Ever since Russia carried out its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in late February 2022 I’ve been thinking about ways to prevent an invasion, whether by land, sea or air. After all, prevention is far better than cure.
Obviously the Feb 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine was land based, but an invasion of Taiwan (if it happens) would primarily be a sea-based invasion with presumbly an airborne component as well.
Some eastern European countries are currently thinking about building fences, or are in the process of building fences, along their borders with Russia, Kaliningrad and Belarus. Fences though are nowhere near enough to prevent a military invasion. All they’ll do is stop immigrants.
How to prevent a land-based invasion
For countries bordering a hostile country then it would make sense to do the following:
- Dismantle rail tracks near the border(s) (since invading armies often rely heavily on rail lines for logistics)
- Dig up roads near the border(s)
- Blow up bridges near the border(s)
- Blow up vital inland bridges. AIUI Ukrainian traitors didn’t blow bridges in southern Ukraine, which enabled Russia to take Kherson City. Don’t take the risk — blow up all vital bridges. Don’t rely on just one individual to perform this task. Make sure you have foolproof systems in place so that even if you do have one (or more) traitors in your ranks, the bridges will still get blown up.
- Create anti-tank ditches (and enhance existing natural ditches): These ditches would need to be deep and so wide that they’re too wide for military bridge-carrying vehicles to span (so about 30 metres or wider I’d have thought)
- Create artifical hills (and enhance existing hills): These hills would need to be so high and steep that no military vehicle could get over them.
- Make forests harder to get through by placing very large rocks throughout them (or create artificial rocks)
- Create artificial marshland/swampland (and enhance existing marshland/swampland): This would thwart non-amphibious vehicles and even amphibious vehicles could be thwarted by underwater vegetation and roots (either real or artificial), which propellers could get wrapped up in or caught on
- Create a 24/7 surveillance system: This could be provided by a variety of assets such as satellites (especially geostationary ones), HAPS (High-Altitude Pseudo-Satellites), other long-endurance airships, AEW&C aircraft, ELINT/COMINT aircraft, ISR UAVs, river patrol boats (either manned or unmanned), Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs) with EO/IR cameras, trip wires (physical or laser based), hidden camouflaged surveillance cameras (either CCTV or WiFi based), etc, etc.
- Create 24/7 fire control (complemented by 24/7 surveillance): Ensure that all roads and suspected river crossings are covered by 24/7 fire control. This could be achieved using a variety of assets such as artillery, mortars, HIMARS/M270, anti-tank missiles, land-launched Brimstones, loitering munitions, RCWS, drones firing or dropping ordnance, etc, etc.
I expect some people will reply saying that the Maginot line failed and that fixed fortifications are “monuments to the stupidity of man”.
Well, firstly the Maginot line had two massive problems: a) It didn’t reach the sea and b) It didn’t cover the Ardennes Forest. A bucket with holes won’t hold water. Where the Maginot line didn’t have holes though, AIUI it stood up very well.
Secondly, what I’m suggesting aren’t fixed fortifications anyway. They’re simply “landscaped defences” (to coin a phrase). They’re designed to greatly slow down an attack and make the attacking forces far more vulnerable to fire control (combined with 24/7 surveillance). As a result a land invasion would either fail entirely or its effectiveness would be considerably reduced. After all, taking out a fixed fortification is one thing, but how do you defeat an anti-tank ditch or a hill? Bomb a ditch and you just make it deeper. Bomb a hill and what do you achieve? Maybe take a bit of a chunk out of the hill, but other than that not much.
The only solution is for the invading force to use earth-moving equipment and if the defending force has 24/7 border surveillance and 24/7 fire control that is not going to be easy by any means. In fact, I’d expect it would be suicidal.
How to prevent a sea-based invasion
This possibility is particuarly applicable to Taiwan.
Taiwan could do with loads of the following:
- Mobile land-launched anti-ship missiles that can shoot and scoot. And especially modern anti-ship missiles like NSM and Type 12. That said, Taiwan could do with any system that countries are willing to provide. Taiwan needs loads of them. The problem is that many countries are not currently willing to provide any sorts of weapons to Taiwan. This needs to change.
- Weapons to take out landing craft, so any relatively short-ranged weapon and especially ones that can hit a moving target and/or weapons that use airburst ammo.
- Air-launched anti-ship missiles: Taiwanese F-16s AIUI can fire Harpoons. I don’t know how many Harpoons Taiwan has, but it would need loads of them if China were to attempt an invasion. The primary targets for Taiwanese F-16s, apart from Chinese fighter jets, would presumably be Chinese aircraft carriers and ships with anti-aircraft capability. I don’t know if Taiwan has any F-16s with EW capability, but if they don’t it would be good if some could be upgraded with this capability. And/or if they could be supplied with Growlers.
- Diesel-electric AIP subs: Such subs are very quiet and deadly. But again western countries aren’t willing to sell any to Taiwan.
- Sea mines near potential landing sites
- Ensure potential landing sites are covered by 24/7 surveillance and 24/7 fire control
- USVs and UUVs used as suicide water drones
How to prevent an air-based invasion
Develop a multi-layered IADS (Integrated Air Defence System), which should include:
- Various radar and other systems to detect aircraft at various ranges and altitudes
- AA & AAA flak (old-school but still very effective against many types of target)
- Guns firing airburst ammo (e.g. AHEAD, ATOM)
- MANPADS
- Ground-launched and air-launched APKWS rockets
- Laser weapons
- Microwave weapons
- Anti-drone systems (e.g. Drone Dome)
- Short-range SAM systems
- Medium-range SAM systems
- Long-range SAM systems
The above should either entirely prevent an invasion using aircraft or render it disastrous.
As for hypersonic missiles, they’re another issue entirely. Probably a topic for another article, since AIUI no current systems are able to shoot them down.