This means that, at the moment, the Chinese would be at a severe disadvantage in any significant encounter with American forces over Taiwan, where mastery of surveillance and targeting data would be essential for victory. Overcoming its C4ISR limitations has, therefore, become a major priority for the Chinese military, superseding the quest for superiority in numbers alone. According to the 2021 Pentagon report, this task was made a top-level priority in 2020 when the 5th Plenum of the 19th Central Committee established "a new milestone for modernization in 2027, to accelerate the integrated development of mechanization, informatization, and intelligentization of the PRC's armed forces." The achievement of such advances, the Pentagon added, "would provide Beijing with more credible military options in a Taiwan contingency."
Five years is not a lot of time in which to acquire mastery over such diverse and technically challenging military capabilities, but American analysts nonetheless believe that the PLA is well on its way to achieving that 2027 milestone. To overcome its "capability gap" in C4ISR, the Pentagon report noted, "the PLA is investing in joint reconnaissance, surveillance, command, control, and communications systems at the strategic, operational, and tactical levels."
If, as predicted, China succeeds by 2027, it will then be able to engage the U.S. Navy in the seas around Taiwan and potentially defeat it. This, in turn, would allow Beijing to bully the Taiwanese without fear of intervention from Washington. As suggested by the Defense Department in its 2021 report, China's leadership has "connected the PLA's 2027 goals to developing the capabilities to counter the U.S. military in the Indo-Pacific region and compel Taiwan's leadership to the negotiation table on Beijing's terms."
Beijing's Taiwan Nightmare
Ever since Chiang Kai-shek and the remnants of his Chinese Nationalist Party (the Kuomintang, or KMT) fled to Taiwan after the Communist takeover of China in 1949, establishing the Republic of China (ROC) on that island, the Communist Party leadership in Beijing has sought Taiwan's "reunification" with the mainland. Initially, Taiwanese leaders also dreamed of reconquering the mainland (with U.S. help, of course) and extending the ROC's sway to all of China. But after Chiang died in 1975 and Taiwan transitioned to democratic rule, the KMT lost ground to the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which eschews integration with the mainland, seeking instead to establish an independent Taiwanese state.
As talk of independence has gained favor there, Chinese officials have sought to coax the Taiwanese public into accepting peaceful reunification by promoting cross-Strait trade and tourism, among other measures. But the appeal of independence appears to be growing, especially among younger Taiwanese who have recoiled at Beijing's clampdown on civil liberties and democratic rule in Hong Kong a fate they fear awaits them, should Taiwan ever fall under mainland rule. This, in turn, has made the leadership in Beijing increasingly anxious, as any opportunity for the peaceful reunification of Taiwan appears to be slipping away, leaving military action as their only conceivable option.
President Xi Jinping expressed the conundrum Beijing faces well in his November 15th Zoom interchange with President Biden. "Achieving China's complete reunification is an aspiration shared by all sons and daughters of the Chinese nation," he stated. "We have patience and will strive for the prospect of peaceful reunification with utmost sincerity and efforts. That said, should the separatist forces for Taiwan independence provoke us, force our hands, or even cross the red line, we will be compelled to take resolute measures."
In fact, what Xi calls the "separatist forces for Taiwan independence" have already gone far beyond provocation, affirming that Taiwan is indeed an independent state in all but name and that it will never voluntarily fall under mainland rule. This was evident, for example, in an October 10th address by Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen. The island, she declared, must "resist annexation or encroachment upon our sovereignty," directly rejecting Beijing's right to ever rule Taiwan.
But if China does use force or is "compelled to take resolute measures," as Xi put it Beijing would likely have to contend with a U.S. counterstroke. Under existing legislation, notably the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, the United States is under no obligation to aid Taiwan in such circumstances. However, that act also states that any use of force to alter Taiwan's status will be viewed as a matter "of grave concern to the United States" a stance known as "strategic ambiguity" as it neither commits this country to a military response, nor rules it out.
Recently, however, prominent figures in Washington have begun calling for "strategic clarity" instead, all but guaranteeing a military response to any Chinese strike against the island. "The United States needs to be clear that we will not allow China to invade Taiwan and subjugate it," Arkansas Republican Senator Tom Cotton typically said in a February 2021 address at the Ronald Reagan Institute. "I think the time has come to be clear: Replace strategic ambiguity with strategic clarity that the United States will come to the aid of Taiwan if China was to forcefully invade Taiwan or otherwise change the status quo across the [Taiwan] Strait."
President Biden, too, seemed to embrace just such a position recently. When asked during an October CNN "town hall" whether the United States would protect Taiwan, he answered bluntly, "Yes, we have a commitment to do that." The White House would later walk that statement back, insisting that Washington still adheres to the Taiwan Relations Act and a "One China" policy that identifies both Taiwan and mainland China as part of a single nation. Nonetheless, the administration has continued to conduct massive air and sea maneuvers in the waters off Taiwan, suggesting an inclination to defend Taiwan against any future invasion.
Clearly, then, Chinese policymakers must count on at least the possibility of U.S. military intervention should they order an invasion of Taiwan. And from their perspective, this means it won't be safe to undertake such an invasion until the PLA has been fully intelligentized a milestone it will achieve in 2027, if the Pentagon analysis is correct.
The Road to World War III
Nobody can be sure what the world will look like in 2027 or just how severe tensions over Taiwan could be by then. To take but one example, the DPP could lose to the KMT in that island's 2024 presidential elections, reversing its march toward independence. Alternatively, China's leadership could decide that a long-term accommodation with a quasi-independent Taiwan was the best possible recourse for maintaining its significant global economic status.
If, however, you stick with the Pentagon's way of thinking, things look grim. You would have to assume that Taiwan will continue its present course and that Beijing's urge to secure the island's integration with the mainland will only intensify. Likewise, you would have to assume that the inclination of Washington policymakers to support an ever-more-independent Taiwan in the face of Chinese military action will only grow, as relations with Beijing continue to spiral downward.
From this circumscribed perspective, all that's holding China's leaders back from using force to take Taiwan right now is their concern over the PLA's inferiority in intelligentized warfare. Once that's overcome in 2027, by the Pentagon's reckoning nothing will stand in the way of a Chinese invasion or possibly World War III.
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