At no other time in the ancient story of international relations has Taiwan mattered as much as it does today and will in the next ten years.
It is exceedingly difficult to think about the future in the middle of a once-in-a-century public health catastrophe. Yet hidden deep inside the dark shadows of every great crisis is the chance to remake the world. What might that new world look like? Will it shine brighter than the old one we remember? Or will the waves of death and economic destruction now washing over the face of the earth recede at long last only to expose a gray, nightmarish landscape?
Rudyard Kipling famously observed, “Words, of course, are the most powerful drug used by mankind.” What words will future historians write when they record those events that are rushing toward us? Will they excite highs of ecstasy and triumph, or evoke crushing lows of regret?
Part of the answer will hinge on whether or not the United States and other like-mind countries stand together with Taiwan. More than ever before, it looks like they will.
Taiwan’s free, democratic, and transparent government has done a superb job fighting the pandemic. As a result, it has attracted an outpouring of admiration. Nations around the globe are finally beginning to see that by diplomatically isolating Taiwan they are hurting themselves.
Today, those who walk the halls of power in Washington, D.C. are looking at Taiwan in a new light. What they see are Taiwanese microchips and Taiwanese cyber experts contributing to US national security at a time when our medical communications networks are being hammered by Chinese Communist Party hackers. What they see are Taiwanese face masks protecting our president and his family, and millions of everyday Americans. What they see are Taiwanese airmen, sailors, soldiers, and marines holding the center of the first island chain while the titans of our Navy recover from the shock of mass shipboard infections. Taiwan has never looked so good.
So far, no other country has done as well in the face of this fearful pandemic. From the American perspective, this is exactly the kind of high-performing friend and ally we need going into the 2020s — a period of time that former US Pacific Fleet intelligence chief Jim Fanell sagely called “the decade of concern.”
The choices before our elected leaders in the United States are monumental. It is going to take wise statecraft to rise from the ravages of the pandemic and rebuild a world in which Taiwan can fully contribute to the prevention of the next great disaster. The task is urgent.
The Chinese Communist Party’s hostility and bellicosity toward Taiwan are growing. It is perfectly understandable why Xi Jinping (習近平) and his comrades are loath to see this island nation thrive. Taipei’s shining achievements cast a long shadow, making Beijing’s appalling governance failures appear even worse in juxtaposition.
Since the pandemic started, China’s provocations against Taiwan include everything from fiery rhetoric and mass war games to electronic jamming and cyber-attacks. Chinese authorities have sent unauthorized individuals from Wuhan to Taiwan on chartered flights in violation of prearranged agreements. They have also sent fighter jets across the Taiwan Strait median line, one of which attempted to lock a missile onto its Taiwanese escort. They have even sent their maritime militia boats on ramming missions against Taiwanese Coast Guard cutters. These are not isolated incidents. Viewed in totality, they signal hostile intent.
On May 1, 2020, General Chiu Kuo-cheng (邱國正), the director of Taiwan’s National Security Bureau (Taiwan’s CIA equivalent), testified before the island’s parliament that, “When the pandemic subsides, Beijing will want to diffuse the domestic pressure it faces over COVID-19, so it might shift the focus from China’s internal problems to outside... Therefore, Beijing is likely to make aggressive, threatening moves against Taiwan.” His intelligence estimate is starting to come true.
One possible outcome of the mounting tensions could be a fourth cross-Strait crisis. While disquieting to consider, there is every reason for greater vigilance but no reason for fear. Such an event would drive the United States and Taiwan closer together, much like the last three crises did. Already, the Trump Administration is carefully repairing this long-neglected diplomatic relationship. If Joseph Biden is elected president in November, it seems likely he will agree with, and continue, this prudent policy.
We may be coming to a turning point. By 2030, US-Taiwan relations could improve in ways scarcely imagined today. In 2030, there could be an American embassy in Taipei where the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) currently stands. We could see Taiwanese diplomats working proudly in concert with their American colleagues in newly created international organizations, those in which only democracies are allowed to join as member states.
By 2030, there could be a US-Taiwan free trade agreement. There could be a raft of bilateral US-Taiwan task forces working on 6G communications technology, the biomedical economy, and green energy. There could be thousands of US military personnel stationed in Taiwan, with American ships and aircraft routinely passing though the island’s harbors and airports to ensure strategic stability. All of this is possible and will likely prove necessary.
China can threaten to attack its peaceful neighbor. Soon it may even spark a violent confrontation. But acts of aggression against Taiwan will further stain the already ugly reputation of the regime in Beijing. And they will undoubtedly cement the growing consensus of Americans who believe an international community that has the benefit and privilege of including Taiwan is something worth rebuilding.
Ian Easton is senior director at the Project 2049 Institute and author of The Chinese Invasion Threat: Taiwan’s Defense and American Strategy in Asia (中共攻台大解密).
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
Delegation-level visits between the two countries have become an integral part of transformed relations between India and the US. Therefore, the visit by a bipartisan group of seven US lawmakers, led by US House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs Chairman Michael McCaul to India from June 16 to Thursday last week would have largely gone unnoticed in India and abroad. However, the US delegation’s four-day visit to India assumed huge importance this time, because of the meeting between the US lawmakers and the Dalai Lama. This in turn brings us to the focal question: How and to what extent