Taiwan’s defense ministry said that it is confident Chinese invasion of the island would be very hard

December 14, 2021: A full Chinese invasion of Taiwan with troops landed and ports and airports seized would be very difficult to achieve because of China’s problems in landing and supplying troops, Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said in its threat assessment.

Tensions amid Taipei and Beijing, which claim the democratically-ruled island as its territory, have increased in the past two years as China steps up military activities near Taiwan to pressure it to accept Chinese rule.

The Defense Ministry of Taiwan said China’s transport capacity was limited; it cannot land all its forces in one go and would have to rely on “non-standard” roll-on and off that would need to use port facilities and transport aircraft would need airports.

“Although, the nation’s military defends ports and airports, and they will not be easy to occupy in less time. Landing operations will experience extremely high risks,” the ministry said in its report, which was reviewed by Reuters.

China’s logistics also experience challenges, as any landing forces would need to be resupplied with weapons, food, and medicines across the Taiwan Strait that make the two different, it added.

“The nation’s military has the advantage of the Taiwan Strait being a natural moat and can use joint intercept operations, that can cut off the Communist military’s supplies, reducing the combat effectiveness and endurance of the landing forces.”

China would need to keep a few of its forces in reserve to prevent any foreign parties from joining to help Taiwan and keep a close watch on other fractious areas of China’s border, such as with India and in the South China Sea the ministry said.

“U.S. and Japanese military bases are near to Taiwan, and any Chinese Communist attack would necessarily be monitored, plus it would need to reserve forces to prevent foreign military intervention,” it further said.

“It is difficult to concentrate all its efforts on fighting with Taiwan.”

Experts say that China has different means at its disposal to bring Taiwan to its knees short of a full-out invasion, including a blockade or targeted missile attacks.

Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen oversees a military modernization program to make the island harder to attack, which makes the military more mobile and with precision weapons like longer-range missiles to take out an attacking force.