Official statements have been alarming. Defence Minister Peter Dutton says war with China over Taiwan cannot be ruled out. The head of the Department of Home Affairs warns of the "drums of war". And a US admiral reckons China could attack Taiwan within six years.
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After all that, many readers must be wondering what Australian involvement in a war over Taiwan would look like. The top concern: how could Australia suffer if it joined the US, and probably Japan, in trying to prevent the Chinese Communist Party from swallowing the island of 24 million people?
The main answer is that Australia would probably deploy ships, submarines and aircraft. They and their crews could be lost. The war would be fought mostly far from Australia, around Taiwan and probably southern Japan, eastern China and the Western Pacific. But missile attacks on important military targets elsewhere, including some in Australia, could occur.
China would probably not be interested in hitting cities, except those in Taiwan.
This is an awkward article to write. Conflict with China is just about the last thing anyone wants, and talk of war tends to promote war, at least if a population gets carried away with excitement and hostility. But Australians need to know what could happen.
Let's start with the background. Taiwan is 130 kilometres from the south-east coast of China, which claims to own the island and its people. They are about as keen on being oppressed by the CCP as you would be.
War would probably start because Beijing thought its forces could neutralise US power in the western Pacific, while Washington reckoned they could not. Wars usually start with miscalculation.
Apart from recovering supposed national territory, China would gain a great strategic advantage in taking Taiwan: it would break a chain of foreign-controlled islands, stretching from Japan to Indonesia, that can impede its military access to the Pacific and Indian oceans.
The US knows that if it lets China take Taiwan, all east Asian countries, except Japan, will almost certainly become vassal states of Beijing. Judging the US as unreliable, they would see resistance to China as useless.
The Chinese armed forces are largely shaped to take control of Taiwan: by destroying its defences, landing soldiers, and, crucially, fighting back US intervention. The threat of war is rising now because China is rapidly building an array of weapons and sensors (mostly missiles, submarines and satellites) to knock out the air bases and aircraft carriers that the US would use to help Taiwan.
War would probably start because Beijing thought its forces could neutralise US power in the western Pacific, while Washington reckoned they could not. Wars usually start with miscalculation.
Terrified that a Chinese victory would be followed by more Chinese expansion and by the US abandoning this side of the world, Australia would probably help the Americans.
The US Navy is huge, but it would have a lot to chew on. Washington would ask for all the useful ships we could send. These would be destroyers and frigates (for defending aircraft carriers and supply ships) and submarines (which would search for and maybe attack Chinese ships and submarines). Australia would send probably both its supply ships to help keep its own and US naval forces on station.
Missiles that China has developed to sink US ships could be used against Australia's, too. The Australians could try to defend themselves and nearby ships against cruise missiles, which fly as aircraft just above the water, but not against China's fearsome ballistic weapons, which go into space then fall at enormous speed. Only the Americans have a chance of shooting them down (with fingers crossed).
A missile hit might rapidly sink a ship, perhaps killing all aboard (about 180), or just cripple it, killing many. Torpedo hits from submarines are guaranteed to sink, pronto.
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Australia could insist on its ships, aircraft and their crews staying out of danger. But the US, fighting its most important and dangerous war since 1945, and partly for Australia's benefit, would expect this country to put its back into it.
Not all ships of the Royal Australian Navy would go. At any time, some are not operational, and the government would likely hold others back for national defence.
Probably amid pre-war tension, warships would begin slipping out of the navy's main ports, in Sydney and near Perth, to head north at speed. Meanwhile, people living near Royal Australian Air Force bases, especially Williamtown at Newcastle and Amberley near Brisbane, would hear waves of aircraft departing. Most RAAF installations are bases for peacetime training, not war-fighting. And a worryingly large chunk of the country's military capability is concentrated at Williamtown and Amberley; it would need to be dispersed for fear of surprise attack.
Regardless of what the government said, many people would understand what was going on. As a country faces rising military threats, people start reading more about defence. You're doing that now.
Washington would especially ask Canberra to commit precious Boeing Wedgetail air-surveillance aircraft from Williamtown, and Airbus A330 MRTT tankers from Amberley.
How the government would wish it had more of both. With only six Wedgetails, the RAAF cannot maintain much coverage of northern Australian airspace if it sends any away. Yet Wedgetails, with powerful radars, are superb performers in their mission of scanning the skies hundreds of kilometres away, building a picture of who is doing what, and controlling friendly forces accordingly. The US would want them in action.
The US has aircraft with the same function, E-3 Sentries, but they are old, less reliable and could be in short supply after suffering casualties in missile attacks on their bases.
The RAAF could keep Wedgetails in the battle area by flying them back and forth from Australia. That would be safer than basing them on Guam, a US island in the Pacific, but then they would spend a lot of time in transit. To make the long flights, Wedgetails would need in-flight refuelling from tanker aircraft, probably Australia's own.
We have seven tankers. The US has hundreds, but it and its allies could find themselves running short, because fighters over Taiwan would have to fly long distances from aircraft carriers, Japan, Guam and other islands, topped up by tankers. Taiwan's friends are unlikely to base fighters on its missile-wrecked airfields.
Tankers and air-surveillance aircraft used to be pretty safe in war, with friendly fighters patrolling between them and the enemy. But China has worked on ways to fly or shoot past hostile fighter lines and get at the crucial but vulnerable support aircraft on the other side. Wedgetails, each with about 10 people aboard, could be exposed.
- Monday: How a war could spill onto Australian territory
- This article is supported by the Judith Neilson Institute for Journalism and Ideas.