Thank you for thinking of me and my article. It was written when I was still living in Bangkok; alas, now that I've moved back to Malaysia for a bit, I've become stuck in things and not been able to write as much as I would've liked.
Now, on to why I still think China won't invade Taiwan imminently, after gathering more information over the past year.
Undoubtedly, China intends to re-unify with Taiwan. China has two options to achieve this - broadly speaking - which are the political/diplomatic and the military options.
My take is that taking the military option brings no advantage to China besides expediting the reunification process. But it is by far the riskier of the two options because of (i) the tremendous cost to China - in terms of manpower, reputation, and direct costs, (ii) the very real risk that the battle will not won, and (iii) making it impossible to reunify in the event the battle is lost.
Xi Jinping is no fool. He's probably playing to the bloodthirsty conservatives in the military by releasing bellicose statements. But Xi Jinping has seen how restless the residents of Shanghai became after the prolonged lockdowns during the zero COVID days.
China is no hermit kingdom like their neighbour immediately north of the 38th parallel. Since zero COVID fell, I've seen Chinese citizens all over the place in Malaysia, and they've been credited with reviving tourism throughout Southeast Asia. The point is, the Chinese can (and do) travel, and they are exposed to outside media. It's not likely the case that Xi Jinping has a pliant populace lining up to volunteer to fight a Taiwan war on his behalf, and the "relative openness" of China limits the ability of propaganda to manufacture consent. BTW, I say relative openness because I don't feel the CPC is the totalitarian dictatorship that the Western media likes to portray, but clearly there are restrictions on what people can see/talk about.
With regards to the US getting involved in a hypothetical invasion of Taiwan, I think the US will, unless its military-industrial complex has completely taken leave of its senses. Both sides have very clear red lines in this conflict. China will invade if Taiwan makes a formal claim for independence. The US will defend Taiwan if China makes a move. It must. Otherwise, US credibility will be in tatters (the cynic in me wants to say in more tatters), and its security guarantees will be rendered meaningless. Which could well provoke the DPRK into making a move for the ROK, and draw other third parties away from the US to look for someone else who could credibly guarantee their security. And we'll all - China and the US included - have to deal with the unintended consequences of these moves.
Therefore, I think the political/diplomatic option is the most likely one China will pursue.
BTW, Taiwan's election is scheduled in January 2024. One of the contesting parties, the Kuomintang, has already made some overtures to China via former President Ma Ying-jeou's visit in March 2023, perhaps indicating that there's still hope for political progress in resolving the China-Taiwan impasse. I'm sure parties on both sides of the Taiwan Straits are looking keenly at this election to see how it develops.
