The US’ Marine Corps University on Monday conducted a World War III simulation that had Taiwan as one of the fronts, with China, Russia and North Korea as belligerents.
The university said that the exercise was not intended to be preparations for war with those countries, and that the main focus was the European front, where the majority of US forces were sent in the simulation.
There is no doubt, given regional tensions and China’s militarization of the South China Sea, that US military officials are seriously thinking about potential conflict in the region.
However, US preparedness relies heavily on its partnerships in the Indo-Pacific, which is where doubt remains.
At the Five Power Defence Arrangements meeting in Singapore on June 2, 2017, regional leaders discussed potential security arrangements that would bolster cooperation and reduce dependence on the US.
“We have to take responsibility for our own security and prosperity, while recognizing we are stronger when sharing the burden of collective leadership with trusted partners and friends,” then-Australian prime minister Malcolm Turnbull said at the meeting.
Singaporean Minister of Defense Ng Eng Hen (黃永宏) said that his country welcomed cooperation with the US, but was concerned about policymaking at the top levels of the US government and was worried about the US being the only nation “powerful enough to set red lines with China.”
In a poll cited in a report published on the Foreign Policy Web site on Jan. 8, respondents in ASEAN said that they lacked confidence in the US’ policies in the region.
The US’ freedom of navigation exercises in the area had not deterred China from obstructing economic activity by those nations in their own waters, the report said.
A report published by the National Interest Web site on Nov. 6 last year cited the growing challenges US businesses face in the Chinese market as “an underlying driver of bipartisan willingness to get tough on China.”
However, a heavy-handed approach would not work, because the US’ allies in the region still heavily depend on Beijing economically, it said.
The US needs to be more flexible and needs a clear strategy, it said, adding that US allies in Asia do not want to take sides in a US-China conflict.
Resolving the South China Seas crisis would require multiparty dialogue and it is imperative to bring China to the negotiating table.
China wants to be respected, and it sees the area within the “nine-dash line” as its territory, so there is no way it will agree to remove bases from it.
Regional leaders should seek to negotiate an agreement with China that protects their economic interests in those waters, and should seek shared responsibility to protect those operating in the area from conflict, piracy and other illegal activity. If China is to have military personnel stationed there, why not put them to use? Drug trafficking, human trafficking and piracy are major problems along major sea lanes, and China could work with other regional governments to combat this.
If China were to be in partnerships, it would be less likely to antagonize.
Taiwan could also participate in shared policing of the South China Sea.
The US and its partners in the Indo-Pacific — including Taiwan — must engage China in productive ways, while reducing their dependency on China’s market.
A strong China in itself is not a threat, but if it feels alienated or ostracized, it is likely to lash out. Therefore, cooperation that holds China accountable is needed.
US aerospace company Boeing Co has in recent years been involved in numerous safety incidents, including crashes of its 737 Max airliners, which have caused widespread concern about the company’s safety record. It has recently come to light that titanium jet engine parts used by Boeing and its European competitor Airbus SE were sold with falsified documentation. The source of the titanium used in these parts has been traced back to an unknown Chinese company. It is clear that China is trying to sneak questionable titanium materials into the supply chain and use any ensuing problems as an opportunity to
It’s not every month that the US Department of State sends two deputy assistant secretary-level officials to Taiwan, together. Its rarer still that such senior State Department policy officers, once on the ground in Taipei, make a point of huddling with fellow diplomats from “like-minded” NATO, ANZUS and Japanese governments to coordinate their multilateral Taiwan policies. The State Department issued a press release on June 22 admitting that the two American “representatives” had “hosted consultations in Taipei” with their counterparts from the “Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs.” The consultations were blandly dubbed the “US-Taiwan Working Group on International Organizations.” The State
The Chinese Supreme People’s Court and other government agencies released new legal guidelines criminalizing “Taiwan independence diehard separatists.” While mostly symbolic — the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has never had jurisdiction over Taiwan — Tamkang University Graduate Institute of China Studies associate professor Chang Wu-ueh (張五岳), an expert on cross-strait relations, said: “They aim to explain domestically how they are countering ‘Taiwan independence,’ they aim to declare internationally their claimed jurisdiction over Taiwan and they aim to deter Taiwanese.” Analysts do not know for sure why Beijing is propagating these guidelines now. Under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), deciphering the
The Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercises, the largest naval exercise in the region, are aimed at deepening international collaboration and interaction while strengthening tactical capabilities and flexibility in tackling maritime crises. China was invited to participate in RIMPAC in 2014 and 2016, but it was excluded this year. The underlying reason is that Beijing’s ambitions of regional expansion and challenging the international order have raised global concern. The world has made clear its suspicions of China, and its exclusion from RIMPAC this year will bring about a sea change in years to come. The purpose of excluding China is primarily