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You don't have to be part of NATO to have an agreement that the old US of A have your back.

Taiwan, well TSMC specifically, is world leading in the production of computer chips, and this matters enormously to the US, which is where most of the leading semiconductor companies are based.

The US Government is determined to ensure that China doesn't succeed in it's attempt to become a genuine rival to the US in semiconductor terms, so will support Taiwan militarily if required.

Taiwan not part of NATO, what stopping them pulling a Putin?

Partly the sea. They can't send 100,00o troops to walk across the border. If they tried parachute drops and shore landings from ships, they'd lose a lot of ships to Taiwan's defences and huge numbers of their troops would die. If the US defended Taiwan they'd lose a lot more. Plus they'd have a mahoosive trade war with the US and the West,and their economy is fragile right now. They had quite a bad property crash. About the only good thing for them is exports. If Xi wrecked their economy he might not win the third term he wants at the congress later this year.

But they could do it, if they accept lots of casualties and are prepared to gamble that a trade war would harm the West more than them. In the past their leaders have been more willing than ours to inflict suffering on their own people. They know we are scared of this ruthlessness. Xi might think that if he sent two or three hundred thousand motivated troops who are prepared to die, the US and Taiwan would prefer not to fight at all, and accept a negotiated settlement rather than another global catastrophe. Maybe he'll get his third term and invade afterwards.

I'll stop now, I'm depressing myself.

The Taiwan Relations Act requires the US to maintain capacity to help Taiwan’s defence. The wording is slightly vague to give the government room to manoeuvre in its implementation, but historically it’s been accepted that the US would likely go to war to defend Taiwan. IMO it’s probable the Biden admin would go all the way to help Taiwan stay relatively independent, because a future conflict with China would be all but assured and losing Taiwan would put the US at an irredeemable disadvantage. If the Chinese agree, they would only shoot their shot if they calculated they’d win (rational actor), or if internal political pressures, hubris at the top, or fear-induced exaggerated reaction to a foreign action led them to act without being fully ready (irrational actor).

For what comfort it’s worth, China doesn’t currently appear to have the naval strength or amphibious capabilities to invade Taiwan successfully, let alone keep it. They would need to draft in civilian ships with large displacement for transport and amphibious ops, and then conduct large scale training with those ships. Fortunately, since those ships travel around the world, it’s pretty certain that they’re all known, registered, and even locatable online. In our satellite age, it’s pretty much impossible for China to have a secret fleet. There are other indicators that I vaguely recall posting here that would suggest China is readying an invasion: amassing materiel and medical supplies (blood especially), large-scale amphibious assault exercises (incl. nuclear response), movement of troops (requiring convoys and civilian trains), electronic attacks vs. Taiwanese infrastructure and regional US assets… As far as I’m aware, that’s not happening now. With Ukraine, these movements took months to arrange, and were clearly seen around the world.

That said, deception and cleverness are core tenets of Chinese military doctrine, and they control their information flows pretty well, so having a devil’s advocate ‘what if’ plan isn’t a bad idea.

Additionally- the Taiwanese defence forces are no pushovers. They’re a modern force, highly trained and motivated, well supplied, with generational knowledge of the terrain, and they’ve been planning for that one major scenario for decades. Quite like Ukraine’s forces, but Ukraine doesn’t have a sea around it.