Donald Trump’s July 17 , Bloomberg interview , prompted headlines , to the influence that” the US do not protect Taiwan from a Chinese invasion under his presidency”, as the , Daily Telegraph complained.
He claimed that there is no need for China to invade Taiwan, which is within the reach of as much Foreign artillery as the island cares to fire at it.  , The former president and pioneer for the November US election , spoke popular sense, as opposed to the face-saving subterfuge of US defence experts – including many from the Trump station.
The US has the wrong kind of military to fight a land-based power with the most advanced mass production capability in the world, which is capable of producing an unsustainable number of anti-ship missiles and drones, and US defense analysts have the unenviable task of dissecting thirty years ‘ worth of mistakes.
Trump, by comparison, ignores the authorities and notes the clear.  ,
” Taiwan is 9, 500 yards away. It’s 68 kilometers away from China. A little benefit, and China’s a large piece of land, they could only destroy it. They do n’t even need to – I mean, they can literally just send shells. Now they do n’t want to do that because they do n’t want to lose all those chip plants”, Trump said.  ,
Taiwan is 100 yards from the Chinese mainland, which is roughly the equivalent of 20 miles of ordnance shell range, but China has the weapons to completely destroy the area if it so chooses. It wo n’t, as Trump suggested, not only because it does not want to destroy the Taiwanese fabrication plants that make 90 % of the world’s advanced chips, but because it does not want to kill Taiwanese citizens, whom it considers Chinese nationals.
In the event of a crisis, for instance, a shift towards conventional independence by Taiwan, China would siege the island. The beach imports all of its power, largely natural oil, and has about three days of storage capacity. The lights on Taiwan would go out in less than a fortnight if China just revealed to shipping companies that it intends to drop any LNG ship approaching the island.
China is n’t terrible enough to give landing craft across 100 miles of open sea. British defence experts such as the , Center for a New American Security , and the , Center for Strategic and International Studies stage “war games” about a potential Chinese invasion , to conceal the loss of US protection strategy.
No military force 6, 000 miles from home can meet the land-based power of a local gaze attack. The results may resemble the Japanese fleet’s death at the 1905 Battle of Tsushima Strait in the improbable event of a , full-fledged war between China and the US Navy.
The U.S. war is well-versed in this and has explained why in many publications.
Major Christopher J. Mihal, a member of the PLA Rocket Force, stated in a US Army journal in 2021 that” the typical arm of the PLARF is the largest ground-based missile force in the world, with over 2,200 typically armed nuclear and cruise missiles and with enough anti-ship missiles to attack every US surface combatant ship in the South China Sea with enough power to overthrow each ship’s weapon defence.”
The Pentagon’s 2023 assessment of the People’s Liberation Army reported:  ,
The PLARF’s conventionally-armed CSS-5 Mod 5 ( DF-21D ) ASBM variant gives the PLA the capability to conduct long-range precision strikes against ships, including aircraft carriers, out to the Western Pacific from mainland China. The DF-21D is reported to be capable of quickly reloading in the field and has a range of more than 1,500 kilometers.
The PLARF continues to grow its inventory of DF-26 IRBMs, which it first revealed in 2015 and fielded in 2016. The multi-role , DF-26 is designed to rapidly swap conventional and nuclear warheads and is capable of conducting precision land-attack and anti-ship strikes in the Western Pacific, the Indian Ocean, and the SCS from mainland China. The PRC launched anti-ship ballistic missiles into the SCS in 2020 against a moving target.
The PLARF is developing and testing a number of novel theater-range missiles, as well as developing capabilities and strategies to combat hostile BMD systems. The DF-17 passed several tests successfully and is deployed operationally. A PRC-based military expert stated in 2020 that the DF-17’s primary objective was to attack foreign military installations and fleets in the Western Pacific.
China claims to have  , automated factories , that can manufacture 1, 000 cruise missile motors a day. It can also produce as many anti-ship drones of the kind that the Houthis effectively use against US ships in the Red Sea.  , These are easy to shoot down with modern anti-missile systems, but a US destroyer can carry only 100 interceptors in its hold. China has the freedom to fire as many projectiles from its land.  , China also has about 60 silent diesel-electric submarines and about 1, 000 4th – and 5th-generation aircraft.
The US built the wrong kind of military, something that no Pentagon-funded think tank or prospective office-seeker wants to admit. Donald Trump , by contrast stated the obvious: China’s enormous size and proximity to Taiwan constitute an overwhelming, insuperable , advantage. Surface ships, moreover, are sitting ducks for modern missiles, just as the lumbering battleships of 1940 were vulnerable to dive bombers and torpedo planes.  ,
Battleships were the most important line item in the defense budget of every major power until the eve of World War II, when the situation is reminiscent of today’s situation. Victor Davis Hanson makes the observation in The Second World Wars that Germany and Japan erred by using battleships rather than carriers, and that this most likely cost them the war. After Japanese bombers sunk four US battleships at Pearl Harbor and , Britain’s Repulse and Prince of Wales near , Singapore in December 1941, no navy , started work on , a battleship again.  ,
China’s home-theater advantage, combined with its missile and drone advantage, can outnumber it regardless of how much of its current capabilities are given to East Asia by the United States. That makes nonsense out of the now-popular meme of “prioritizing Asia” over Ukraine, a theme promoted by a former junior Pentagon official, Elbridge Colby, reportedly under consideration for a senior national security post in , a new Trump Administration.
There has never been a clear explanation of what the United States might prioritize, perhaps 155mm howitzers and Patriot air defense systems, and how this might aid in a flurry of Chinese missiles. The US should aim for ,” a balance of power that is consistent with our reasonable differences” , , maintaining the status quo over Taiwan,  , Colby said in a recent , interview.  ,
Translated into real-world circumstances, that means China will , let , the United States pretend to be a Pacific power, and pretend to threaten an invasion of Taiwan while Taiwan pretends to defend itself.  , Taiwan wo n’t provoke China by promoting sovereignty, and all sides will save face.  , Face-saving flummery of this sort might keep the peace, but it would depend not on a balance of power, but rather on Chinese forbearance.
Using a million-dollar interceptor to shoot down a$ 5, 000 drone is a losing proposition. The cost of conventional missile defense is prohibitive even if America could produce enough interceptors to keep up with China’s missile production and US ships could carry enough of them to thwart Chinese attacks.
Directed-energy weapons, including laser and microwave devices, have the potential to destroy projectiles and drones cheaply, but , prototypes of such , devices , can only stop slow-moving drones. It’s difficult to stop a laser from hitting a ballistic before it burns a hole in it, and directed-energy weapons would be necessary to use them effectively against modern missiles.
The Pentagon’s 2025 budget includes just$ 780 million for directed-energy weapons research, less than the cost of eight F35 fighters.
Drone swarms also have the potential to screen against missile attacks, but , this technology also faces formidable obstacles. Drones have a short range and would have to , be launched from a platform less vulnerable than surface ships, for example, from a submarine. In the last five years, the US has only constructed six submarines.
Trump has spoken often of building a missile shield for the American homeland, in emulation of Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative. That is the right course of action, but it would necessitate a radical shift in defense priorities and a radical change in the US military.  ,
Trump also made a hint in the Bloomberg interview that the prospect of significant tariffs on Chinese exports to the US is a negotiating stance, supported by experts like former Special Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and economist Peter Navarro.
Tariffs do” two things”, Trump said.  , “Economically, it’s great. And man, is it good for negotiation? I’ve had guys, I’ve had countries, that were potentially extremely hostile coming to me and say,’ Sir, please stop with the tariffs. Stop.’ They would do anything. Nothing to do with economic, they would do—you know, we have more than economic, we have other things like let’s not go to war. Or I do n’t want you to go into war in another place”.
Trump also reiterated his , April invitation , to Chinese car companies to build plants in the United States.