“I think they [China] are working to be ready every day, and they could go, and we have got to be constantly vigilant.” ~Admiral Samuel Paparo, Commander of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command

Mao Zedong once said to his comrades that overtaking the United States is not only possible for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), but also necessary and obligatory. As Xi Jinping may have dictated the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to be fully ready to invade Taiwan by 2027, what should America policymakers respond to this incoming threat? In August 2024, the Heritage Foundation published a report that outlines a new framework of America’s defense strategy for the next administration.

In the report, the authors emphasize the importance of prioritization, given that at one time the U.S. forces can only engage in one major battle, which may very likely feature a direct confrontation with China. As for other theaters, the U.S. should urge the allies and partners to take on more responsibilities in countering the threats from Russia, Iran, and North Korea. The report lays out two pillars of America’s national defense: defending the homeland and detering China from invading Taiwan.

For homeland defense, the top priority is to confront threats from nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, cyber attacks, and illegal immigration. Hence it is urgent for the U.S. to expand its nuclear arsenal to deter nuclear threats from Russia, China, and North Korea. The U.S. should develop defense capabilities against missile attacks, either large barrages or small salvos. American infrastructure should be guarded against destructive cyber attacks. Southern borders should be secured to forestall espionage and sabotage activities from illegal Chinese immigrants. Fentanyl and other narcotics, another homeland threat from China, must be thwarted from entering into the U.S. territory so that American lives can be saved.

Turning to overseas, the U.S. should strive to achieve power balance in key regions, including Europe, the Middle East, and the Indo-Pacific. In Europe, the authors think there must be a redistribution of labor among allies. Europe should bear main responsibilities for their own conventional defenses, weapon production, and military aid to Ukraine. In the Middle East, the U.S. should continue supporting Israel, and promote Israel’s defense cooperation with the Gulf States based on the Abraham Accords. At the same time, the U.S. should block Iran’s efforts to become a regional hegemony, and deter any forms of Iranian aggression.

In the Indo-Pacific region, there is no doubt that China is the biggest threat. China’s dominance of the region will not only dispel America out of export markets and maritime routes, but also force acquiesce from its neighbors and strike a new anti-America alliance composed of China’s proxy states. Taiwan stands up as the very battlefront in a possible war with China. The loss of Taiwan would give China strategic advantages on military, psychological, and economic fronts against the U.S.

On the military front, the taking of Taiwan would enable China to break through the First Island Chain, and project its power on American allies, such as Japan, Korea, and the Philippines, as well as American territories in the Second Island Chain, like Guam and the Northern Marianas. Grabbing Taiwan would also release military resources to be relocated to other military hotspots like the South China Sea. On the psychological front, the taking of Taiwan would boost China’s status as a regional hegemony as America’s credibility declines. Countries in the region would no longer trust America as a defender of their core interests, and thus become more acquiescent to China’s demands. On the economic front, the taking of Taiwan would allow China to have full control of the island’s whole semiconductor cluster. This would not only give China a card of coercion against the U.S., but also fracture the America-led coalition from within. 

What should the U.S. do to deter China from waging a war across the Taiwan Strait? First the U.S. should concentrate defense resources on preparation for a war over Taiwan. The U.S. should broaden the scope of intelligence-gathering on China’s military facilities, which can serve as possible targets for America’s preemptive strikes. American production capacity in long-range strike weapons, such as anti-ship, land-attack, and air-to-air missiles, must be expanded. The U.S. should expand the AUKUS-style technology development and collaboration with key allies such as Japan, Korea, and India to harness their technical expertise and industrial capacity. Most importantly, the U.S. must strengthen Taiwan’s asymmetric defense capabilities with provision of anti-ship missiles, naval mines, long-range precision fires, mobile air defenses, anti-armor weapons, unmanned aerial vehicles, etc. At the same time, the U.S. should strongly urge Taiwan to accelerate its capability-building in national defense.

The report concludes with a vociferous appealing for resetting of strategic priorities and reallocating of resources to protect American security, prosperity, and freedom. American policymakers can choose to maintain the conventional ways of sequencing between theaters, asking for more budgets, or just bluffing it out. However, given the constraint of resource scarcity, the best choice for American policymakers is strategic reorientation based on the prioritization imperative.

The article is based on Heritage Foundation’s “The Prioritization Imperative: A Strategy to Defend America’s Interests in a More Dangerous World”, authored by Alexander Velez-Green and Robert Peters. Read the full report