Challenge#2 To Armchair Generals(Spratlys)

umair

Peace Enforcer
Ok as we all know the Spratlys are a hot piece of property in the South China sea, with a lot of natural resource potential.
Contested by all in the neighbourhood, they are a flash point.
Scenario:
In my hypothesis[say near about 2020), a huge oil reserve has been found in the Spratlys.
China, Taiwan,Vietnam and Malaysia begin a war of words over the islands' ownership.Things get nasty pretty soon as China moves it's CBG into the area in order to ward off any action by the other three.This is followed by deployment of Chinese and Vietnamese(however unlikely, they enter into an alliance) troops to the Spratlys.Malaysia (during all this) decides to launch recce flights in order to survey the Chinese and Vietnamese troop movements/concenteration in the spratlys.The recon flight's escort is intercepted and shot down by a PLAAN SU-33.The recce platform survives and comes back with pics showng the Red Forces digging them selves in.
All you guys have to do is to visualise how things go from this point onwards.
P.S:Speculators are free to involve any ally they see fit.Also the firm which struck oil was an Aussie firm.(Hint I'd like to see how the FPA countries would react in such a situation, read many on Uncle Sam's response)
 

gf0012-aust

Grumpy Old Man
Staff member
Verified Defense Pro
I don't think any of the other 6 claimants are able to take on China individually. Unpalatable as it may seem, I see that the best way for the remaining claimants to have any chance of winning is to form an alliance and "harry" the chinese with combined ops. China would be loathe to militarily compete with 6 hostiles - even though she would have the capability to probably win a war of attrition. It would mean that 6 nations could bring various forces to bear and would make a chinese response quite difficult.

A bundle of sticks is harder to break than a single one. Combine the forces and agree to an equitable split of resources.
Merging capability would place the Chinese fleet at risk from 3 lots of submarine forces and 6 skimmer fleets.

I can't see Vietnam and China as bedfellows, there is too much animosity over the last 2000 years of history.

If a merged response was not possible, I can't imagine one of the 3 navies with submarine capability not having a free shot at chinese naval forces - it could be blamed on another claimant (if so inclined)

Either way, the fleet needs to be isolated from it's logistics supply - and maybe a long range strike at a chinese port would serve to send a message. Sink a boat at home and they won't be so keen to stay adventurous.
 

umair

Peace Enforcer
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  • #3
Good, lets expand it further.The other claimants ask their allies namely USA, and probably Australia etc to jump in.And lets say they do. What happens next?
 

Pathfinder-X

Tribal Warlord
Verified Defense Pro
I can't predict what the result will be but this will turn into a large scale conflict for sure. U.S wouln't allow China to control south china sea all by itself, neither will India and Russia. And it is very unlikely for China to launch any military campaign in the next 2 decades because it has to keep pressure on Taiwan. Also another reason is that China won't have a blue water navy until 2030's so it'll be hard for Chinese navy and marines to fight so far away from homeland.
 

Soldier

New Member
I do not think Vietnam will ever side with China as it lays its own claim on Spratley. Anything to hinder China, US will jump in helping the allies opposing China, assisting them with intelligence, weapons instead of getting in direct conflict with the dragon. I do not see India also jumping in to fight South east Asian war unless there is some type of treaty between South Asian allies with India to come to assist in case of a need. With US jumping in, Australia & Britain are likely to side with US as usual :smokingc: . Can't be too sure about Japan :roll , as to what role will it play, most likely secretly assisting allies as it is anyways wary of Chinese rising power. Russian role will really be something, hard to guess :idea2 . On one side it would not like to see China emerging as a Super Power but chinese defeat and US getting hold on its border will be too big of a thing to gulp.
Overall the war would be very destructive for allies and China itself. The region will be reversed back to stone age. :eek
 

gf0012-aust

Grumpy Old Man
Staff member
Verified Defense Pro
Depending on how flexible the interpretation of the conflict, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and the UK could be placed in a position where Malaysia attempts to use the 5 Powers Agreement as a form of defence support.

In that case, those countries may be obliged to defend Malaysia - primarily the FPDA was designed to protect Malaysia and Singapore from Indonesia, but there is nothing that actually restricts it from being used for other military confrontations.
 

Soldier

New Member
gf0012-aust said:
Depending on how flexible the interpretation of the conflict, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and the UK could be placed in a position where Malaysia attempts to use the 5 Powers Agreement as a form of defence support.

In that case, those countries may be obliged to defend Malaysia - primarily the FPDA was designed to protect Malaysia and Singapore from Indonesia, but there is nothing that actually restricts it from being used for other military confrontations.
GF, None of the five allied countries would dare to fight China without US active involvement. Not only that, if they will fight even, they would do so only after seeing what side Russia goes. Not as a disrespect to Australia or to any country, but I do not see any country in the world which will dare to fight China, unless it is Chinese arrogance. For a well known reason, even US fears China when it comes to war. Now I do not mean to say that US is less powerful but I am talking about war-casualities as China is almost a super power.
 

gf0012-aust

Grumpy Old Man
Staff member
Verified Defense Pro
Soldier said:
GF, None of the five allied countries would dare to fight China without US active involvement. Not only that, if they will fight even, they would do so only after seeing what side Russia goes. Not as a disrespect to Australia or to any country, but I do not see any country in the world which will dare to fight China, unless it is Chinese arrogance. For a well known reason, even US fears China when it comes to war. Now I do not mean to say that US is less powerful but I am talking about war-casualities as China is almost a super power.
Point taken, but China is incapable of deploying and lifting sufficient troops and logistics into the Taiwan Strait - let alone to the Spratlys.

China would need to have a sustained and persistent logisitics element to deal with the Spratlys - otherwise she is vulnerable. She does not have a blue water capability, is limited to one coastline and is under persistent 24/7/365 port surveillance due to overwhelming ISR capability by the US, Russia and to some degree - japan.

She is not even remotely able to launch a transnational let alone an intercontintental sustained tempo intervention.

China can only impact and threaten Vietnam. The other nations are surrounded by sea - thus China needs to be able to blockade each country to have any impact on their response. Those nations with submarines neutralise that capability immediately. China has very poor asw capability, very poor logistics support, and it's airborne intervention would be extremely vulnerable.

The odds do not lie with China if all claimants elect to combine and respond.
I respect what you are saying - but tactically, China is very very vulnerable in this scenario.

This is also predicated on the fact that it does not go nuclear. As for the FPDA, I can only provide a prospective view on Australian role (and my view only). As a military player, we honour our agreements and treaties. The military option is always a last resort, and we would exercise all avenues to avoid conflict. Australias relationship with China is better than the US, as such we do have some extra diplomatic leverage - and this has been used with North Korea and Vietnam problems recently, as such our focus would be dialogue before deployment.
 

Pathfinder-X

Tribal Warlord
Verified Defense Pro
As GF said, China does not have advanctage in this scenario, at least not until 2020. The handful of modern DDGs and FFGs China have is more than enough to deal with any single nation around South China Sea, but surely not against the all naval forces within that area. Chinese does not have carrier groups and therefore cannot ensure the safety in the sky for their DDG task groups, not to mention U.S intervention.

And if China does attempt a military campaign it will begin with Vietnam first, since China's navy and airforce can overpower Vietnam's counterpart without too much problems.
 

srirangan

Banned Member
If the US+ intervenes then we know the result, can anyone predict the scenario in which US intervenion actually takes place? Unless China attack Taiwan directly US can't intervene right?

And I repeat, what about Japan and Russia?

U.S wouln't allow China to control south china sea all by itself, neither will India and Russia.
Prolly Russia and US would get crummy, but I don't think India would do much; unless as previously stated there is an alliance in place.
 

gf0012-aust

Grumpy Old Man
Staff member
Verified Defense Pro
srirangan said:
can anyone predict the scenario in which US intervenion actually takes place?
The US could intervene if the Filippinos are attacked and they request assistance. The US also has an emerging relationship with Vietnam as well. There has been talk about co-basing opportunities at Cam Ranh Bay.

I would imagine that if any of the smaller claimants asked for assistance that the US would consider it in a favourable light.
 

umair

Peace Enforcer
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  • #13
Ok so my date[2020] was a bit off.Lets assume this takes place when China has a bluewater capability and a governmwnt resolute enough.
 

umair

Peace Enforcer
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  • #14
gf0012-aust said:
srirangan said:
can anyone predict the scenario in which US intervenion actually takes place?
The US could intervene if the Filippinos are attacked and they request assistance. The US also has an emerging relationship with Vietnam as well. There has been talk about co-basing opportunities at Cam Ranh Bay.

I would imagine that if any of the smaller claimants asked for assistance that the US would consider it in a favourable light.
Also, if the state's commercial stakes were at risk.Say if the company which struck oil was US based, it could in theory ask it's government to protect it's and indirectly US interests.Am I right?
 

gf0012-aust

Grumpy Old Man
Staff member
Verified Defense Pro
umair said:
Also, if the state's commercial stakes were at risk.Say if the company which struck oil was US based, it could in theory ask it's government to protect it's and indirectly US interests.Am I right?
Absolutely correct. In fact that is the premise that is used by most nations that they have legitimacy to defend their national interests or citizenry. Russia, China, the UK, France and the US have all invoked that response over the last 50 years.

IIRC India also made substantial noises about Fiji during the 1st coup.
 

Awang se

New Member
Verified Defense Pro
By 2020, the military situations will be different and cannot be compare to the current situations. By that time, maybe china will have that capability, but other countries in the region will also have different levels of military capability. in the end, it's back to square one.

If the situations happen ( the recce plane scenario) we would certainly try to negotiate first. if that didn't work, it's time to find some strong allies and use the strength of the alliance as deterence. malaysia didn't have military capability to overcome chinese might except in it's own ground.
 
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