This would absolutely never happen, but if we were serious about completely removing the possibility of a Chinese mainland invasion of Taiwan, we could just publicly give Taiwan some nukes.
It would be a global political shitstorm, but even mainland China would not be stupid enough to invade after that.
Nuclear proliferation may be bad for all sorts of reasons, but MAD really does appear to work.
Also Taiwan already has nuclear power plants, so it's not that crazy. They are capable of developing nuclear weapons on their own if they really wanted to.
US would never do that, it would violate Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Some non-nuclear NATO countries do host US nuclear weapons, but they are legally and physically under US control. In an actual nuclear war, the US would release these nuclear weapons to their allies – at which point the US would have indeed violated the treaty, but in a nuclear war who cares?
So in principle the US could station US-controlled nuclear weapons in Taiwan, and publicly announce they have done so. But it would be an extremely risky move – basically the Cuban Missile Crisis all over again, but this time with the US playing the role of the Soviet Union.
Given the extreme risk of such a move, I doubt the US is going to make it.
> The US unlikely to be enormously bothered about violating treaties if it finds doing so in its interest.
The US cares greatly about the NPT because it wants a world in which only a small number of countries have nuclear weapons, not a world in which dozens of them do.
NPT limits nuclear weapons to 5 countries only - China, France, Russia, UK, US. Four nuclear states refuse to give up their weapons as the treaty demands (and hence refuse to join it) - India, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan. But a world with 9 nuclear weapons states is preferable to one with 90
> What exactly is China going to do?
Attack Taiwan? China would likely try to call the US nuclear bluff with a massive conventional attack. The ensuing loss of human life and economic damage would be enormous.
> The US cares greatly about the NPT because it wants a world in which only a small number of countries have nuclear weapons, not a world in which dozens of them do.
The treaty doesn't ensure that in any way. It's an empty letter.
> NPT limits nuclear weapons to 5 countries only - China, France, Russia, UK, US. Four nuclear states refuse to give up their weapons as the treaty demands (and hence refuse to join it) - India, Israel, North Korea, Pakistan.
Exactly. The NPT does fuck-all against this, and it's going to be of equally fuck-all use against the next bunch of countries that really want to get nukes. (Also, BTW, fuck knows if your four shouldn't be a five: how certain are you, really, that South Africa doesn't have them?)
> But a world with 9 nuclear weapons states is preferable to one with 90
Maybe. (Yeah: I'm not even all that sure about that, any more.) But that has fuck-all to do with the NPT, since that is of absolutely no use in ensuring the former in stead of the latter.
> ...but if we were serious about completely removing the possibility of a Chinese mainland invasion of Taiwan, we could just publicly give Taiwan some nukes.
IIRC, that's one of the PRC's red lines to trigger an invasion.
Also, I'm not sure if Taiwan could get to the point of having a survivable nuclear arsenal that's large enough to guarantee MAD.
It would be a global political shitstorm, but even mainland China would not be stupid enough to invade after that.
Nuclear proliferation may be bad for all sorts of reasons, but MAD really does appear to work.
Also Taiwan already has nuclear power plants, so it's not that crazy. They are capable of developing nuclear weapons on their own if they really wanted to.