The Greatest Danger in the Taiwan Strait
Even If China Avoids a War of Choice, a Miscalculation Could Spark a War of Chance
Joel Wuthnow
September 12, 2025
Soldiers loading sea mines during a military exercise in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, July 2025 Ann Wang / Reuters Tension across the Taiwan Strait has raised fears that Beijing and Taipei could soon find themselves at war. Most observers imagine two possible avenues that could lead to conflict. In a so-called war of choice, Beijing could try to capture Taiwan by force after careful consideration of the economic, military, and political risks. Such an aggressive action without explicit provocation would reflect Chinese leaders’ judgment that the island could be taken at minimal cost. Alternately, Beijing might launch a so-called war of necessity if it felt that Taiwan had crossed a political redline that permanently threatened China’s control of the island. A formal declaration of independence in Taipei, for example, would likely trigger a military response from Beijing regardless of the costs.
A third possibility, however, has received much less attention—yet may be even more likely. A war between China and Taiwan could result from an accident or miscalculation that spirals out of control. The risks of such a war of chance are high compared with other parts of the world, in part because both military forces operate in close proximity. Domestic political dynamics on both sides of the Taiwan Strait make backing down difficult. And the possibility of U.S. intervention on Taiwan’s behalf raises the stakes, which means that a chance encounter could escalate a small skirmish into a larger war.
Unlike a war of choice or a war of perceived political necessity, which can be avoided by strengthening deterrence against China and preventing Taiwan’s pursuit of de jure independence, respectively, China, Taiwan, and the United States cannot eliminate the risk of a war of chance. But shrewd statesmanship by leaders can manage it. China and Taiwan need to maintain ongoing backchannel communications to discuss crisis prevention and establish off-ramps. The United States and Taiwan, too, must increase dialogue on how to make decisions in the event of a crisis and preserve U.S. strategic ambiguity that provides space for flexible responses to potential Chinese aggression. China must also exercise military restraint and rein in fighters whose aggressive tactics could provoke further conflict. Wars of chance are by nature sudden and unpredictable, often with devastating consequences. Careful coordination could prevent one in the Taiwan Strait.
ACCIDENTS OF HISTORY
It is not difficult to envision how a war of chance could start in the Taiwan Strait. Imagine that a People’s Liberation Army (PLA) fighter jet ventures too close to Taiwan. After the aircraft fails to heed repeated warnings, Taiwan’s forces shoot down the plane with surface-to-air missiles, killing the pilot. Enraged, Beijing orders the destruction of air defense batteries in retaliation, which results in the deaths of dozens of servicemembers in Taiwan’s armed forces. The United States, unsure of Beijing’s intentions, begins to mobilize for a larger conflict in the region, prompting China to ramp up mobilization of its own forces. With no party willing to back down and each interpreting the other’s moves as signs of aggression, the crisis quickly escalates.
Such a sequence has numerous historical precedents. World War I, which was triggered by the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand by a Serbian nationalist in 1914, is a classic example of how a war of chance can develop. The Austro-Hungarian Empire’s retributive demands against Serbia led Russia, a Serbian ally, to mobilize its forces, which in turn provoked Germany to build up troops against Russia and England, another Russian ally. Within a month, a single act of violence had engulfed the entire world in war.
Wars of chance do not require acts of political violence as triggers; minor military and diplomatic incidents, too, can set them in motion. The Revolutionary War in the United States began when a British soldier in Concord, Massachusetts, opened fire on local militia forces, against orders. This accidental “shot heard ‘round the world’” launched the war that led to U.S. independence. The Peloponnesian War of the fifth century BC began with a quarrel between opposing factions in the city-state of Epidamnos, in modern-day Albania, which snowballed into a clash involving the major rivals Athens and Sparta. And the Second Opium War began in 1856 when Chinese officials boarded a British vessel and arrested the crew. Unwilling to suffer the indignity of the arrest, England responded with attacks against Chinese coastal forts near Canton, culminating in a blow to the Qing dynasty remembered as a key episode in China’s “century of humiliation.”
History suggests that three main factors combine to increase the risks of a war of chance. Frequent contact between opposing military forces, such as that between British soldiers and colonial militiamen on the eve of the American Revolution, increases the chance of an incident. Internal political dynamics can make de-escalation difficult, particularly when leaders value intangibles such as prestige, honor, or preserving their or their nation’s reputation. In the 1856 incident that led to the Second Opium War, sensationalist press coverage in Britain sparked public outrage that contributed to London’s heavy-handed reprisal against the Qing empire. And mobilization by allied nations concerned about the credibility of their commitments can turn a dispute into something much more serious, as occurred between rival alliances in the Peloponnesian War and at the outbreak of World War I.
THE PERFECT STORM
All three of these factors are present in cross-strait relations today. Chinese air and naval forces are operating increasingly close to the main island of Taiwan to gradually erode the informal boundaries between China and Taiwan. In January, Chinese jets crossed the center line of the Taiwan Strait 248 times, compared with 72 times in January 2024. In April 2024, a Chinese fighter came within about 40 miles of the island—a five-minute flight to downtown Taipei. As part of the Strait Thunder military exercise in April, Chinese navy ships entered Taiwan’s 24-nautical-mile contiguous zone for the first time. Chinese coast guard ships have been venturing closer to territory held by Taiwan, as well, and in 2024 they arrested the crew of a Taiwan-flagged vessel near Kinmen, which is part of Taiwan but sits just off the coast of China’s Fujian Province—the exact type of incident that could spark a war of chance.
Chinese forces are likely to exert greater pressure on Taiwan in the years ahead. As Taiwan becomes accustomed to aggressive maneuvers, and such actions lose their desired effect of pressuring the island, the PLA will need to add to its coercive repertoire by taking progressively greater risks. Chinese air force sorties may encroach farther on Taiwan’s territorial airspace, and ships may close in on the island’s territorial seas, raising the risk of collisions or misperceptions of Chinese intent among Taiwan’s defenders.
If an accident does occur, finding an off-ramp will be difficult because of political considerations for leaders on both sides of the strait. No Chinese leader will want to suffer the embarrassment of backing down against what the Chinese Communist Party has long framed as a rogue secessionist movement. Nor will Beijing want to lose face by withdrawing if the United States or other foreign powers line up to defend Taiwan, because doing so would roil nationalist sentiment among a population taught that the party will defend the nation’s core interests. Taiwan’s leaders might want to be cautious in escalating tensions with China, given the relative weakness of their military force, but they would also face a political price at home if they backed down too easily, given support in Taiwan for autonomy from the mainland. (About a quarter of the island’s residents want independence now or in the future.) Anti-Chinese protests could break out in Taiwan’s cities and embolden independence activists to press their agenda more forcefully, which would alarm Beijing.
Finally, although Taiwan has no official military allies, U.S. involvement could expand the crisis. Washington might not be able to distinguish between an accident and a provocation, or it could interpret the events as a pretext for an invasion and begin sending its own forces into the area. Strong bipartisan pressure on the White House to intervene could force the president’s hand. Worried that failure to act would make the administration look weak, embolden China, and undercut the credibility of U.S. commitment among East Asian allies such as Japan and the Philippines, the U.S. president could order rapid mobilization, which could lead to escalation and even preemptive strikes if Beijing believes it is about to face a U.S. attack.
RISKY BUSINESS
China’s reckless military actions have created another hazard that is increasing the probability of a war of chance. Beijing may intend for encroaching flights and ship transits to exert psychological pressure on Taiwan’s government, led by the independence-leaning President William Lai, without causing a war, but the actions of individual aviators and sailors could unintentionally cross a line. They might veer too close to areas that Taiwan has pledged to defend or accidentally collide with Taiwan-flagged planes or boats. Beijing would then be stuck in an unintentional escalatory spiral from which it cannot escape.
The 2001 collision between a J-8 fighter from the Chinese navy and a U.S. EP-3 reconnaissance plane in the South China Sea is instructive. The Chinese pilot died and the U.S. plane made an emergency landing on Hainan, an island province of China in the South China Sea. Although the Chinese pilot’s poor airmanship was responsible for the crash, Beijing could not easily back down because of nationalist outrage among the Chinese population. China detained the U.S. crew for ten days and released them only when the United States issued a formal statement of “regret.”
The incident might have served as a cautionary tale for Beijing. Yet similar encounters have continued across the region, many of them driven by the brashness or arrogance of individual PLA pilots or crews. In October 2023, a J-11 fighter flew within ten feet of a U.S. B-52 bomber at night and in poor visibility over the South China Sea. In June 2024, Chinese sailors boarded a Philippine naval vessel that was attempting to resupply troops at the disputed Second Thomas Shoal, destroying the ship’s communications and navigation equipment and seriously injuring a Philippine marine in the process. In August, a Chinese coast guard ship collided with a ship from China’s own navy as both pursued a Philippine coast guard vessel in the South China Sea.
Perhaps the most serious clash in recent memory was the brutal melee that broke out along the disputed Chinese-Indian border in the Galwan Valley, high in the Himalayan Mountains, in 2020. Chinese and Indian forces accused each other of precipitating the clash by engaging in what each side saw as aggressive infrastructure-building and troop movements. Twenty Indian soldiers and more than 40 Chinese soldiers were killed.
Fortunately, none of these near misses triggered a war. Yet with the uniquely fraught geography, history, and politics of the strait, a similar incident involving Taiwan and China could.
TALK ISN’T CHEAP
Preventing a war of chance between China and Taiwan requires reducing the opportunities for interactions that could be misinterpreted as aggressive acts. The PLA needs to exercise caution in how close airplanes and naval and coast guard ships come to Taiwan and its offshore islands such as Kinmen and Matsu. The PLA should assume that probing Taiwan’s defenses is a dangerous game with potentially fatal consequences. Meanwhile, Taiwan’s military should exercise prudence in its rules of engagement and not assume that every close call is intentional. Leaders on both sides of the strait, especially Chinese President Xi Jinping, can help by giving clear internal messages to their forces that they will not tolerate rogue displays of showmanship from service members.
In even the best-case scenario, however, incidents are likely to occur. Establishing a feedback mechanism whereby information on dangerous encounters or stunts by individual Chinese operators get high-level attention would ensure that Beijing is more aware of individuals’ extreme actions that might cause conflict. In the 2023 B-52 incident, the U.S. Department of Defense suggested that the Chinese pilot himself was “unaware of how close he came to causing a collision.” There may be no direct contact between defense officials from China and Taiwan for the time being, but U.S. officials can pass along information about the antics of individual aviators or units to Beijing. Chinese leaders have a stake in controlling escalation, which would allow the PLA to rein in its worst offenders and reduce the prospects of a war of chance.
China and Taiwan do ultimately need some level of communication to discuss crisis prevention and find off-ramps that both sides can accept without losing face. Chinese officials will not condone direct discussions with Lai because of what they perceive as his ardent pro-independence beliefs, but there is still room for backchannel conversations between Taipei and Beijing. Research institutes, for example, could be designated to pass information and offers across the strait. These channels need to be established and safeguarded in peacetime so that they can be quickly activated in a crisis, just as informal U.S.-Soviet contacts helped avert catastrophe during the Cuban missile crisis.
Washington, for its part, needs to address concerns that an alliance-like commitment to Taiwan could galvanize a much larger conflict. The United States should uphold its long-standing policy of strategic ambiguity with respect to Taiwan’s defense. The alternative, a policy of “strategic clarity” in which the United States would commit to providing immediate military assistance in a cross-strait crisis, would increase the likelihood of a war of chance by limiting Washington’s ability to determine whether an incident is intentional or accidental and force the United States into an immediate and potentially escalatory response. It is thus encouraging