"If Taiwan chooses unification, should the United States care?" is the title of a recent paper in The Washington Quarterly by Nancy B. Tucker, professor of history at Georgetown University. Tucker notes that while the vast majority of Taiwanese people prefer an open-ended status quo, the growing tide of Taiwanese investment in China makes Taiwan's prosperity dependent on the political relationship with Beijing.
The Chen Shui-bian (
Beijing uses both a seductive strategy (tax incentives to Taiwan's businesspeople and promises of political power in a greater China to the those who are politically ambitious, or a united front, to court the PFP and KMT) and a coercive strategy (an accelerated missile buildup to force Taiwan to surrender before the US can intervene).
If the democratically elected Taiwanese government chooses peaceful unification with China, the US will be in no position to object. So, it is time for Washington to consider the implications of such a move. In that regard, Tucker lists several adverse strategic consequences for the US. China's naval and air power will be projected beyond coastal waters. China will be able to interrupt vital sea lanes in the vicinity of Taiwan and strangle Japan's economy. An apprehensive Japan could thus revise its constitution, expand its military and preserve its US alliance. The US would have to surrender its listening posts in Taiwan. To prevent military technology from falling into China's hands, some members of Congress have called for ending sales of sophisticated US arms to Taiwan or disabling weapons already sold.
Taiwan as part of China could strengthen a China whose values had not changed. Despite these adverse consequences, Tucker concludes that avoiding war with China is in the US' best interest.
While many policymakers in Washington have been increasingly concerned that President Chen's policy of economic and political integration may eventually lead to a bloodless surrender of Taiwan's sovereignty and democracy, Tucker is perhaps the first Sinologist to publicly address the issue.
While Tucker's topic is timely, I do not agree with her views in two areas. First, mainstream Japanese public opinion is against rearmament. The anti-war sentiment is deeply ingrained into the Japanese psyche due to the horrendous casualties of World War II and the trauma of the Hiroshima bomb.
With Taiwan's fall, Japan might conclude that America is not a reliable ally and opt to become a docile protectorate of China, offering Japan's financial and technological resources as tributes in return for China's promise of non-aggression. After all, Taiwan's dire straits are due in part to years of neglect by the administration of former US president Bill Clinton. Once Japan sides with China, the US will have little choice but to withdraw from East Asia.
Second, peace with China may merely defer a greater conflict. With the combined resources of this greater China, the Koreas and Japan, Beijing could challenge America's military, political and economic supremacy within two decades, threatening the US with a nuclear Pearl Harbor.
It is not wise to take a sanguine view of Taiwan's absorption by the People's Republic of China.
Li Thian-hok is a freelance commentator based in the US state of Pennsylvania.
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