There are two types of nations, Continental and Maritime. China is a continental power, its strength is its army. The three most obvious naval nations are Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. All three live behind "sea moats". The old India (which included Pakistan and Bangladesh was similar, although they are now a continental power but they were surrounded by moats (in the case of India the Himalayan mountain range). Of course, the reason Pakistan and Bangladesh were created was to remove the parts that were not inside the nation, creating one of the world's most volatile borders.
Continental and Maritime nations are fundamentally different, the first is an empire, outsiders are brought in, often against their will, to provide a buffer from invading armies. It worked for the Han Chinese and the ethnic Russians for centuries -- the current problems in Russia are not new, and the same is true for China. In its 3,000 years of recorded history, about 2,800 were marked by civil wars and internal conflicts.
When a nation is faced with this type of existential threat, it creates the army that it needs (a) those inside it's borders remain, and (b) those outside remain weak and disorganized. There are plenty of examples of this throughout Europe, but Russia is easily the largest empire -- run for the benefit of the ethnic Russians, and no one else. It remains today, that 90% of conscripts in the Russian army are from minorities and not from ethnic Russians.
The maritime nations have different goals their nation is protected from invasion. You have to go back to 1066 for the last successful invasion of Britain by foreigners (the Norman conquest). The Americans fully colonized through war and acquisition their entire country only 170 years ago, the last act was the purchase of Texas in 1845, only 170 years ago, and almost 75 years after the Declaration of Independence. A maritime nation will focus on its Navy and its overall goal will be to enhance commerce because commerce provides a maritime nation with the resources to maintain its naval assets. A continental nation will seek to control through conquest and the destruction of its neighbours. One looks at economic growth and the consequence of its action, the other, economics doesn't enter into the equation.
What this means for China, as a continental power, is that its focus will always be on land. Despite Taiwan being 100 km away, it is still seen as part of the Chinese empire, it is populated by ethnic Hans and as such they are cousins. For decades the Chinese have made it a goal to conquer Taiwan. China's most significant problem is that its navy is small and weak, it has lots of boats, but they are small and have limited range. China cannot project force over the oceans, because all its resources are focused on its land army, largely an army of occupation and today of incredibly intrusive surveillance state.
Realistically, China should remain focused on its continental strength. Its army is generally recognized as poorly trained and is mostly focused on watching the empire's citizenry. China can easily win the battle for Taiwan by total destruction of its population and infrastructure, but then lose the war against the rest of the world. Would anyone think of treating China differently than they have treated Russia? Contrary to Russia (a massive exporter of raw materials including energy, food, and fertilizer) China imports most of these goods.
Many seem to have no understanding of geography will say that America cannot blockade the South China Sea, and that China has sufficient naval power to seriously degrade America's strength. Those same people forget about Andaman Island (off the coast of Thailand). A blockade of Chinese-bound vessels could be easier there. Thousands of miles from the Chinese borders, where no Chinese military vessels can protect them.
That's the weakness of Continental powers. Those who are open to trade, Russia, Germany, China and most of Europe's nations face that same dilemma. Few took serious action to secure their positions, the Pols and the French the obvious exceptions.
What does it mean for China as a continental nation, conventional war will be lost, but battles will be won, but the end game is a certainty. Moreover, continental nations do not really care about economic growth, rather it is control of their buffer zone and of their citizenry. By default, the maritime nations win because in the information age, those who can, leave as soon as the pendulum of oppression swings towards suppressing internal dissent.
Over the past 10 years, Putin's various wars of aggression and his domestic suppression of economic activity have pushed nearly a million to emigrate. No one knows how many Chinese have left the country because China doesn't track (mostly) those who emigrate.
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