On Feb. 27, US Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman gave a major address on US-Northeast Asia relations at the Carnegie Endowment in Washington.
Overall, it was a good speech, emphasizing that the US is committed to engage with Northeast Asia — Japan, Korea and China. She said that the US has a sustained, well-resourced, high-level engagement with the region, and that the rebalance is a “recognition of reality. America’s security and prosperity are inextricably and increasingly linked with the Asia-Pacific.”
However, Taiwan was hardly mentioned: Only once during the speech did she refer to the nation, saying China has complaints about US friendship with the people of Taiwan. When someone in the question-and-answer session asked about that, Sherman said that it “is a good sign” that Taiwan is not talked about as much as it once was.
This might be true, but Sherman, and the US, can do better than that: Taiwan is a vibrant democracy, which is under an existential threat from across the Taiwan Strait by its large and undemocratic neighbor, China. Given these circumstances, it would have been nice if the speech had mentioned Taiwan as a shining example of democracy.
As it was, Sherman did say that “the concept of one China and the Three Communiques has become a standard, that the economic integration between Taiwan and mainland China is quite so — it is the status quo that the political issues are worked out over time.”
There are a number of problems with that statement. First, the “One China, Three Communiques” mantra might have become standard in the repeated recitations of US officials, but it perpetuates an outdated concept dating to the 1970s, which keeps Taiwan dangling in international isolation. For the people in a vibrantly democratic Taiwan, this is becoming less of a tenable position. Taiwanese ask: “Why can’t we be treated like any other country in the international family of nations?”
Second, whether the economic integration between Taiwan and China is the “status quo” is highly debatable: The Sunflower movement and the results of the local elections in November last year show very clearly that the large majority of the people of Taiwan reject the policies of the administration of President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), which push Taiwan into a closer economic embrace with China.
It was precisely on this topic that former US secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton, in an interview with Taiwan Business Weekly on June 18 last year, warned Taiwan against economic over-dependence on China, saying that the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government’s push for closer cross-strait ties could lead to Taiwan losing its economic and political independence, and leave it vulnerable to an over-reliance on China.
A third point not mentioned by Sherman is Taiwan’s strategic importance: It is located right between the South China Sea and the East China Sea — two areas of major tension where China is aggressively pushing the envelope — and is therefore a key link in the US’ security chain in the region. So, what we would have liked to see in the speech is a bit more vision about Taiwan’s strategic importance and its future.
In her speech, Sherman referred to the “lofty nature of UN ideals” and that it was “the handiwork of clear-eyed realists [who] … saw as their most urgent job the development of institutions that would keep nations from once again ripping each other apart.”
To the people of Taiwan, the most poignant injustice in Western policies is that they are still not treated as an equal member in the international community, and excluded from the institutions Sherman holds so high.
Gerrit van der Wees is editor of Taiwan Communique, a publication based in Washington.
I came to Taiwan to pursue my degree thinking that Taiwanese are “friendly,” but I was welcomed by Taiwanese classmates laughing at my friend’s name, Maria (瑪莉亞). At the time, I could not understand why they were mocking the name of Jesus’ mother. Later, I learned that “Maria” had become a stereotype — a shorthand for Filipino migrant workers. That was because many Filipino women in Taiwan, especially those who became house helpers, happen to have that name. With the rapidly increasing number of foreigners coming to Taiwan to work or study, more Taiwanese are interacting, socializing and forming relationships with
Whether in terms of market commonality or resource similarity, South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co is the biggest competitor of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC). The two companies have agreed to set up factories in the US and are also recipients of subsidies from the US CHIPS and Science Act, which was signed into law by former US president Joe Biden. However, changes in the market competitiveness of the two companies clearly reveal the context behind TSMC’s investments in the US. As US semiconductor giant Intel Corp has faced continuous delays developing its advanced processes, the world’s two major wafer foundries, TSMC and
The recent termination of Tibetan-language broadcasts by Voice of America (VOA) and Radio Free Asia (RFA) is a significant setback for Tibetans both in Tibet and across the global diaspora. The broadcasts have long served as a vital lifeline, providing uncensored news, cultural preservation and a sense of connection for a community often isolated by geopolitical realities. For Tibetans living under Chinese rule, access to independent information is severely restricted. The Chinese government tightly controls media and censors content that challenges its narrative. VOA and RFA broadcasts have been among the few sources of uncensored news available to Tibetans, offering insights
We are witnessing a sea change in the government’s approach to China, from one of reasonable, low-key reluctance at rocking the boat to a collapse of pretense over and patience in Beijing’s willful intransigence. Finally, we are seeing a more common sense approach in the face of active shows of hostility from a foreign power. According to Article 2 of the 2020 Anti-Infiltration Act (反滲透法), a “foreign hostile force” is defined as “countries, political entities or groups that are at war with or are engaged in a military standoff with the Republic of China [ROC]. The same stipulation applies to
RSS