Despite the imbalance, invading Taiwan would not be a walk in the park. Relative weakness notwithstanding, the Taiwanese military fields a relatively modern force—F-16s, AH64E attack helicopters, Kidd-class destroyers and so on—that could inflict a fair degree of damage to invading PLA forces. Furthermore, the fielding of offensive-defense platforms, such as the Hsiung Feng IIE land-attack cruise missile (LACM), the Hsiung Feng III supersonic antiship cruise missile and the Wan Chien —an air-to-ground, standoff, cruise missile-type missile mounted on aircraft that can be used to disable airbases and radar sites in China—would increase the potential cost of Chinese military adventurism in the Taiwan Strait.
Besides technology, Taiwan’s geography also poses a challenge to invading PLA forces. The the soil composition and inclination of Taiwan’s west coast facing China, where the Taiwanese military deploys most of its antiarmor capabilities, is even less conducive to a successful amphibious assault than were the beaches of Normandy, where Allied forces changed the course of World War II, at the cost of an estimated 10,000 casualties, including 2,500 dead.
Regardless of the impressive advances made by the PLA in recent years, the fact remains that no occupation of Taiwan will ever be possible without a major amphibious assault and putting enough boots on the ground. Anything short of that would fail to ensure Beijing’s control of Taiwan, and falls in the category of “limited strikes” for coercive or punitive purposes—not invasion. If the 1995-96 Taiwan Missile Crisis is any indication, coercive displays would accomplish very little besides encouraging Taiwanese to rally around the flag and thus undermine China’s efforts to annex Taiwan. Moreover, though damaging, Taiwan is resilient enough that it would weather such operations.
The costs of taking Taiwan by force is massive, and would perturb the entire East Asian apparatus. If ever, the best cost is to wait it out. Take for example Hong Kong and Macau, both were under the rule of the British and Portuguese, respectively. Hong Kong was under British control for almost 200 years, while Macau was a Portuguese colony for nearly half a millenia , China did not seize the territories by force, rather, these eventually voluntarily joined back to the Chinese Motherland gradually and in its own time. I believe the same will manifest in regards to Taiwan's reunion with Chinese Motherland , a gradual and voluntary basis.
