“He who defends everything, defends nothing”. The US and its allies can pick the time and places to attack. China needs to defend its entire coastline all the time. If China launches an attack against the US Navy, the entire world will turn against it and China’s economy will die.
And why would they even need to attack the coast at all? That would be rather stupid, there is no point in doing that at all.
The US aircraft and long range missiles. And the wonderful thing about attacking ground targets is that they can't move. Hitting military targets like bases and logistical points is fairly simple, as they can't go anywhere. And if they want to expand that they can also strike at resource and industrial centers. It's not like China can move their mines, oil wells and refineries, pipelines, power stations, and factories.
However, things are not so simple for China, as they would literally be trying to hit a moving target. And locating ships at sea with enough precision to attack them is nowhere near as easy as a great many people seem to think. The US can sit quite a ways out to sea and attack fixed locations almost at will, but there will not be a hell of a lot that China can do in return, seeing as they would have to locate the ships with enough precision to actually target them, then have their attack actually penetrate the fleet defenses.
The coastline itself (other than bases on the coast like ports) are actually rather insignificant. And this can be seen very clearly in the Gulf War. Want a good example of how foolish the idea that
frigidweirdo is proposing, look no farther than that.
In 1991, the Navy and Marines did a great job distracting Saddam as to what the intent of the US and the Coalition was after he took Kuwait. Saddam knew the reputation of the Marines, and was absolutely obsessed with the idea they would be making an amphibious landing at Kuwait City. He even had a school gym converted into a giant sand table which covered about 20 miles of coastline and where they expected the Marines to land. The Marines did a lot of the things they do when at sea, including doing several preparations for doing landings with their landing craft. They would leave the ships in their assault craft, making circles at sea then moving a few miles closer to the shore. This would repeat 3 or 4 times until they were about 10 miles out, then they would simply turn around and return to the ships. This is actually SOP for the steps before an amphibious landing (we called it "making circles in the ocean), and they did it over and over again all up and down the Kuwait coast. The next steps in that drill would have been to make a final dash towards shore, then make a final circle where they then moved from a column to an on-line orientation then land. However, right at the point where they would do that they just stopped and returned to the ships.
And for almost a month they kept up those mind games. Once even doing an actual amphibious landing and liberating one of the islands.
However, Saddam and his military were caught completely off-guard when the actual invasion came from the west, through what they all thought was unpassable desert. And as they were trying to react to that and send forces west to meet them, the Marines finally landed. At the Kuwait City airport by helicopter.
That is the thing a lot of people tend to forget about the Marines. Yes, they are famous for their amphibious landings. But they are also as well trained in airborne operations. And they have multiple helicopters (CH-53 and CH-46) in addition to the OV-22 Osprey they can use to land and take a position many miles inland. In fact, one tactic I know that has been gamed out is basically doing to China what China did to Vietnam in 1979. Use the Marines in an air mobile fashion to take a small city and airport and do as much damage as possible. Then before forces can arrive to liberate it, simply depart on their own. They could literally have China chasing their tail for weeks, doing a hell of a lot of damage with little cost. Take an airport or industrial center, tear it the hell up, then leave.
Because there is no way that China can protect everything, no more than the US could protect everything if the situation was reversed. However, the difference is that the US actually can conduct operations like that and has in the past. And China is completely incapable of doing operations like that in return.
Oh, and the sand table? My Warrant Officer was actually with the force that landed at Kuwait City, and he was one of the first to see it. It was very detailed, and laid out all of the locations of their bunkers, artillery, and other defenses. Along with what they expected the landing beaches to be and the ships involved. I got to see some pictures of he that he took and it was awe inspiring. That sand table now sits in a museum in Kuwait City about the invasion and liberation of their country.
