Compass Points - Battle for Taiwan
Prepare for a massive battle.
Compass Points - Battle for Taiwan
Prepare for a massive battle.
April 2, 2025
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What would the Battle for Taiwan look like?
Many news outlets including the BBC are reporting on China’s recent live fire drills in the Taiwan Strait, “China carries out live-fire exercises in drill encircling Taiwan - military.” In recent days, China sent a fleet to encircle and threaten Taiwan.
China’s ominous drills against Taiwan this week come 80 years after the the start of the Battle of Okinawa.
What would the Battle for Taiwan look like? What sort of force would it take for the Marine Corps to fight a peer or near peer competitor in the Pacific? Any Battle for Taiwan today would most likely resemble the Battle of Okinawa 80 years ago. One of many similarities between the two battles is that in the Battle of Okinawa, a crucial and deadly role was played by ship-killer precision munitions. Back then, they were called, kamikazes.
The Battle of Okinawa was the last major battle in World War II. By April 1945 the war in Europe was virtually over. The US and her allies turned their attention to the Pacific and the defeat of Japan. To conduct the largest amphibious assault in the Pacific during World War II, it took a US force of 1,500 ships and half a million soldiers, sailors, and Marines. The Japanese commander, General Ushijima and his Chief of Staff, General Cho, committed ritual suicide on June 22. The losses endured to secured US victory were enormous.
The amphibious invasion of the island began on April 1, 1945. In the nearly12 weeks of brutal fighting, roughly 1,000 US military were killed every week. The Japanese military suffered 10 times that number of dead. Japanese military and civilian deaths on Okinawa may have reached 250,000.
The suicide drones being used in Ukraine today are nowhere near as destructive as the repeated waves of kamikaze suicide planes that struck the ships of the 5th Fleet. In just one major attack, nearly 400 kamikaze planes, escorted by 300 fighter escorts attacked the US ships off Okinawa's coast.
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During the Battle of Okinawa, the Fifth Fleet suffered:
• 36 sunk ships
• 368 damaged ships
• 4,900 men killed or drowned
• 4,800 men wounded
• 763 lost aircraft
-- History.com
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The Medal Of Honor was awarded to 23 Americans for the fighting on Okinawa including 14 awarded to Marines or those serving with the Marines.
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Richard Bush
Rank at Time of Action: Corporal
Service: US Marine Corps Reserve
Birthday: December 23, 1923
Birthplace: Glasgow, Kentucky
Unit: 1st Battalion, 4th Marines, 6th Marine Division
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Robert E. Bush
Rank at Time of Action: Hospital Apprentice First Class
Service: U.S. Naval Reserve
Birthday: October 4, 1926
Birthplace: Tacoma, Washington
Unit: 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division
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Henry A. Courtney Jr.
Rank at Time of Action: Major
Service: U.S. Marine Corps Reserve
Birthday: January 6, 1916
Birthplace: Duluth, Minnesota
Unit: 2nd Battalion, 22nd Marines, 6th Marine Division
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James L. Day
Rank at Time of Action: Corporal
Service: U.S. Marine Corps
Birthday: September 23, 1921
Birthplace: San Bernardino, California
Unit: 2nd Battalion, 22nd Marines, 6th Marine Division
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John P. Fardy
Rank at Time of Action: Corporal
Service: U.S. Marine Corps
Birthday: August 15, 1922
Birthplace: Chicago, Illinois
Unit: 1st Battalion, 1st Marines, 1st Marine Division
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William A. Foster
Rank at Time of Action: Private First Class
Service: U.S. Marine Corps Reserve
Birthday: February 17, 1915
Birthplace: Cleveland, Ohio
Unit: 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines, 1st Marine Division
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Harold Gonsalves
Rank at Time of Action: Private First Class
Service: U.S. Marine Corps Reserve
Birthday: January 28, 1926
Birthplace: Alameda, California
Unit: 4th Battalion, 15th Marines, 6th Marine Division
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William D. Halyburton Jr.
Rank at Time of Action: Pharmacist’s Mate Second Class
Service: U.S. Naval Reserve
Birthday: January 28, 1926
Birthplace: Alameda, California
Unit: 2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division
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Dale M. Hansen
Rank at Time of Action: Private
Service: U.S. Marine Corps
Birthday: December 13, 1922
Birthplace: Wisner, Nebraska
Unit: 2nd Battalion, 1st Marines, 1st Marine Division
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Louis J. Hauge Jr.
Rank at Time of Action: Corporal
Service: U.S. Marine Corps Reserve
Birthday: December 12, 1924
Birthplace: Ada, Minnesota
Unit: 1st Battalion, 1st Marines, 1st Marine Division
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Elbert L. Kinser
Rank at Time of Action: Sergeant
Service: U.S. Marine Corps Reserve
Birthday: October 10, 1921
Birthplace: Greeneville, Tennessee
Unit: 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines, 1st Marine Division
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Fred F. Lester
Rank at Time of Action: Hospital Apprentice First Class
Service: U.S. Navy
Birthday: April 29, 1926
Birthplace: Downers Grove, Illinois
Unit: 1st Battalion, 22nd Marines, 6th Marine Division
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Robert M. McTureous Jr.
Rank at Time of Action: Private
Service: U.S. Marine Corps
Birthday: March 26, 1924
Birthplace: Altoona, Florida
Unit: 3rd Battalion, 29th Marines, 6th Marine Division
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Albert E. Schwab
Rank at Time of Action: Private First Class
Service: U.S. Marine Corps Reserve
Birthday: July 17, 1920
Birthplace: Washington, D.C.
Unit: 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division
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For the Battle of Okinawa 23 Medals of Honor were awarded. The US could have awarded 230 Medals of Honor and still not have begun to recognize all the acts of conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity that reflected great credit on every person who served on Okinawa.
So many Medals of Honor were awarded because the fighting was so difficult. Even with the massive force of soldiers, sailors, and Marines, it was still a close contest.
In just one three month battle at Okinawa in World War II, the Japanese military destroyed or damaged more ships than exist today in the entire US Navy. In just that one battle, the US had to be able to logistically support the living, wounded, and dead for a force of one-half million men.
Today, to seriously contest a peer or near peer military like China, the US military will have to be able to blot out the sun with squadrons of aircraft. darken the seas with fleets of ships, and clog the sea lanes with an array of submersibles. All those aircraft, ships, and submersibles will be needed to support US ground forces who will still have to land and then with blood and thunder rip away key territory from a determined foe.
Over the last several years in the Office of the US Secretary of Defense, the Office of the Secretary of the Navy and at the highest levels of the Marine Corps, there has been much talk of preparing to fight a peer adversary like the massive military of China. Some experts have placed an unreasonable faith in technology. Technology is always important. Unfortunately though, technology by itself never wins victory.
Peer adversaries cannot be easily defeated. The future of war is on display now in the Ukraine and in Gaza. Despite all the advances of technology, the fighting on those battlefields today is still continuous, hard, and bloody. Nothing comes easy and nothing comes quick. Big adversaries mean big battles.
Should war breakout with China in the Pacific, the US will require a massive air, sea, and land force. Marines will be expected, as always, to do more than their share. Even if open war with China does not breakout, there will be one global crisis after another and each will need the response of a highly trained, equipped, and capable force of Marines.
The Marines today as yesterday must be ready to arrive quickly and be reinforced, expanded, and augmented almost as quickly. That Marine force will deter, assist, and fight. When the Navy and Marine ARG-MEU suddenly appears off the shore of a nation in crisis, civilians and friendly forces smile, while bad guys plan their escape.
Those Marines who fought so fiercely on Okinawa 80 years ago, are sending a warning to the Marine Corps today. Prepare now for a fight more difficult than can be imagined. The future fight will never be an antiseptic technology duel. The future fight, like the Battle of Okinawa, will be brutal and bloody. There are no technology tools nor any technology tricks that can easily defeat a peer adversary in war.
It is time for the US to rebuild the combined arms capabilities of the Marine Corps as part of a buildup of US air, sea, and ground forces. On Okinawa 80 years ago the US 5th Fleet withstood the loss of more than 30 ships and more than 700 aircraft and still kept fighting. If the Marine Corps is going to be able to keep fighting today, the Marine Corps must bulk up, rebuild, and rebalance the MAGTF, and focus relentlessly on global, combined arms, crisis response.
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History.com
Battle of Okinawa
By History.com Editors
https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/battle-of-okinawa
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Medal of Honor Museum
The Battle of Okinawa
https://mohmuseum.org/the-battle-of-okinawa/
As I see it there are two issues here:
1. DoD. Simply too small and lacking strategic mobility to fight China at their back door. Mass can only be manipulated so far by technology. The tyranny of distance is real. Smaller forces do, across history, prevail but it is not the way to bet. China would certainly love to lure the US into a fight over Taiwan. I would suggest not walking into that ambush in our current, reduced state. We simply lack the mass to recover from even modest losses and we can be certain losses would be huge. We might think we are a heavyweight able to go 15 rounds. We are a middleweight unable to last 5 rounds. DoD needs to focus on the fight after the loss of Taiwan. It needs to prepare for that fight now.
I refuse to believe that China will attack Taiwan soon. As we continue to get weaker they can just wait. Why attack the adversary who is bleeding out? Taiwan might only be the cheese in the trap. Reunification is secondary. Defeating the US in the process is far more valuable.
2. The other part of this discussion is the now irrelevant Marine Corps. In the best of circumstances making the USMC potent enough to be involved in the fight in the South China Sea would require a rebuild taking years and probably not be an option until later in the conflict anyway. No amphibious assault into Tokyo Bay in 1942. Yet, it must be rebuilt if only to be available globally while a fight unfolds in the South China Sea. Surprisingly Russia, China, Iran and N Korea have never acted in a coordinated and synergistic way. There is no guarantee they will not in the future. Hence the rebuilt and modernized USMC with an offensive spirit must be available to secure the critical, global chokepoints.
The Corps in its self assigned mission as short range, light, coastal defense forces is simply irrelevant. It could not interdict drug running boats in the Carribean or Gulf of America. It has ship killing abilities in aircraft with available ordinance and refuses to acquire it. The reason is probably that it would make EABO obsolete.
3. To use my much hated sports analogies. We do not know where and when the first game of a protracted season might be. We currently do not have a roster of players, equipment or a playbook. We can only put 11 players on the field at any given time and the Genius Brigades believe we only need 9 to win. DoD and the Marine Corps are being led by misanthropes lacking in integrity and knowledge.
The only rational role in the short term for the Marine Corps would be to reinforce its air resources with more land deployable aircraft equipped with as many anti-ship missiles it can acquire, and as many C-130's it can buy new or get from the Air Force that has limited use for them and equip them with refueling kits on each wing and develop whatever hard power force of armor, infantry, and artillery that it can form in to battalion groups for contingency operations that can be flown in where they can be of value by the C-130 force.
Formally end FD2030 now, its the supreme cluster **** of bad strategy. Don't worry about grand strategy right away, just come to grips with the insanity of FD2030 and end it now.