Almost every day, Taiwan is feeling the heat of China's aggression: Beijing's military threat and intimidation, more than 1,000 missiles aimed its way, constant attempts to isolate it internationally and a failure to accept Taiwan as a friendly neighbor.
What is China fighting against? What is driving China's leaders in their obsession with Taiwan? When we go back in history, we see three main reasons.
One is the Chinese Civil War, which the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) fought against the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT). This struggle was deeply ingrained in the minds of older leaders of the CCP, and still plays an important role in the thinking of the present leadership. But as the international power and influence of the KMT waned in the 1970s and 1980s, the old hostility was refocused on the new "threat": Taiwan's democracy.
While Taiwan considered its transition to democracy in the late 1980s and early 1990s a momentous achievement, the leaders of the PRC perceived it as a threat to the authoritarian system they had built in China.
If the Chinese had ideas similar to those of the Taiwanese, then the rule of the CCP would be finished.
China is thus not fighting Taiwan because the latter wants to remain separate: History shows that most Chinese leaders don't care much whether Taiwan is separate or not. It is an outlying place -- very much like the Northwest Territories for the US -- and not crucial to China's "center of civilization."
The real reason China is fighting Taiwan is because it represents a successful democracy right next door, undermining the CCP's authoritarian "stability."
The second reason that seems to be prevalent in Chinese thinking is to "right the wrongs" caused by two centuries of "humiliation"at the hands of Western countries.
This may have been a factor in the 19th century, after the Opium Wars, when Western states established enclaves along the Chinese coast, but the trials and tribulations of the 20th century were of China's own making: The Chinese Civil War, the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution were internal Chinese affairs with which the West had little to do.
The third reason for China's hardheaded attitude toward Taiwan is that it thinks Taiwan's close association with the US and the West stands in the way of China becoming a "great power."
The leaders in Beijing have set an ambitious course for China to become a "superpower" along the lines of the US: wielding economic and political influence and power across the globe.
For China's leaders, "possession" of Taiwan is a key element in their geostrategic competition with the US -- and to a lesser extent in their regional competition with Japan.
This is because of Taiwan's strategic location -- straddling the important sea lanes between Japan and Southeast Asia while keeping China from unfettered access to the deep oceans of the Pacific.
China's threats to Taiwan are thus not caused by Taiwan's efforts to seek its rightful place under the sun, but rather by geostrategic competition with the US. This argument is made eloquently in a recent book titled Why Taiwan? by Alan Wachman of Tufts University. As long as "Taiwan's people seek the dignity of sovereignty and the assurance that so long as they do no harm to the PRC, Beijing will regard the island with neighborly comity," Wachman writes.
He argues that if, on the other hand, one views the issue through the lens of Beijing's geostrategic ambitions, one might come to a very different conclusion. If it sees Taiwan as essential to its security and even more importantly as part of a broader geostrategic competition with the US and Japan, the chance of Beijing resorting to the use of force is much greater.
This has important implications for the US. Another US East Asia researcher, Don Rodgers, recently wrote: "In the United States, policymakers must be careful not to view increasing tensions between China and Taiwan as the outcome of a `trouble-making' government in Taiwan (as they seem far too inclined to do), but rather as one manifestation of an intensifying geostrategic competition between China and the US and Japan."
Let us hope that Washington pays heed.
Gerrit van der Wees is editor at the Washington-based Taiwan Communique.
Taiwan’s victory in the World Baseball Softball Confederation Premier12 championship is an historic achievement. Yet once again this achievement is marred by the indignity of the imposed moniker “Chinese Taipei.” The absurdity is compounded by the fact that none of the players are even from Taipei, and some, such as Paiwan catcher Giljegiljaw Kungkuan, are not even ethnically Chinese. The issue garnered attention around the Paris Olympics, yet fell off the agenda as Olympic memories retreated. “Chinese Taipei” persists, and the baseball championship serves as a reminder that fighting “Chinese Taipei” must be a continuous campaign, not merely resurfacing around international
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) appears to be encountering some culture shock and safety issues at its new fab in Arizona. On Nov. 7, Arizona state authorities cited TSMC for worker safety violations, fining the company US$16,131, after a man died in May. The Arizona Division of Occupational Safety and Health released its six-month investigation into the fatality and cited TSMC for failing to keep the workplace free from hazards likely to cause death or serious harm. At about the same time, the chip giant was also sued for alleged discriminatory hiring practices favoring Asians, prompting a flurry of debate on whether TSMC’s
This month, the National Health Insurance (NHI) is to implement a major policy change by eliminating the suspension-and-resumption mechanism for Taiwanese residing abroad. With more than 210,000 Taiwanese living overseas — many with greater financial means than those in Taiwan — this reform, catalyzed by a 2022 Constitutional Court ruling, underscores the importance of fairness, sustainability and shared responsibility in one of the world’s most admired public healthcare systems. Beyond legal obligations, expatriates have a compelling moral duty to contribute, recognizing their stake in a system that embodies the principle of health as a human right. The ruling declared the prior
US president-elect Donald Trump is inheriting from President Joe Biden a challenging situation for American policy in the Indo-Pacific region, with an expansionist China on the march and threatening to incorporate Taiwan, by force if necessary. US policy choices have become increasingly difficult, in part because Biden’s policy of engagement with China, including investing in personal diplomacy with President Xi Jinping (習近平), has not only yielded little but also allowed the Chinese military to gain a stronger footing in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait. In Xi’s Nov. 16 Lima meeting with a diminished Biden, the Chinese strongman signaled little
RSS