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LorenPechteltoday at 2:31 AM1 replyview on HN

China most certainly can destroy Taiwan. What would be very hard is taking it intact. That needs lots of boots on the ground--and how do you get those boots on the ground when any ship that tries to get too close finds itself facing a variety of seeker weapons. China shoot them down when they are fired from a few miles out? Not likely. Even not near land, look at what happened to the Moskova--targeting a sea skimmer is hard.

And it's a sea battle--drones can pick their own targets and thus can't be jammed. What happens when the ship is met by a hundred drones with explosives? Doesn't take much of a processor to compare the image of a ship with the ocean.


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dataviz1000today at 4:25 AM

One month ago the Chinese navy surrounded the island. [0] That is a siege. Nothing comes in and nothing goes out. The eastern side of the island's infrastructure is complete shit because corrupt local governments. They can't defend it. The Chinese can land and take the mountains and have the high ground easily. The west side can be completely obliterated with rockets from the mainland.

The citizens wouldn't challenged the mainland in 2024, they won't challenge the mainland today, and they won't challenge the mainland in the future.

Likely the reason the mainland hasn't taken the island yet IS because they can take it in 3 days if they wanted.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justice_Mission_2025