US president-elect Barack Obama completed his victory on Tuesday night with a speech as stirring as it was carefully worded. It would come as no surprise if his fine words moved as many people of other nations as the people of his own.
Indeed, his words included a pledge that credibility in the eyes of the rest of the world is an important part of the US agenda once again: “… our destiny is shared,” he said, “and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand.”
He spoke in a way that will encourage individuals and nations that are struggling against oppression by adjacent states or even their own.
“To those who would tear the world down: We will defeat you,” he said. “To those who seek peace and security: We support you. And to all those who have wondered if America’s beacon still burns as bright: Tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity and unyielding hope.”
These words are a profound and essential statement of what the US represents to people all over the world who hope for self-betterment and self-respect while acknowledging the need to admit to mistakes and heal past wounds.
But the mechanics of Obama’s foreign policy are yet to be enunciated.
Worse, the words and actions to date of Obama’s aides with responsibilities for Taiwan and China sit very awkwardly — if not contradict outright — the inspiration and principles in his speech on Tuesday night.
The extent to which this situation should worry Taiwanese is limited by military and diplomatic reality in the Asia-Pacific region. The received wisdom among hawks and doves alike is that US policy on Taiwan over the last 30 years has been remarkably stable and consistent, though under President George W. Bush there has been a subtle but unnerving change from “acknowledging” to supporting China’s claim to Taiwan.
Concerns that a Democratic Congress would erode Taiwanese interests may also be overstated given the marginal role it plays in executive operations.
To the incoming Obama administration, Taiwan’s fate will likely fall under the radar for some time, and predicted overtures by Washington to Beijing could extend this period of superficial peace for as long as Zhongnanhai can behave itself.
China’s agenda, however, requires this stability to end at the very moment that its strategy of coaxing Taiwan and offering economic inducements fails.
This moment is inevitable; the question is whether Obama will be prepared for it should it happen under his watch.
Supporters of Taiwanese democracy must have listened to Obama’s invocation of Abraham Lincoln with a mixture of admiration and wistfulness. Based on the evidence available, despite the warning signs from China and pro-China forces in Taiwan, and despite all the energy that hope can generate, no one can really say if an Obama administration would act to stop a Taiwanese government of the people, by the people and for the people from perishing.
Minister of Labor Hung Sun-han (洪申翰) on April 9 said that the first group of Indian workers could arrive as early as this year as part of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between the Taipei Economic and Cultural Center in India and the India Taipei Association. Signed in February 2024, the MOU stipulates that Taipei would decide the number of migrant workers and which industries would employ them, while New Delhi would manage recruitment and training. Employment would be governed by the laws of both countries. Months after its signing, the two sides agreed that 1,000 migrant workers from India would
In recent weeks, Taiwan has witnessed a surge of public anxiety over the possible introduction of Indian migrant workers. What began as a policy signal from the Ministry of Labor quickly escalated into a broader controversy. Petitions gathered thousands of signatures within days, political figures issued strong warnings, and social media became saturated with concerns about public safety and social stability. At first glance, this appears to be a straightforward policy question: Should Taiwan introduce Indian migrant workers or not? However, this framing is misleading. The current debate is not fundamentally about India. It is about Taiwan’s labor system, its
On March 31, the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs released declassified diplomatic records from 1995 that drew wide domestic media attention. One revelation stood out: North Korea had once raised the possibility of diplomatic relations with Taiwan. In a meeting with visiting Chinese officials in May 1995, as then-Chinese president Jiang Zemin (江澤民) prepared for a visit to South Korea, North Korean officials objected to Beijing’s growing ties with Seoul and raised Taiwan directly. According to the newly released records, North Korean officials asked why Pyongyang should refrain from developing relations with Taiwan while China and South Korea were expanding high-level
Japan’s imminent easing of arms export rules has sparked strong interest from Warsaw to Manila, Reuters reporting found, as US President Donald Trump wavers on security commitments to allies, and the wars in Iran and Ukraine strain US weapons supplies. Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s ruling party approved the changes this week as she tries to invigorate the pacifist country’s military industrial base. Her government would formally adopt the new rules as soon as this month, three Japanese government officials told Reuters. Despite largely isolating itself from global arms markets since World War II, Japan spends enough on its own
RSS