and note that the Israeli specially modified F-35I has extra fuel capacity).

Something changed in the region several years back, when Israel declared its first squadron of F-35s operational. Numerically, the change seemed minor. The Israeli Air Force's (IAF) 140 ("Golden Eagle") Squadron has just nine F-35I Adir aircraft, scheduled to grow to fifty over the next three years. That's a small number compared to the roughly 300 F-15s, F-15Es and F-16s currently operated by the IAF.

But the significance of Israel's F-35s is more than numbers. First, there is the simple qualitative advantage. Nationalists and propagandists can argue the merits of the F-35 versus the latest Russian MiG and Sukhoi fighters. What matters here is that neither Iran nor Syria are likely to get the most advanced Russian fighters or antiaircraft missiles (it took Iran ten years before it received Russian S-300 long-range anti-aircraft missiles in 2017). The F-35 is superior to Iran's collection of F-14, MiG-29s, and F-4 Phantoms, Syria's MiG-29s and Egypt's F-16s. There is a remote possibility that Israeli F-35s could confront Russian Su-35s (which Russia claims scared off U.S. F-22s) over Syria. But otherwise, Israel has and will continue to have the most advanced combat aircraft in the region.

Then there is the stealth factor. It has been almost thirty-six years since Israel last conducted a major air campaign against an opponent possessing a respectable air force. Now the IAF spends its time conducting pinprick raids with a few aircraft against a Hezbollah arms convoy here, a Hamas weapons dump there. Even a handful of stealth jets will enable Israel to conduct sneak raids over Syria—or even Iran.

Critics can rightly point out that technological advantages like stealth are fleeting. Perhaps Israel's enemies will develop, or receive from Moscow, the capability to detect and defeat the F-35. All of which may be true, but which also misses the point.

Israel is locked in a perpetual state of deterrence with its neighbors, all of whom are enemies now or could easily become enemies again. In particular, Israel is threatened by rockets and ballistic missiles from Iran and Hezbollah, who in turn are threatened by the prospect of Israeli retaliation. Israel's F-35s add uncertainty to the mix. That Israeli aircraft could reach Iran, and routinely strike Hezbollah and Syria, is no secret. But Iran now has to wonder whether Israeli F-35s can stealthily penetrate Iranian defenses (and note that the Israeli specially modified F-35I has extra fuel capacity).

Whether or not the aircraft can successfully accomplish this doesn't matter in this context. It's only whether Iran believes it can, and whether this will affect Tehran's actions.

An Israeli F-35 doesn't just carry bombs. It also sows doubt.

Meet the American-Built Ships Ukraine Will Soon Sail (But Will Russia Care?) by Caleb Larson

The Ukrainian Ministry of Defense said that this security package will provide “various means of surveillance, counter-artillery fire, vehicles, medical equipment, cyber security systems and countering Russian propaganda, etc. to our state.”

Although Ukraine has received assistance in their land war against Russian-backed separatists, including some of America’s powerful Javelin anti-tank missiles, this latest aid package is focused on naval support. “Support of the Ukrainian Navy is an important part of the assistance, which should contribute to the establishment of stability and security in the Azov and Black Sea regions,” the Ministry stated.

Sea of Azov

In November of 2018, the Russian FSB violently captured three Ukrainian patrol boats that were transitioning through the Kerch Strait into the Sea of Azov northwest of Russian-occupied Crimea. During that action, twenty-four Ukrainian sailors were detained. Though the soldiers were eventually repatriated to Ukraine, the three Ukrainian ships—one corvette, one minesweeper, and one smaller-sized gunboat were not. Combined with Ukrainian Navy defections to Russia during the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea, Ukraine’s Black Sea fleet is depleted and understrength.

Mark VI

In June, the State Department approved a $600 million sale of sixteen Mark VI Patrol Boats to Ukraine. These boats would help “improve Ukraine’s capability to meet current and future threats by providing a modern, fast, short-range vessel. Ukraine will utilize the vessels to better defend its territorial waters and protect other maritime interests.”

The Sea of Azov is relatively shallow, making it difficult for larger blue-water ships to operate—but the Mark VIs are optimized for near-shore operations. 

The Mark VIs are small, fast littoral boats, designed to operate close to shore where they can conduct maritime patrols, boarding operations and interdictions, or support special operations missions. They have a shallow draft, the measure between the hull bottom and waterline, allowing the quick boats to get close into shore. And these boats are armed to the teeth.

In addition to two .50 caliber machine guns, there are multiple points for other smaller machine guns to be mounted In American service, the Mark VI is armed with a large 30 millimeter cannon, though in Ukrainian service the larger main gun was not approved. Still, the Ukrainian boats have space onboard for two 25 millimeter guns.

Island Class

In addition to the Mark VIs, the United States sent two Coast Guard Island-class cutters to Ukraine last year. The retired boats are part of a four-boat cutter donation that is intended to beef up Ukraine’s naval defenses. Last summer, Ukrainian sailors conducted training in Baltimore, Maryland to familiarize themselves with the boat’s navigation system and bridge controls. These cutters are relatively lightly armed and sport at least two .50 caliber machine guns and a single 25-millimeter chain gun.

Postscript

Though somewhat symbolic, American naval support affirms the United States’ commitment to Ukraine. Still, with Russia possibly in violation of the Montreux Convention, a few patrol boats won’t tip the balance of power in Ukraine’s favor. Still, it is the support that Ukraine desperately needs.

China and Taiwan Could Be Headed Towards a Showdown. What Should America Do? by James Holmes

 

“Independence Support Spikes,” blared a headline this week in the Taipei Times, one of my favorite erstwhile publishing haunts. And blare it should. A Taiwanese Public Opinion Foundation poll indicated that a striking 54 percent of respondents favor early independence from China, 23.4 percent back the cross-strait status quo, 12.5 percent favor early unification with China, and the remainder made no response or were unsure. Breaking down the numbers among those who prefer the status quo—who in effect are content to postpone settling the question indefinitely—the pollsters found that 64.4 percent of respondents support independence, now or later, while just 17.8 percent endorse unification across the Taiwan Strait.

The poll shattered longstanding patterns in popular opinion. Declared foundation chairman Michael You: “In my research on public surveys on these issues over the past 30 years, this is the highest rate of support among Taiwanese for independence,” not to mention “the lowest figure for people supporting unification with China.”

And indeed the breakdown is stunning. For many years opinion on the island was steady and predictable. Some small percentage, generally under 10 percent of the electorate, generally favored either immediate independence or immediate unification. The middle 80 percent or so were content to kick the can down the road in hopes of getting their wish sometime in the indefinite future, whether that wish was for unification or for independence. And why not? I used to spend a fair amount of time on Taiwan and found the status quo there pretty darned pleasant. Some large share of that 80 percent backed eventual independence while the remainder backed eventual unification. The proportions sidled gradually toward independence as demographics shifted. Youthful islanders defined themselves as Taiwanese while the elder generation, many of mainland origins, went to their reward. Events seem to have accelerated that trend—as You notes.

Why the sudden surge in pro-independence sentiment?

Depicting it as a “spike,” as the Times did, implies that this is a passing phase. After all, the curve tracing a spike ascends along a steep upgrade, reaches an apex, then plummets. Chairman You attributed the results mainly to the coronavirus pandemic, saying he could imagine no other “reasonable explanation for the results.” Doubtless there’s something to that. By most accounts President Tsai Ing-wen’s government in Taipei handled the pandemic well, helped by Taiwan’s island geography. The government could regulate the flow of people across its frontiers, keeping the infected out to contain the problem while simplifying the task of preserving public health within. Taipei would lose the authority to control the island’s borders should it be subsumed within China. Poll respondents, it appears, want to preserve their island’s de facto sovereignty in order to ensure the authorities can control its borders and ward off cross-border infection.

Plausible. Oddly, though, You ruled out the China factor when interpreting the survey results. If the pandemic is the only reasonable explanation, then everything else must be unreasonable. Right? But Taiwanese pay attention to their surroundings, which include far more than disease outbreaks. The coronavirus is neither the only threat to Taiwan; nor is it a mortal threat. The mainland does pose a mortal threat. Beijing doesn’t bother concealing its aims vis-à-vis the island, and it shows anew every day that it is prepared to use military might to get its way, from the East China Sea to the South China Sea to the frontier with India.

And then there’s Hong Kong. Taiwanese have long understood that Hong Kong’s fate today would be theirs tomorrow should they submit to unification. That fate has taken a dismal turn. Beijing has been constricting Hong Kong’s freedoms for many years. Just this week the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) enacted “national security” legislation fabricating vaguely defined crimes and granting officialdom sweeping police powers to punish them. In so doing Xi and his henchmen demolished the “one country, two systems” framework governing Hong Kong affairs, whereby the city was supposed to remain autonomous until around midcentury. That’s the same arrangement they have offered Taiwan to coax the islanders into accepting mainland rule. The situation in Hong Kong reminds anyone paying attention that Beijing regards no commitment as forever, no matter how solemn. All promises are perishable—and CCP magnates determine when one hits its expiration date.

Small wonder President Tsai has rejected overtures from the mainland under the guise of one country, two systems. No leader knowingly accepts a suicide pact. And that’s what it would be. If Taipei consented to unification under any formula, or if China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) launched a cross-strait offensive and won, the democratic government in Taipei would cease to exist. Taiwanese would lose their liberties over time, just as Hong Kong residents have. With apologies to You, it’s eminently reasonable for Taiwanese to endorse policies aimed at fending off such an apocalyptic destiny. If that’s what respondents are saying, the proper metaphor for the poll may not be a spike but a tectonic shift that permanently alters the public-opinion landscape. Pro-independence sentiment will endure even as the pandemic subsides.

Now, military preparations across the Taiwan Strait are nothing new. A standard talking point among officials in Taipei lists the number of ballistic missiles the PLA has emplaced on the mainland within striking range of the island. Though potent, however, missiles remain over the horizon and mostly out of public view within their launchers. They are abstract. Rocket forces have minimal emotional resonance with people not schooled in military technology, including most ordinary Taiwanese. But the Chinese Communist Party has stepped up its threats over the past year in in-your-face fashion. PLA warships now cruise around the island’s periphery as a matter of course while PLA warplanes routinely probe its airspace. These threats are readily intelligible to anyone, as though calculated to galvanize opinion among the islanders.

Hand it to CCP strongman Xi Jinping: he is a uniter. His bluster and saber-rattling may well unite Taiwanese behind the cause of independence.

So Michael You’s interpretation of the survey results makes sense but remains incomplete. He is correct that threats rally people. Self-preservation is an irresistible motive in human affairs. Self-help is a common remedy. Taiwanese may see independence as a way to help themselves in the face of both disease and cross-strait aggression—especially if they believe they could uphold their independence despite the military onslaught the mainland has vowed to undertake. (Beijing wrote its threat into law many years ago.) A majority may believe just that judging from the 55 percent of poll respondents who disclaim fears of attack—mirroring the proportion who espouse independence.

That self-confidence augurs well for coalition building and maintenance between Taiwan and the United States. Readers of these pixels know that one go-to passage in the strategic canon comes from Carl von Clausewitz, who observes that the value a society attaches to its “political object,” or goal, determines “the sacrifices to be made for it in magnitude and also in duration. Once the expenditure of effort exceeds the value of the political object, the object must be renounced and peace must follow.” Thinking about wartime costs and benefits resembles purchasing something on an installment plan. The magnitude of the effort is the amount paid out in each payment, measured in lives, national treasure, and military hardware. The duration is how many payments it takes to pay off the balance. Multiplying the two yields the total cost of some political aim.

In other words, a society has to prize something dearly to make steep payments over the long term.

Try a commercial analogy. If you prize a luxury car and can afford one, you might dig deep and purchase a BMW roadster. If you don’t care that much about bling or can’t afford a flashy ride, you settle for something less expensive—maybe even a used Ford. Is keeping Taiwan independent a BMW or a Ford for the United States? The value Americans assign to it—how much they treasure the island’s independence—dictates how much they’re willing to spend on it. Taipei needs to convince its ally that it is a BMW selling for a low, low price. It needs to show that an independent Taiwan is precious to Americans. In Clausewitzian parlance, the value of the object is high. And Taipei needs to show that the cost of protecting Taiwan is affordable for the United States, the cheaper the better. The magnitude and duration of the effort are bearable under Clausewitz’s formula.

Message: keeping Taiwan free is a bargain!

Public Opinion Foundation polling data should abet Taipei’s cause. Allies help those who help themselves. Much of Winston Churchill’s diplomacy during the dark days of 1939-1941 aimed at convincing a reluctant United States that Great Britain would stand against Nazism. And so it did—buoyed by inspired leadership and public fortitude. An apathetic Britain would have looked like a losing cause. A plucky Britain merited U.S. support. It was extraordinarily valuable to the United States and thus merited an effort of lavish magnitude and long duration. If a majority of Taiwanese both covet independence from China and are willing to fight for it, the leadership in Washington will find it easier to gather popular support on this side of the Pacific—and to order U.S. forces into action.

Succoring free peoples is an idea that resonates in American society, but Taiwanese must not kid themselves. Washington will not automatically honor its informal security commitment to Taiwan. Like Britain at the outset of World War II, Taiwan must show itself to be a worthy and affordable cause. For its part, Beijing will try to depreciate Taiwan’s value to Americans while convincing them they will have to pay BMW prices for a clunker—if they can afford the sticker price at all. Xi will try to turn Clausewitzian cost/benefit logic to strategic advantage. A fair number of doomsayers here in the West seem receptive to such messaging, writing off the island as not worth the effort or expense.

How will Washington come down in the cross-strait standoff? There are hopeful signs. The latest: recently the War Zone carried a story about soldiers from the U.S. Army’s 1st Special Forces Group, the famous Green Berets, training with their counterparts on Taiwan. Releasing such footage is rare. It signals to influential audiences, including Taipei and Beijing, that the U.S. leadership does believe Taiwan is a worthy cause and is prepared to come to its aid in times of strife. It signals that Washington has skin in the game of Taiwan’s independence and will be there for the islanders should war come. Putting American lives in harm’s way is as firm a commitment as there is. It could deter Beijing. And disclosing Green Beret operations signals that the U.S. and Taiwanese armed forces work together on practical matters. Armed forces fight the way they train. If two partners train together regularly, they’re apt to fight as one.

Will it be easy to defend Taiwan? No. But John F. Kennedy delivered a speech at Rice University in 1962 in which he asked rhetorically, “why does Rice play Texas?” (He was referring to the gridiron mismatch between the Texas universities.) JFK proclaimed that societies—whether it’s the beleaguered Rice football program or the American people—attempt great feats “not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”

Let’s get on with it.