Battlefield Taiwan

by James Rosone

  Once everyone had taken their seats, Jim Castle, the Secretary of Defense, cleared his throat. “Mr. President, would you like me to begin with the overall brief of what is going on, and then you can ask more pointed questions of the various generals?” he asked. They had a lot to discuss and needed to make decisions on all the major theaters of conflict: Europe, Korea, and now Taiwan.

  The President looked up and simply nodded for him to begin.

  The SecDef brought up a map of Europe with various unit markers and symbols written on it. “Our forces in the Belarusian capital of Minsk had to withdraw back to Lithuania. While this is a minor setback, the Polish forces and the rest of Three Corps was able to push the Russian 6th Tank Army to the outskirts of Minsk and is now holding the line. The 4th Infantry Division and two battalions of the 82nd Airborne in Lithuania still pose enough of a threat to the Russians’ right flank that they haven’t tried to push our forces out of Belarus.”

  The President held up his hand. “What happened with the 4th ID? Why did they have to give up Minsk?” Gates asked.

  “The Russians rushed two additional divisions from other parts of the country and a brigade of Special Forces to the capital region. We just were not able to hold the line — the 6th Tank Army fought better than we thought they would. While they didn’t have any of the newer T-14 Armata tanks, they were able to maintain a high level of air defenses over most of the country, negating our air power and making this much more of a one-dimensional fight,” Jim replied, hoping that his answer would suffice.

  Gates nodded in acknowledgement and signaled for him to continue.

  “In Ukraine, the Russians have held their current positions and appear to be settling in for the winter. We have a couple of proposals we would like to go over with you, Mr. President, regarding our choices in Europe.”

  Jim signaled for the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs to proceed with his portion of the brief.

  Admiral Peter Meyers stood up. “Mr. President, we’re training 6,000 new infantry soldiers each week. That number will rise to 25,000 a week by the end of the year and hit 75,000 a week by April of 2018. With the war going full speed ahead in Europe and Asia, we’re stretched incredibly thin right now. Presently, we’re training just enough soldiers to replace our casualties. We’re still not training enough soldiers to start creating the new divisions needed to win this war. That should start to happen around January if we slow the pace of the war in Europe and Asia down and allow our forces to build back up. What we’d like to propose is pausing the war in Europe while we focus on building up an army to defeat the Russians and looking to launch a new offensive in May or June—”

  “—If we hold off until essentially the beginning of the summer,” the President interrupted, “what exactly is that going to provide us with at that point, and what are we going to do to harass the Russians throughout the winter?”

  “Holding off until summer will allow us to build up our forces in Europe and give our allies the time they need to rebuild their own armies. The Germans have said they’ll be able to field an army of 300,000 soldiers by June. The French have said they’ll make 250,000 soldiers available by that deadline as well. While there is significant political opposition to the war in Britain, the Minister of Defense has assured me that the Prime Minister is going to move forward with a draft to rebuild their military, and they would also contribute 250,000 soldiers to the fight by the June deadline. Italy is drafting 90,000 for their new army group, and the Greeks are drafting 400,000, although we believe that’s most likely in response to the Turkish government’s announcement that they would be doubling the size of their military.”

  “Mr. President, by holding off until June, our allies will be able to provide 890,000 soldiers, in addition to the 250,000 new soldiers we’ll be sending to Europe when they complete basic infantry training. Mind you, these are infantry soldiers, so our overall troop levels will probably be closer to double that by the time the offensive kicks off,” Admiral Meyers explained.

  Gates smiled. “Finally, the Europeans are building an army to take ownership of this war,” he thought.

  “Admiral, please send my regards to our allies for agreeing to begin a buildup of forces. I will call the various political leaders to thank them as well. From the onset of this war with Russia, I have been adamant that this war cannot be an American war. I’m very relieved to hear that our European allies are finally moving forward and doing something about the state of their militaries. I want you to press them hard in meeting the timelines. Do whatever you need to in order to prod and poke them to make sure they are ready. I’ve already spoken with the Treasury Secretary, and we are making 2 % interest loans available to our allies if they need access to additional funding — so there should be no excuse of them not having enough capital to meet the deadlines,” Gates said.

  Admiral Meyers leaned forward, pausing for a second. “Mr. President, do you approve of our buildup in Europe and plan for a resumption of offensive operations in June? It means we’ll settle in for the winter where our troops are at right now. The Air Force and the Navy will of course continue to carry out operations, but the ground war will remain static until we’re ready to move forward,” he clarified.

  “I’m fine with holding things in place in Europe until June,” said the President, resigned to the reality before him. “What I still haven’t heard from you guys, and what we need to figure out, is what is going to be our end state? Aside from removing the Russians from Ukraine, we still have to determine what we’re going to do with Petrov. If we leave him in power, he will just rebuild his forces and remain a belligerent threat to Europe. I don’t think that’s the outcome any of us wants.”

  Those around the table sat back in their chairs, digesting what he had just said. It was a rather profound statement. Until now, the objective had been to remove the Russians from Ukraine, but with the massive buildup of military forces in Europe, they were being presented with an opportunity to do something more.

  Tom McMillan, the President’s National Security Advisor, leaned forward. “What would you like to see happen, Mr. President?”

  Gates thought about that for a moment before responding. He had been pondering this question for some time. “The world is at a tipping point,” he realized. “These conflicts have been brewing under the table for some time, but now that things have finally boiled over, it might just be time to reassert American dominance as a world power. We could build ourselves up not only as the military superpower, but also as the leader of a new global alliance so these wars don’t happen over and over again.”

  He sighed. “Too many people are being killed in these senseless wars, and for what?” he wondered. “So that the defense industry can continually have a boogeyman to create more means of killing each other? To fund a trillion-dollar defense budget? No… this war may have been thrust upon me, but if I have to fight it, then by God, I’m not just going to win it — I will end it!”

  When he had fully finished calculating his answer, President Gates cleared his throat. “First, I want us to finalize the creation of this global defense force alliance to replace NATO. This alliance needs to be politically and militarily binding in all respects. Nations will be obligated to maintain 3 % of GDP spending on defense, no matter the size of the nation. They will also fall under US military control in times of war. We will integrate their military leaders into the leadership structure of the force carrying out any military operations, so that they are fully vested in the alliance. They will also have to meet whatever force compositions we determine the alliance needs; we don’t need the entire alliance to focus on aircraft and not have a ground component or naval component, for instance.”

  The President paced with excitement. “Second, with regard to Russia — I want Petrov removed. I want us and the Allies to start working on finding a political opposition group we can start to back now, and we should work with them on fomenting resistance to the current government. When we topple the Pet
rov regime, I want this new opposition government to come into power, fully backed by us. To ensure this new government has a chance to take root and survive, I propose the Allies assert administrative control of Moscow, just as the Allies did to Berlin at the end of World War II. We will work with the new government to assume full control of the government and military within a ten-year period. Unlike Iraq, Germany and Japan, we are not going to demand the dissolution of the military. We will need those troops to assist in maintaining law and order. We are also not going to occupy all of Russia with an occupation force. The new opposition force will handle that with advisors from the Allies until they’re fully able to assume control of the country from us.”

  The President sat down, and there was a brief moment of silence as everyone in the room absorbed the massive amount of information that had just been thrown their way.

  NSA McMillan folded his fingers into a temple on the table as he leaned forward, clearly deep in thought. Admiral Meyers, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, likewise said nothing, wanting to see what the others had to say. Jim Castle placed his pen down and looked around at the group.

  “I like it,” Castle began. “I think this is a solid plan to ensure we have peace and stability in Europe for generations to come. We need to find a way to end the hostilities and animosity left over from the Cold War and World War II, and this is probably our best course of action. It may be a hard sell to the Allies, but if they join this new alliance we are going to create, they’ll have to go along whether they like it or not,” he concluded.

  The generals nodded in agreement, all except for Admiral Meyers.

  “Mr. President, I like this idea, but let’s go over the logistics,” Meyers asserted. “We’re talking about keeping a substantial number of US forces in Europe for at least five to ten years. We still have to figure out what we’re going to do with Korea and China,” Meyers said.

  “I don’t want to be a wet blanket,” Admiral Meyers thought, “but we have to make sure we are thinking things all the way through.”

  McMillan jumped back into the conversation. “Admiral Meyers is right about Asia. That’s going to be a long, drawn-out fight. Even if we are able to knock the Russians out of the war by the end of summer or the fall, we’re going to have to shift a lot of our combat power from Europe to Asia. The logistics alone are going to be a challenge. We’re also going to have to convince our allies that they will need to shift their forces to help us deal with the Chinese as well. That’s going to be its own challenge, to say the least.”

  The President scratched his chin, deep in thought. “They’re right, of course. It would be a challenge to get our allies to want to support our fight in Asia. I don’t want this war to still be going on as we enter the 2020 election — then the election would just become a referendum on the war. This war needs to be fought clean of politics, if at all possible,” Gates thought as he weighed the options.

  “You bring up a great point, Admiral. I’ve been reading up on the Republic of China in Taiwan and the People’s Republic of China and their history. I think we can do something similar with China. Taiwan views itself as the rightful government of China, and if this war has shown us anything, it’s that communist China is not only a rival superpower. If left unchecked, it will become the dominant power in the world. Their version of government and civil society is not something we want to see promulgated across the world.”

  Gates took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. “What if we look to remove the communist government and replace them with the democratic government of the Republic of China? We could break Beijing down into administrative zones, along with the rest of the country. We could administer the country until elections can be held and then work with the newly elected government to take full control of the country. Over time, we would phase ourselves out of occupation duty and control of the country, just as we would with Russia.”

  The President paused for a second before continuing. “I know this would be a long-term commitment on the part of the alliance and the United States, but if we don’t address these problems now, we’re going to be fighting the same war twenty or forty years from now. We need to find a way to end the bloodshed and get our countries focused on economic prosperity for our people,” Gates explained.

  McMillan understood the President’s grander vision but wanted to focus on the short-term issues. “This has been a lot to take in, Mr. President, and you’ve certainly made your wishes known for how you’d like things to play out in both Europe and Asia. The challenge for us as your military and national security team is to determine how best to implement the vision you have just laid out. While a lot of details need to be hashed out, I’d like to present you with some options for how to handle China and work to contain them in their current positions while we grow the Navy and finish off the Russians,” McMillan said, looking to Admiral Meyers for support. The admiral just nodded, as if telling him to run with it.

  “With regard to China, we have to acknowledge that Taiwan is lost. Our initial wave of bombers and cruise missiles did hurt the PLA invasion force, but it was never going to be enough to stop it, nor can we sustain any sort of heavy military support to Taiwan with the conflicts in Korea and Russia still going. I know that the attack on Taiwan is less than two days old, but we have no forces we can shift in their direction to help. We can hope their military is able to maintain an effective insurgency operation and keep the dream of freedom alive, but aside from periodic military and strategic bomber support, we just don’t have the naval or ground troops available to intervene. The Chinese navy has dispatched so many of its submarines to the Taiwanese sector and the areas around some of the Japanese islands that it’s incredibly risky for our ballistic missile submarines to launch continual cruise missile barrages against the Chinese mainland or in support of operations in Taiwan. It’s going to take us a few months to hunt these submarines down. Our ballistic missile submarines are too important of a national asset to risk losing them in combat right now. We should have an additional thirty attack submarines in the East China Sea and the South China Sea within the next forty days, but until then, we’re being very cautious with what we do with our submarines,” McMillan explained.

  The President didn’t like what he was hearing, but knew he needed a better understanding of the situation on the ground. He gestured for McMillan to continue.

  “While we can’t do anything about Taiwan, what we can do is fight to win in Korea. The Chinese have sent over 150,000 regular army soldiers across the border. They’re also in the process of preparing to send more than 200,000 militia forces to join them. We expect these numbers to more than double over the next couple of months. As of right now, the Republic of South Korea or ROK forces have done a superb job in blunting the Chinese advance. With help from Japan, our Allied forces have been able to secure half of North Korea, and we may have the rest of the country within our grasp before the end of the year. The ROK has fully activated their reserves and is currently rushing them towards the frontlines. Nearly 60 % of the North Korean Army was either destroyed during the first 72 hours of the war or has surrendered. The remainder of the army is poorly equipped and poorly fed. While the Chinese have announced a new leader to take control of North Korea, that new leader has virtually no support with the army or among the civilian population.”

  Admiral Meyers cut in at this point. “Mr. President, the military recommendation, which I am sure the NSA will agree with, is for us to do whatever is necessary to capture North Korea and then park our forces on the Chinese-North Korean border for the winter and well into the summer months. While the focus is on building up our forces for Europe to finish off the Russians, the Navy and Air Force will look to expand our capabilities in Asia. The Japanese, for their part, are converting their helicopter support ships into modern-day aircraft carriers. Each carrier will be able to hold 62 aircraft, making them a potent force considering that the Japanese have three of them that will be ready by spring. They�
�re also announcing a draft of two million men to join their self-defense force and have suspended parts of their constitution that restrict them from operating an army on foreign soil. Like our European allies, they’ll be ready to contribute a significant ground force in June.”

  The President interrupted Meyers before he could continue. “So, what would be the strategy for attacking China and defeating the PLA?

  The admiral turned briefly to confer with the Commandant of the Marine Corps before turning back to the President. “We plan on launching a two-pronged attack. The first will be a massive invasion across the North Korean border into China proper. This prong, which will be led by the ROK forces, will be the right flank pincer that will drive towards Beijing. The second pincer will be an amphibious assault on the critical port city of Qingdao. Once the port has been secured, we will be able to offload our heavy armor forces and begin to expand upwards towards Beijing from the left flank. This force will be largely led by the Japanese and the US Army. The US Marines will be accompanying them and securing the beach and port for them, but the JDF will be the bulk of the ground force that will lead the way to Beijing while our forces focus on holding the port and the outer flanks.”

  Meyers took a swig of water before he continued. “To further complicate the PLA’s ability to reinforce their northern military district, we’re going to carry out a massive invasion of the ports near Nantong, which is just north of Shanghai. Once our forces have secured the ports and begun landing the bulk of our ground forces and their armor support, they’ll drive our forces to the industrial heartland of Hefei, 441 kilometers inland from the cost, essentially dividing northern China from the rest of the country.” Admiral Meyers brought up a map of the area and walked the President through the plans and objectives.

  Gates nodded in approval. He was partial to the idea of hitting the Chinese from multiple points. “In general, I like the plan you’ve laid out, but what forces are going to make up this landing force north of Shanghai?”