China is likely to continue using economic and cyberoperations against Taiwan to force it to capitulate without resorting to a military attack, Fox News reported yesterday, citing the outcome of a tabletop exercise.
Washington-based think tank the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) earlier this month held a tabletop exercise in Taipei focusing on Beijing’s use of economic and cybercoercion against Taiwan.
The FDD mentioned an “anaconda strategy,” in which Beijing would likely use cyberwarfare and disinformation campaigns followed by a blockade or other measures to strangulate Taiwan, rather than attempting an invasion, the report said.
Photo: Reuters
A large-scale cyberattack would be far costlier to defend against than to launch, thereby giving China the advantage, it said.
“This asymmetry allows China to exert considerable pressure on Taiwan without triggering a direct US military response,” it said, adding that China would use covert cyberwarfare operations that provide it with “just enough cover to maintain plausible deniability.”
Former US Navy rear admiral Mark Montgomery, senior director of the FDD’s Center on Cyber and Technology Innovation, said in an online interview Taiwan faces severe challenges in sustaining its economy in the event of an attack on its critical infrastructure by China.
“How do you keep things going during a series of interlaced critical infrastructure failures, where electrical power drives a problem with financial services, things like that?” he asked.
In addition to cyberattacks, China might also attempt to affect the morale of Taiwanese by spreading misinformation, the report suggested.
In the report, researcher Dean Karalekas said that while Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has spurred preparation in Taiwan, that preparation might not be particularly useful.
Rather than kinetic warfare such as the one in Ukraine, Taiwan was more likely to face being cut off from its supplies of energy, food and other imports, he said.
The FDD said that Taiwan’s reserve troops are poorly trained and lack sufficient equipment to effectively support the regular army in wartime.
Taiwan is also highly dependent on imported liquefied natural gas and has limited energy reserves, it said.
“Once key routes are blocked, it may fall into an energy shortage crisis, and although Taiwan actively develops green energy such as wind power generation, these facilities can easily become targets of enemy attacks during wartime, making it difficult to provide a stable power supply,” it said.
The team recommended that Taiwan actively demonstrate to the international community its determination to defend itself and resolve through specific actions, including increasing its defense budget, strengthening reserve force training and diversifying energy sources.
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