Taiwan matters to the world because of its economic and technological achievements, its geopolitical location and its democratic system, Alliance of Democracies Foundation executive director Jonas Parello-Plesner said.
The former Danish diplomat and expert on US, European and Chinese foreign policy, made the remarks on Friday in a conversation with the Hudson Institute’s Asia-Pacific security chair, Patrick Cronin, for the Hudson event in Washington titled “Why Taiwan Matters to the US and the World.”
Cronin said that Taiwan matters not least because it is a major flash point for conflict in the Indo-Pacific region and Asia.
Photo: Walid Berrazeg, AFP
People are worried that with the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, another in the Indo-Pacific region could lead to a cataclysmic conflict, he said.
“I think there are three real big reasons why Taiwan matters to all of us, even though you could say we’re sitting here roughly 8,000 miles [12,874km] away from Taiwan, and it’s a small island, kind of the size of Maryland,” Parello-Plesner said.
“First is economic and technological,” he said, adding that Taiwan is indispensable for the world’s tech industry, as 90 percent of the world’s most advanced and smallest semiconductors are produced in Taiwan.
A Bloomberg Economics estimate showed that a Chinese blockade of Taiwan could cost the global economy US$10 trillion — about 10 percent of global GDP, which would be the equivalent of the combined economies of California, Texas and Florida disappearing overnight, he said.
If a conflict were to break out in Taiwan, it would in many ways stop the world economy, he said.
Second is “the military and geopolitical side,” as a conflict would not just involve China, but the US as well, which would put the militaries of the world’s two largest powers in the Taiwan Strait, Parello-Plesner said.
The victor “would define who is the leading power in the 21st century,” he said.
Last, “it would also define whether we live in a free or less free world if 23 million Taiwanese were suddenly subjugated by the Chinese Communist Party and fall under their rule,” especially with the ongoing Ukraine war, which is also involves an autocratic neighbor attacking a smaller democratic neighbor, he said.
China could attack Taiwan in many different ways, including politically, diplomatically and economically, so there is a wide range of attacks that Taiwan must prepare for, he said.
Regarding economic resilience, Parello-Plesner said Taiwanese are already doing part of it in many ways, reorienting their economy from being heavily reliant on China to doing more trade with democratic allies in other regions.
Europeans can contribute by directly telling China that European companies are willing to take losses and move out of the Chinese market, which might be a surprise to the Chinese leadership, he said.
Western companies have been spineless, such as giving in to Beijing’s requests to list Taiwan as a province of China, he said.
“So as Europeans, part of our preventive diplomacy should be to give that message to the Chinese leadership as much as we can,” he said.
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