Can China put pressure on Taiwan without landing? U.S. think tank pushes to uncover communications and power crisis

President Lai Ching-te (right) met with Matt Pottinger (left), chairman of the China Program of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), and others at the Presidential Palace on September 24. FDD recently held a war game in Taiwan to simulate scenarios in which China would pressure Taiwan through cyber attacks, disrupting communications and damaging critical infrastructure. (Provided by the Presidential Office)

If China attempts to force Taiwan to make political concessions, it may not necessarily launch a landing operation from the beginning. It may also affect the daily life of Taiwanese people through cyber attacks, communication interference and economic pressure. A U.S. think tank recently held a war game in Taiwan, simulating scenarios such as blocked mobile communications, damaged submarine cables, and failure of power facilities supporting telecommunications services, to examine whether Taiwan's backup systems can maintain operations under sustained attacks.

The US defense professional media "Defense One" reported that the war exercise was hosted by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and held in Taiwan in late September. The results of the exercise were briefed to President Lai Ching-te and the national security team. The organizer pointed out that although the United States often rehearses military conflicts in the Taiwan Strait, there are still gaps in the preparation and coordination between the U.S. military and other federal agencies for possible cyber attacks by China, which may delay support to Taiwan.

Bingtui increases the pressure in stages. The first stage simulates local mobile communication outages, information manipulation and interference with satellite connections; the second stage further assumes that submarine cables are damaged, substation facilities supporting telecommunications services fail, and backup networks are also under greater pressure.

Communication interruption may affect electronic payments and emergency response

Craig Singleton, director of FDD's China Program who participated in the war simulation and played the Chinese side in the simulation, said that the purpose of such actions is to reduce the stability of Taiwanese people's daily lives and weaken people's confidence in the government while avoiding direct confrontation with the United States. He pointed out that communication interruptions may affect electronic payments, slow down emergency coordination, and also increase the difficulty of restoring services after power outages.

Taiwanese participants in the war effort are trying to redirect network traffic and enable alternatives, but Singleton said the bigger test is whether these systems can sustain service demand for weeks as China continues to study Taiwan's response options and turns to attack backup systems.

Retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Mark Montgomery, who has participated in military campaigns, also pointed out that policymakers often underestimate the recovery time after a system is damaged, especially when a service must wait for other systems to recover before it can operate again, the repair process may be more complicated. He said some people expect recovery to take just minutes or hours, but it can actually take days or even weeks.

The report also mentioned that the Chinese-related hacker group "Salt Typhoon" had invaded telecommunications networks in the United States and other countries; another group called "Volt Typhoon" was accused of trying to establish access channels in critical infrastructure to launch destructive attacks during crises or conflicts. These activities influenced the scenario design but were not directly included in the exercise documents.