RAND Project AIR FORCE Presents: Unpacking the Taiwan/Ukraine Comparison

An Indigenous Defense Fighter (IDF) fighter jet and Wan Chien air-to-ground cruise missiles arrayed at Makung Air Force Base in Taiwan's offshore island of Penghu

Photo by Yimou Lee/Reuters

About the Event

While international attention is fixed on the Russia-Ukraine War, U.S. military planners remain concerned about the Chinese threat to Taiwan. To what extent does Ukraine's surprising success at fending off Russia's attack offer insights about how Taiwan might conduct a similarly successful defense? The conflicts would seem to have much in common: Like Russia and Ukraine, China overwhelms Taiwan demographically, geographically, economically, and militarily. Like the Russian Army, the People's Liberation Army has a considerable conventional military advantage and a nuclear trump card. And in both cases, the geography favors the aggressor. But there are significant differences that military planners should heed. This panel will unpack what lessons the Department of the Air Force should--and, as importantly, should not--take from Ukraine as it thinks through a potential Taiwan scenario.

The panel will feature

• Dr. Raphael Cohen, Director of RAND Project AIR FORCE's Strategy and Doctrine Program.
• Dr. Alexandra Evans, RAND
• Dr. Elizabeth Bartels, RAND
• Dr. Howard Shatz, RAND
• Lieutenant General S. Clinton Hinote, Deputy Chief of Staff, Strategy, Integration, and Requirement

"RAND Project AIR FORCE Presents" is a periodic panel discussion of issues critical to the Department of the Air Force and national security. The purpose is to highlight present and future challenges that concern the Department of the Air Force, to share research insights on those issues, and to foster discussion about how the Department of the Air Force can move forward.

About the Panelists

Dr. Alexandra Evans is a policy researcher at the RAND Corporation. Her research interests include strategic competition, deterrence, coercion, escalation management, and regional security issues in the Middle East and Europe. Prior to joining RAND, she was an Ernest May Fellow in History & Policy with the Belfer Center for Science & International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and a postdoctoral fellow at the Clements Center for National Security at the University of Texas at Austin. Evans received a Ph.D. in history from the University of Virginia and a B.A. in history from Vassar College.

Dr. Elizabeth Bartels is the codirector of the RAND Center for Gaming and a policy researcher, as well as a professor of policy analysis at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. She is a specialist in national security policy analysis gaming, and her work explores a wide range of strategic and operational concerns. Other research includes work on defense planning, force development, and long-term competition. Her Ph.D. is from the Pardee RAND Graduate School, where her work focused on how to apply social scientific practices to the design of games for policy analysis. She also has a M.S. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a B.A. from the University of Chicago in political science.

Dr. Howard Shatz is a senior economist at the RAND Corporation and a professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. He specializes in international economics and economics and national security. His RAND research has included economic competition and the U.S. role in the global economic order; great power competition in the Middle East; the Chinese and Russian economies, technology-based development in China, and China-Israel relations; labor-market reform in Mongolia; the finances and management of the Islamic State and its predecessors; civil service reform, development policies, labor markets, and statistical systems in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq; and the development of socioeconomic strategy by governments. He holds a Ph.D. in public policy from Harvard University.

Lieutenant General S. Clinton Hinote is the Deputy Chief of Staff, Strategy, Integration, and Requirements, Headquarters, United States Air Force, at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia. In this role, Lt. Gen. Hinote serves as the HAF A5, or senior Air Force leader responsible for representing the voice of tomorrow’s Airmen. HAF A5, known as Air Force Futures, focuses on developing Air Force strategy and concepts, conducting strategic assessments of the operating environment through wargames and workshops, manifesting an integrated future force design, and achieving timely and effective operational capabilities required for tomorrow’s Airmen to fight and win. Lt. Gen. Hinote was commissioned in 1992 upon graduating from the U.S. Air Force Academy. After earning a master's degree in public policy from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, he completed pilot training at Columbus Air Force Base, Mississippi, and F-16 training at Luke AFB, Arizona. His operational assignments include instructor duty at the USAF Weapons School, leader of the Air Forces Central Strategy Division, Squadron Commander, Wing Vice Commander and Wing Commander. Lt. Gen. Hinote is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Weapons School, Air Command and Staff College, and the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies. Lt. Gen. Hinote is a command pilot with more than 2,000 flight hours and 240 combat hours in operations Northern and Southern Watch.

Moderator

Dr. Raphael Cohen is the director of the Strategy and Doctrine Program of RAND Project AIR FORCE, and a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation. He works on a broad range of defense and foreign policy issues, including defense strategy and force planning, Middle East and European security, and civil-military relations. A military intelligence branched lieutenant colonel in the Army Reserve, Cohen has held a variety of command and staff positions in both the active and reserve components, including during two combat tours in Iraq from 2005 to 2006 and again from 2007 to 2008. He holds a B.A. magna cum laude in government from Harvard University and an M.A. in security studies and Ph.D. in government from Georgetown University.