It has been an epic display of brinkmanship.
The US State Department, after perhaps a year of holding up processes that would have delivered promised arms to Taiwan, has relented and will reactivate the deals prior to the US presidential election, possibly allowing delivery to be approved by Congress before the current session ends.
The reasons for the reversal are unclear at this time, though pressure had been building on the State Department over the status of the arms for an extensive period — pressure from Taiwan lobbyists in the Congress, from military sources, from Paul Wolfowitz in his capacity as chairman of the US-Taiwan Business Council and as a foreign policy hawk and, ironically enough, from the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government after years of blocking the deal in opposition.
In recent months it became clearer that moves were under way behind the scenes to get this problem fixed before US President George W. Bush ends his presidency. Wolfowitz, for one, was oddly optimistic in a speech in Taipei in July, linking passage of the deal to Bush’s personal honor. Wolfowitz might have known something that most others did not; even think tank identities with extensive connections in the US political and military spheres had grown awfully pessimistic as time wore on.
The importance of the effort to unfreeze the arms deal cannot be understated as far as US foreign policy is concerned. As a number of analysts have suggested, leaving the problem to next year would have left both a Republican and Democratic president with an unnecessary burden. Starting a term as US president by releasing arms to Taiwan would be far more damaging to US-China ties than releasing them in the dying days of the current presidential term.
The release of arms also lets the next president craft a China policy relatively unsullied by the ham-fisted behavior of everyone involved in recent years.
As encouraging as the news is, the State Department’s decision is more than likely to have been motivated by limiting damage with China rather than optimizing Taiwan’s ability to defend itself. In this respect Taiwan continues to fall behind and rapidly so, not just in terms of arms procurements and combat readiness but also in terms of the ideological hollowness of Taiwan’s government, the political exhaustion of ordinary people and President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) refusal in rhetorical and practical terms to treat Taiwan as a genuine polity and Taiwanese people as his compatriots and masters.
Such national symbolism, or its weakness, is no small matter. At the same time that the weapons issue is being brought to a head, voices in Congress are making louder noises about Taiwan’s commitment to its relationship with the US amid Taipei’s attempts to mollify and move closer to Beijing.
Many members of Congress could be criticized for failing to heed warnings of Ma’s ideological handicap in this regard, but in the end Taiwanese must look to themselves, not overseas, for the real reasons that China is growing as a threat every day. Lulled by habit and pragmatism, Taiwanese remain vulnerable on too many fronts.
In the near future, however, it is hoped that the State Department, which has so much influence over policy and its implementation, can play a more constructive and supportive role in US-Taiwan relations than it has done under the Bush administration.
A return to power for former US president Donald Trump would pose grave risks to Taiwan’s security, autonomy and the broader stability of the Indo-Pacific region. The stakes have never been higher as China aggressively escalates its pressure on Taiwan, deploying economic, military and psychological tactics aimed at subjugating the nation under Beijing’s control. The US has long acted as Taiwan’s foremost security partner, a bulwark against Chinese expansionism in the region. However, a second Trump presidency could upend decades of US commitments, introducing unpredictability that could embolden Beijing and severely compromise Taiwan’s position. While president, Trump’s foreign policy reflected a transactional
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) has prioritized modernizing the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to rival the US military, with many experts believing he would not act on Taiwan until the PLA is fully prepared to confront US forces. At the Chinese Communist Party’s 20th Party Congress in 2022, Xi emphasized accelerating this modernization, setting 2027 — the PLA’s centennial — as the new target, replacing the previous 2035 goal. US intelligence agencies said that Xi has directed the PLA to be ready for a potential invasion of Taiwan by 2027, although no decision on launching an attack had been made. Whether
A chip made by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) was found on a Huawei Technologies Co artificial intelligence (AI) processor, indicating a possible breach of US export restrictions that have been in place since 2019 on sensitive tech to the Chinese firm and others. The incident has triggered significant concern in the IT industry, as it appears that proxy buyers are acting on behalf of restricted Chinese companies to bypass the US rules, which are intended to protect its national security. Canada-based research firm TechInsights conducted a die analysis of the Huawei Ascend 910B AI Trainer, releasing its findings on Oct.
In honor of President Jimmy Carter’s 100th birthday, my longtime friend and colleague John Tkacik wrote an excellent op-ed reassessing Carter’s derecognition of Taipei. But I would like to add my own thoughts on this often-misunderstood president. During Carter’s single term as president of the United States from 1977 to 1981, despite numerous foreign policy and domestic challenges, he is widely recognized for brokering the historic 1978 Camp David Accords that ended the state of war between Egypt and Israel after more than three decades of hostilities. It is considered one of the most significant diplomatic achievements of the 20th century.
RSS