While calling on the international community to respect China’s “right” to peaceful development, Beijing has yet to abandon its tendency to make requests that are diametrically opposed to that goal.
Again this week, Beijing called on Washington to facilitate mutual understanding and respect its core interests, which include its claim of sovereignty over Taiwan. The problem with such assertions is that Beijing’s definition of mutual understanding is often irreconcilable with reality, or at least morality.
It is very difficult, for one, to increase mutual understanding when one side’s position is underscored by the deployment of 1,600 ballistic missiles. Surely, mutual understanding cannot include the other party’s acknowledgement that the Chinese military has a right to threaten Taiwan’s 23 million peace-loving people, let alone ignore their own preferences regarding their identity and the destiny of their nation.
Bowing to such calls for mutual understanding, with the threat of force as one of the main elements of that understanding, would be tantamount to moral capitulation on Washington’s part, whether as a country that perceives itself as a beacon of democracy or as Taiwan’s sole security guarantor.
The other, equally fatal, flaw in Beijing’s plea for mutual understanding is that on core issues, the understanding in fact is not mutual: It expects its counterparts to absorb, and if possible abide by, its own idiosyncratic view of the world, while categorically refusing to compromise. Taiwan again serves as a perfect example.
It is therefore anxiety-provoking when supposedly seasoned diplomats and strategists, such as former US national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, argue that at some point, the US will have to address the Taiwan “question” and “be sensitive to the meaning of this issue to China,” which in effect represents abdicating to calls by Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Yang Jiechi (楊潔篪) to increase mutual trust.
Never mind that Brzezinski was once again exhibiting his utter inability to understand Taiwan or that mutual trust should also include input from the 23 million people in Taiwan who would be most affected by a decision — which he only vaguely hints at — to abandon Taiwan.
The same applies to the argument, repeated by Brzezinski, that the desired “one China” could, through a peaceful process, exist in the form of several political systems. Here — and we have Hong Kong’s and Tibet’s experience as models — what we have is not mutual understanding, but wishful thinking, if not downright naivety. Beijing does not brook the existence of different political systems under “one China.” Since 1950, when the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) invaded Tibet, Tibetan customs and religion have become shadows of their former glory. The same applies to the tottering democratic system in Hong Kong, which little by little is being chopped away at the edges by Beijing and its minions inside the territory.
Beijing is not exactly receptive to the need for reciprocity that underscores mutual trust and understanding. Tibetans, Uighurs and Hong Kongers know full well from their own, for the most part painful, experience that, by Chinese definition, mutual understanding is a one-way street, and one that leads straight to Zhongnanhai.
So now Brzezinski and other China apologists would have Taiwanese show understanding for the PLA forcing them to live under the shadow of war? No sane person would understand, let alone accept, such a threat. That Beijing continues to aim those missiles at its “own blood” and “compatriots” only proves the point that the Chinese leadership could not care less about the opinions of others.
China’s supreme objective in a war across the Taiwan Strait is to incorporate Taiwan as a province of the People’s Republic. It follows, therefore, that international recognition of Taiwan’s de jure independence is a consummation that China’s leaders devoutly wish to avoid. By the same token, an American strategy to deny China that objective would complicate Beijing’s calculus and deter large-scale hostilities. For decades, China has cautioned “independence means war.” The opposite is also true: “war means independence.” A comprehensive strategy of denial would guarantee an outcome of de jure independence for Taiwan in the event of Chinese invasion or
A recent Taipei Times editorial (“A targeted bilingual policy,” March 12, page 8) questioned how the Ministry of Education can justify spending NT$151 million (US$4.74 million) when the spotlighted achievements are English speech competitions and campus tours. It is a fair question, but it focuses on the wrong issue. The problem is not last year’s outcomes failing to meet the bilingual education vision; the issue is that the ministry has abandoned the program that originally justified such a large expenditure. In the early years of Bilingual 2030, the ministry’s K-12 Administration promoted the Bilingual Instruction in Select Domains Program (部分領域課程雙語教學實施計畫).
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) earlier this month said it is necessary for her to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and it would be a “huge boost” to the party’s local election results in November, but many KMT members have expressed different opinions, indicating a struggle between different groups in the party. Since Cheng was elected as party chairwoman in October last year, she has repeatedly expressed support for increased exchanges with China, saying that it would bring peace and prosperity to Taiwan, and that a meeting with Xi in Beijing takes priority over meeting
Philippine Department of Foreign Affairs spokesman for maritime affairs Rogelio Villanueva on Monday said that Manila’s claims in the South China Sea are backed by international law. Villanueva was responding to a social media post by the Chinese embassy alleging that a former Philippine ambassador in 1990 had written a letter to a German radio operator stating that the Scarborough Shoal (Huangyan Island, 黃岩島) did not fall within Manila’s territory. “Sovereignty is not merely claimed, it is exercised,” Villanueva said. The Philippines won a landmark case at the Permanent Court of Arbitration in 2016 that found China’s sweeping claim of sovereignty in
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