Watch closely and you see quantitative changes – in weather and international politics. Events pile up until a sudden, qualitative change. As winter approaches, temperatures fall and what was liquid is suddenly ice. Communist China’s incursions on Taiwan – and now on the United States with a surveillance balloon – continue to grow. They signal a qualitative change. We need to prevent war with China if we can…and prepare for it, if we cannot.
These are tough words to hear, tougher as China continues to up-arm and apply relentless pressure to Taiwan, sending squadrons of fighters and ships into Taiwanese territory, pushing rhetoric harder and farther. Now, they even reach out and test the Biden Administration over US soil. Where all this leads – and when – is not clear, but crystal clear is a changing op-tempo.
For good reason, talk of war with China is increasingly common. From early 2021 to 2023, a marked turn has occurred in global assessments. Even before the Chinese “surveillance balloon” over US cities, the dialogue had shifted. The tempo has grown quicker, more than “business as usual” is afoot.
The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) noted an invasion of Taiwan would be devastating, impose enormous costs, even if Taiwan survived with US military support. Meantime, three weeks ago, China’s “Taiwan Affairs Office” got belligerent, noting China would be “safeguarding” the “sovereignty and territorial integrity” of Taiwan, “smashing plots for Taiwan independence.” All this was before invasion of US airspace with a “balloon.”
China added, as if setting for the spike, “malicious support for Taiwan independence among anti-China elements in a few foreign countries are a deliberate provocation.” Big words for a nation that just lofted a “Sputnik balloon” over the continental United States.
These statements echo words of Taiwanese intelligence authorities in 2022, who warned that China might be planning to threaten war in 2023 – seeing the US as weak, compelling Taiwanese submission, concessions, surrender.
China’s recent saber-rattling is like reading the old Soviet playbook before invasions of Poland from the East in 1939 (Nazi Germany from the West), East Germany in 1953, Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia in 1967, and a soft reinvasion of Poland in 1980.
Communist China pushed a similar “stick it to the West” approach before taking Hong Kong in 2020, militarizing “artificial islands” in the South China Sea, testing illegal weapons in space, and pretending a “belt and road initiative” was not for global dominance – until it was.
On the kinetic side, the recent deluge of military actions – not unlike Russia’s buildups prior to moving on Ukraine in 2022 – has been remarkable. “Largescale military exercises” were conducted around Taiwan in January, unprecedented numbers of fighters and ships.
Similar large exercises, resembling a mock invasion with dozens of combat fighters in the sky around Taiwan were conducted in December 2022.
Throughout January, heightened anti-Taiwanese rhetoric from Chinese authorities and actions resembling a trial run at invasion of the island nation have been observed. Although offering just words, the US State Department described recent “record incursions” as a “danger zone.”
Then a US four-star general predicted the US will be at war with China in two years, by 2025. Public acknowledgment of the threat, possible “hot war” with China, with fewer but highly capable weapons – is stunning, and sobering. Even mainstream media is starting to perk up.
Few thought Japan would do what it did in 1941, Germany in 1939. Few imagined Soviet invasions in the 1950s, 60s, 70s, and 80s. Few imagined Putin’s crimes against innocents and devastation in Ukraine a year ago. As we keep learning – somehow too late – life changes fast.
Now we have Taiwan – in some ways a leading indicator of which way freedom’s winds will blow for 50 years – at risk. What should we do? The answer is step up – now. Add the Chinese “balloon” and need for action becomes obvious.
We should have two carrier battle groups within range of Taiwan, for maximum deterrence. We should be prepared to hit China’s artificial islands if fighters are deployed. We should be sending cyber-signals that we will respond with a devastating blow to China’s military in cyberspace.
At home and around the world, we should be preparing defensively with readiness not wokeness, warfighting drills, ramped up ballistic and theater missile defenses, reaffirmations to allies in the region and globally. We should be sending clear signals that the US will defend free nations, and that any war begun implicates us. We will fight without limit and win. In short, we should be assuring “peace through strength” lives – to borrow on Ronald Reagan.
If we do these things, we will back down a restless, testing Chinese Communist state, opportunist and blundering, not focused on history or logic. We create focus, staunch the tilt toward war, but we must also be ready. If required, we must be prepared to engage.
Water can become ice fast, or go back to liquid. We have to exercise the power we have to keep change within margins, not let quantitative moves turn qualitative. Wars, once started, are hard to stop. They are always better deterred than fought. The “balloon” is just the latest, but it reminds us we must dare – to prepare.
Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC.
Just wondering how things will affect people in the USA borders?
Because of democrats open borders illegal politics, we’re witness to the invasion from all nations in the world. Several nations have been emptying prisons to send criminals to the US. CCP is not stupid to not bring military troops in the United States for their already sworn declared preparation for war.
Unless people wake up and understand that the events of the past few years, are just a precursor to what is about to happen!
I have said since the beginning of this balloon episode that it is a distraction and Taiwan should be on full alert.
And we have no idea what the balloon was really about. What a great way to spread a toxin of some kind and be able to blame the U.S. for causing the deaths when they shoot it down. I heard the pilots said they noticed something like smoke when they shot the balloon. Maybe the military was not wrong waiting until it was out over the ocean before shooting it down. But , even though it did not have any known agents in the balloon, future ones could!
Let us state the obvious. If Trump were President none of this would be happening.
Notice how China was not important enough for Joe to bring up in his SOTU speech. Notice how anything real was not important enough to bring up – not Taiwan, not Cuba and Russia getting together big time to mess with the U.S, and do other mischief in our hemisphere. Cuba can’t feed its population or keep them housed or even alive. All they can do is tourism for the idiots who go there for tourism, and meddle with other countries to mess them up as Cuba is messed up. Also there was no room for a discussion of the border crisis, self caused.
The only thing Biden had room for is lies. If the Left didn’t have lies, they would have to be silent.
Trump 2024 and make it quick and a sure thing.
Let the useful idiots on the left and their liberal go along to get along compadres, (and Rinos) try to upend Trump.
We must hope there are enough in this country who see the light and will not allow another Leftie to get its hands on power agains here. We have to make it harder and harder for them to steal elections.
I think we should launch a first strike with everything we have to try and destroy Xi & the CCP before they destroy us!!!
Jackass Josef NEEDS A DISTRACTION FROM ALL HIS FAILED POLICIES so don’t be surprised if he gets us into a war with China!
As far as the USA is concerned, I see lots of Chi-Com saber-rattling but no real threat of invasion here. Why? They already own Zhou Bai Dun and effectively have him by the short hairs. As long as he’s POTUS, there’s simply no need to invade or risk major conflict. His weak nearly non-response to their airspace invading “trial” balloon confirmed that! However, Taiwan is at great risk of invasion and takeover at any time going forward. Zhou and his foreign policy team are almost exclusively focused on Russia and Ukraine as they continue to deplete and weaken our military assets and strength. World-wide, the Chi-Coms are very active and doing as they please with little, if any, US push-back.
I’m not worried in the least…comrade joe is at the helm.
God help the USA
War with China is a certainty after last night SOTU speech.
Lol…No.
China has us right where they need us. No need for an icky war…Unless they want to get rid of their surplus of males that is….But they can do that themselves, and no one will say a word about it.
Ask yourself. Why did we give oil to the Chinese from the SPR? When it was supposed to “lower: the price of gas here in the USA? Likely because the Chinese said something like this” Hey Joe, That’s a nice bunch of bonds we have, Be a shame if we sold em’. No we don’t want anymore, in fact I’m not sure you’ve noticed (given your spending) that pretty much no one wants your paper.
Still, we are old pals and all. We’ll do you a favor we will buy some of you new bonds (even though we know you are never going to repay them) but you are reimbursing us with oil. That way we get what we need (cheap since you screwed up the market) and you get the appearance that everything is ok. No, no. We insist or not only do we dump what we have, we won’t buy anymore well!
Oh it’ll ruin our markets….Our biggest customer goes belly up….Well if you haven’t noticed your people aren’t buying too much of our rubber dog sh*t and related plastic crap these days, and We do have plenty of other customers. So Yeah… it’ll be fine in the long run. Have a nice day..
Any way Joe is doing all he can to CAUSE A WAR with the chip stupidity and with Taiwan (a major chip manufacturer right next door…. Nah he wouldn’t do anything like that on purpose?……Nah.
I sure miss those days of the chaotic Trump years when the world was at peace, inroads into peace in the Middle East were being made, inflation was low and jobs were high. The current situation with a pending war with China is certainly worth getting rid of those “mean tweets.” (SARCASM)
lol old boomer war monger article. We don’t have the money grand pa! its not 1953 and the our money is strong. Shoot its not even 1971!
When Chinese division are marching in Kansas THEN call me.
I fully concur with RBC. With compromised beijing biden posing as Commander In Chief along with sellout and arguably treasonous mark milley posing as the head of the Joint Chiefs, we have a really big mess on our hands. Throw in a weakened military that can’t recruit and an archaic power grid (so much for those “infrastructure” bills…spent on everything but infrastructure) and the possibility of the U.S. looking like a scene out of “Mad Max” is becoming an all too real scenario. God in Heaven help us!
War with Shina? Tootin tootin Putin will surely join in. It will be Planetary destruction.
Nukes right and left to where even a pet turtle will die. The worlds leaders are evil and Biden is just plain stupid.
While the sentiments that RBC expresses are correct, my concern remains the fact that we have a Commander in Chief that will either not act or if he does decide to eventually act, one way or another, it will be far too late. The recent example of the Chinese spy balloon demonstrates that point. A leader needs to be able to analyze and interpret information quickly and make decisions quickly to eliminate or minimize any potential threat. In the case of the spy balloon, U.S. armed forces radar had to have detected an object approximately 200 feet in height entering our airspace near Alaska. It’s really kind of hard to NOT pick-up an object that size crossing into U.S. airspace. It’s hard to believe the Air Force didn’t launch one or more interceptors from Alaska to ID the object. At that point military command would have likely escalated up the chain for further instructions on how to proceed. Meaning either shoot it down or keep tracking it for a time until some other action could be taken. A competent President would have OK’ed the downing of the balloon at that point. Worse case, downing the balloon over Montana would have made sense as well.
Another question no one seems to be asking is where was Canadian Air Defense as this balloon traversed through Canada on its way to the United States. They have air defense radar designed to pick-up this sort of activity as well. They also have the means to shoot down a high altitude target as well. I know Trudeau is worthless, but the MSM seems to be giving him a free pass on this item. The Canadian people can’t be thrilled, that yet again their leader has opted to cower to President Xi.
In the era of nuclear ICBM’s being able to traverse the distance from China or Russia to the United States in about 25 minutes, second matter. Indecision or incompetence can end up costing millions, if not tens of millions of Americans their lives needlessly. Competency in leadership matters.
As for engaging China near Taiwan, that would mean our Naval forces would be facing assaults not only from the Chinese Air Force and Navy, but also from mainland based missiles. Likely we would lose 2 to 3 aircraft carriers, a dozen more support ships and most of the planes from those carriers. So deterence is the smarter strategy, than merely waiting for China to decide it is safe for them to take Taiwan by force. Another repeat of the dismal strategy used by Biden against Russia that led up to signaling him that it was OK to invade Ulkraine is NOT the way to go. That means having a leader in the White House that President Xi would actually fear. That is NOT Joe Biden or any other Democrat.
I know, this is probably way too direct and honest for most people to hear. Most folks don’t want to acknowledge the realities and risks that the world presents in terms of threats from our enemies. That doesn’t make those risks go away. That just means you can ignore those risks until they hit you head on one day. Then it’s way too late to do anything about them.
Is war on the horizon? Unknown. What is known is that you can be the unpopular prepper and plan ahead or you can sit back and pretend that king biden and the mob will take care of you. You are not wasting money buying extra food, medicine and other supplies. It will be eventually used, war or no war, emergency or no emergency. What have you got to lose?
I agree with everything you have written, but first we have to elect an American President with a backbone.
China’s downfall is coming.
“China saber rattling”?? A balloon that the American people will never get to see what the thing was carrying (probably was weather survey equipment or perhaps a simple piece of paper saying “screwy yew Blandon”. America goes full blown hysterical over a …………..balloon? My God, what if they flew in a……….clown?? Time to grab the nuclear football!!
Why do we keep allowing our government and their lapdog media to build up various entities as “honest to goodness this time, they are EVIL”. We bought similar lies over Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, Yemen, Panama………I could go on and on. Now we find we really screwed the pooch in Ukraine so the government gets serious about “Xi bad”. And nothing of substance will occur other than more homelessness and higher profit margins for defense contracting corporations….oh, and if our government is really skilled this time………..we get to kill more children……and lose our now woke troops.
We really need to reevaluate just who is “bad” and maybe think about using our defense department for…………..defending our country and not profit margins for Lockheed Martin and assorted other entities of death.
Remember what happened between Britain’s Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and Hitler? Chamberlain’s appeasement policy resulted in Hitler taking over almost all of Europe. When Churchill took over, he vowed to FIGHT! China wouldn’t dare threaten us if Trump was in the White House!
Stay out of wal-0mart. That will fix their ass. Kyle L.
We should, we should, we should, we should, we should and if we do. The problem is we won’t, we won’t, we won’t, we won’t and won’t do! And the CCP knows it! Let’s go Brandon!
Advise all USA citizens to return or suffer consequences of Chinese retaliation.
Close any US embassies in Chinese territories, bringing all US citizens’ home.
Suspend any and all debt payments to China.
Revoke all Chinese diplomatic immunity, sending those folks home.
Close and nationalize all Chinese properties within US borders.
Make Taiwan airspace a no-fly zone to ANY and all flights originating from China.
To US companies that have made China their business partner, tough caca.
If we had any foreign allies left, which we probably don’t, strongly request they follow suit in the above.
Essentially, put China on notice that their actions are unacceptable and will not be tolerated.
Of course, none of this can happen with the current administration, and the lefts strangle hold in congress.
“War with China – Imminent?”
Communist China has been waging war on the United States for decades, increasingly so since Bill Clinton designated them s a most favored trading partner. Do you have any idea of the impact if the Chicons suddenly just stopped shipping everything they supply us with? In case you don’t, for instance, they supply 80% of our pharmaceuticals and lot of everything else we need and have not manufactured in the U.S. for a long time. Suddenly cutting off the supply would be more disastrous than the supply problem during the panicdemic when there were so many ships sitting offshore, unable to be unloaded. In case of war, there wouldn’t even be any ships sitting there at all since goods from the many other Asian suppliers wouldn’t be able to ship to us either under threat or attack if they tried.
The balloon floating across our country last week was mostly show to cause panic due to the media hyperventilating over event. There are so many spies working in the U.S., from whom the Chicoms get the majority of their information a balloon is no more than a distraction. For instance, during the Clinton administration, a Chinese scientist visiting Los Alamos was found wandering in a highly restricted area he was forbidden to enter. Every student, businessman, and tourist from mainland China is required to submit any information they think may be important to their government.
The fact that a vast amount of illegal drugs, especially fentanyl and ingredients originate from Communist China is no accident. They are working with money hungry cartels to get the poison across the border and the cartels are bribing and threatening the Mexican politicians to allow the activity.
Need I go on about political treason within our own government or can you see it yourself?
There is only one way to deal with a bully and it’s not with kind words and attempts at appeasement. Excellent article.
Great article spot on!
Excellent article.
After Communist China watched DICTATOR Beijing biden yell like an idiot (remind of someone) and all the lies he tried to feed the American people seeing how truly WEAK he is. They are LAUGHING cause they know he WON’T DEFEND the UNITED STATES without at least 8 DAYS of Polls taken.
The WHOLE WORLD IS LAUGHING AT US.
And this is the LOSER that YOU ALLOWED to Commit ELECTION FRAUD and DID NOTHING.
Now we are about to pay for it with NUCLEAR WAR because of a Communist Agent in the White House who CONTINUES to DESTROY the UNITED STATES of AMERICA with his Socialist/Communist/Fascist/WOKE Cult party.
Hope you know how to speak Chinese.
I believe it is highly possible that everything happening is by design. This includes stopping our oil and gas production and then emptying our strategic reserve. Then the war in Ukraine was started to deplete our military resources. And when China declares war, the US government will tell us we don’t have any resources to fight and we have to surrender unconditionally. The end of the USA. And the start of the One World Order.
This, unfortunately, is what appears to be happening in my observations.
Lets see what happens China has always been at odds with us they are testing Biden and his people to see what they will do, time to get someone in the WH that can handle this stress not Biden I do not trust him.
What we all talk about is when China invades Taiwan, but no body is talking about when China takes action against Japan. If you take a look at current Japanese government being very much leaning toward accepting most of what China wants us to be, and amount of lands purchased by Chinese throughout the land of Japan with no laws to prevent it. The most strong evidence of it was the assassination of former PM Mr. Abe in broad daylight, and very little is going on in the investigation of who are behind other than an obscure figure of a young man who so happened to be on site and shot a home-made gun against Mr. Abe. We may be absolutely stunned when China unexpectedly send their missiles to major cities of Japan, which no body thought is imminent. ( US is currently reducing their military presence in Japan, and decided not to sell their most advanced jet fighters)
The free world needs to band together and show these commie cripples that war is NOT in their best interests or the worlds interests.At one point or another some country would resort to nukes,that would be the end of life on our planet.
To Robert Charles, What you said in the first paragraph — ” We need to prevent war with China if we can …. and prepare for it , if we cannot .” That is absolutely great, good sense. Knowledge helps to build strength, and strength helps to develop courage, the foundation for using good sense is a combination of courage, strength and knowledge . Understanding the facts presented in history aid in the use of knowledge, strength, courage and good sense.
And the paragraph that began with — ” At home and around the world, we should be preparing defensively with readiness… ” and ended with — ” In short, we should be assuring ” Peace through strength ” lives — to borrow on Ronald Reagan .” that is a great example of the outlook needed at this time. All things that promote a respect for a high level of intelligence, having courage and being resourceful are the the things that will be needed to keep the country on the right course. The spirit of the term , Let Liberty be the watchword, brings to mind the principles that were at the foundation of the beginning of the United States of America, and those principles were then and are now honorable. Your article is a great guideline for everyone who cares about doing what is right , defending what is right , let God guide us all in the right spirit . Let Liberty be the watchword.
Biden and Miley, what a team! With them in charge, winning is questionable.
PFC cold war era, the enemies of the USA (we know who you are). I suggest one looks back at the political climate before Pearl Habor. there are many similarities to what’s happening now.
The present administration in D.C.is being observed.Our potential enemies are sabor rattling.they sense division. and probably going to make some kind move in the next two years .
Our high school kids will be fighting what’s coming no doubt about it.Police action war.The real education is coming.
When Joe was sworn in I predicted he would get us into a World War AND a Civil War. I did not think that could really happen, but now I’m not so sure. .
We will no doubt be at war before our idiot president leaves office. China is well aware of the damage he has done to this country, the moronic actions he’s taken and spoken. How can any country feel anything for the US Unfortunately not pity. The president is an embarrassment, his accomplishments equal pretty much zero, he has demoralized our military, lied to its citizens. WE ALL KNOW THIS AS WELL AS EVERY COUNTRY IN THE WORLD. China is simply waiting for the right moment and opportunity and believe this person called Biden will provide it. It’s sad so sad and makes me
So damn angry over what our near futures may be like. How anyone in their right mind would have voted for this man is just mind boggling. God help us for sure????
Although we are not yet at a conventional war, we are non the less at war. China released their first attack via the biological war against the west and the world in 2019. They lied and then allowed travel from the city where CCP-Virus started to all western countries, but Trump was not notified before the damage was done. THIS REGIME HAS REPEATED IN ITS DOCTRINE THAT IT INTENDS TO DETROY OR AT LEAST CAPITALIZE ON THIS PRESENT ADMINISTRATION WEAKNESS TO REPLACE AMERICA. We have never been weaker and more vulnerable under this current Military leadership and administration, and the build up of China has all the signs as was present before WW2, and like always our intelligence is much more stupid today. Look at history, how can we trust our intelligence agency after Pearl Harbor, 911 attack, and even Korean war history. When it gets to being accurate, the agency that is meant to protect us has failed time after time. History repeats itself, unfortunately todays weapons can and will be much more deadly,, and who will strike first is left to question, Russia or China. That balloon was meant to survey and pinpoint our nuclear Arsenals and defenses. How surprised China was to see how we reacted, and what if that Balloon was carrying another Biological weapon, or perhaps an EMP, or even a Nuclear devise !!!! I pretty much think that Biden would not deploy defenses in time to save America. HELL HE MAYBE AT HIS BEACH FRONT RIDING THE BIKE OR NAPING AND THE MILITARY HAS PROVEN IT IS UNABLE TO REACT WITHOUT BEING DISTRACTED BY WOKE AGENDA. The old saying is that STUPID IS AS STUPID GOES, and Biden has that covered ! WW3 started with invasion of Ukraine, even more stupid we promised under Clinton that if Ukraine gave up its Nuclear weapons, we would protect them against Russia ( what a joke when we sign a document) ! Patton had it right in WW2, we will be judged by history if we allow Stalin to do what he was allowed to do, and Patton beg Eisenhauer to not allow Russia to capture and destroy all the eastern European countries. Imagine 75 years later it maybe proven he was right ! PUTIN IS ANOTHER STALIN, THE NUMBER ONE MASS MURDER IN HISTORY.