Ukraine’s example makes clear to Taiwan an invasion can be defeated given the courage to resist

  President Biden’s reluctance to make Ukraine a no fly zone because it would provoke a confrontation that inevitably marches to a nuclear exchange exposes the defense of Taiwan if it were to be invaded by mainland China.  But the courage of President Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian people choosing to defend their democracy provides an alternative to the super powers mutually assuring our destruction by showing the Taiwanese public and its President Tsai Ing-wen the importance of self-reliance. President Xi Jinping showed his cards by strangling Hong Kong’s democracy. Ukraine’s courage gives the island democracy the template for its defense.

The poor performance of the Russian Army might give the mainland's military pause.  Formosa is over a hundred miles away by sea and the probability of failure and humiliation is high.  President Tsai must show in every way she can that  an invasion would be costly and success at gaining full police power is unlikely. The United States should provide all the material help it can to prepare for an invasion and a protracted guerilla war without a superpower crossing a blockade.

Ukraine’s example should affirm Taiwan’s military reservists' sense of purpose and makes clear that an invasion can be defeated given the courage to resist and the command structure to continue a guerilla war.  Xi Jinping may make the decision to invade but like any autocrat he will have bad information about his military’s capability and so the defending forces should prepare to  take maximum advantage of incompetence, like Russia’s forty mile stretch of stalled tanks North of Kiev, during the beach landing. It's difficult to envision the invasion landing with sufficient military personnel and supplies to take much less to govern the island but every effort must be made to harden military installations and supply depots and examine contingency plans to make the invader’s success impossible.

The self-reliant approach is the only option for Taiwan to protect its democracy because a show of force by the U.S. Navy like President Clinton used in 1996 in the defense of the Straits of Taiwan incident  would be ignored this time by China as a bluff. As the West enters the Second Cold War against the despots of the East, Ukraine clarifies the need to commit military aid to those democracies willing to fight to defend themselves so as to keep conflict local and not lead to superpower escalation. President Zelenskyy’s courage is a shining example of calling the autocrat’s bluff by piercing his aura of invincibility to reveal incompetence. He has single handedly reversed this century’s rise of autocracies and their denigration of democracies to affirm Winston Churchill’s observation that “democracy may be the worst form of government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.”

                         

 

An appreciation of our revolution and the power of insurgency that formed it.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s courage coalesced his countrymen and Europe in a fight against Putin’s megalomania that reverses this century’s rise of autocratic rule and elevates the power of democracy. The Russian Army did not storm Ukraine like Hitler’s blitzkrieg of Poland in September of 1939 which was anticipated. On the contrary the invasion is bogged down and appears to be incompetently lead. “We’re in shock at how dumb their behavior is” stated a Ukrainian special forces member to the Wall Street Journal. “Now we mostly focus on hitting their rear, their supply convoys because if they don’t get fuel, they can’t do anything.”  The delay in the takeover has given western democracies time to provide military and humanitarian assistance and make clear to Russia that the eventual outcome will be withdrawal and humiliation from too much blood and treasure spent on what appears to be just a whim. The consequence of eventual defeat must weigh heavily on China’s Xi Jinping, another autocrat who believes democracies are weak and now clarifies how the United States can defend democracy in SouthEast Asia.

Too many times we as a nation have ignored the example of our revolution and the personal courage to mount an insurrection that wears out and defeats the super power of its time. We rejected Ho Chi Minh’s appeal for help to unshackle colonial Vietnam from France because it didn’t fit with the geopolitical chessboard of the time only to be defeated decades later in a modern replay of our revolution. Ukraine President  Zelenskyy’s courage to defend a democracy changes our perspective over the feared invasion of Taiwan by mainland China.

Currently the Pentagon has been wringing its hands over not having the overwhelming naval power that President Clinton used effectively to get China to back down in the 1996 Taiwan Strait crisis. But China’s naval force has grown many times over since then and won’t back down just with just a show of force, no matter how many vessels we add to our fleet because the nuclear constraint just renders it a bluff.  But the courage of the Ukrainian people shows the path for Taiwan to defend their democracy.  The recent strangling of Hong Kong’s democracy by the mainland has hardened the Taiwanese public and its President Tsai Ing-wen's perception of China and Xi Jinping’s assertion of total power over all its regions. The invasion of Ukraine makes the threat clear and their valiant resistance gives the Taiwanese the steel backbone to organize and prepare.  On the other hand the poor performance of the Russian Army must give pause to the mainland.  Formosa is over a hundred miles away by sea. Like Hitler rejecting invading Britain, Xi Jinping may reject invading because of the high probability of losing and humiliating his regime. President Tsai must lead to re-enforce in every way she can that an invasion would be extremely costly and the Island’s occupation ungovernable. The United States should provide all the material help it can ahead of time to help the island to prepare and develop plans on how to resupply those fighting the invasion when it occurs, a much more daunting problem than Ukraine’s which has Poland next door as a resupply depot.

Zelenskyy’s courage must make the United States look back at its birth and appreciate the power of insurgency and make it a tool in our arsenal. Use it to keep conflicts local and the superpowers from mutually assuring our destruction. And our military budget should focus on what it takes to defend those with the courage to stand up to autocrats and deny it to those who impose their rule on others.