As if Taiwan’s status and official designation were not confusing enough for those who are not familiar with its precarious situation, President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) foreign policy in recent months has seen so many twists and turns as to stun even the most seasoned of policy wonks.
The root of the confusion is not, as some of his detractors would have it, that Ma is bending to Beijing’s will, but rather that he wants it all.
He wants to improve relations with China, the US, Japan and the rest of the international community, but at the same time his administration feels it must rock the boat to ensure that Taiwan is not ignored while elephants clash, and must prepare for a rainy day should the current detente in the Taiwan Strait shift in a different direction.
As a result, while Ma has proposed the widely hailed East China Sea peace initiative, Taipei has also engaged in brinkmanship of a kind never seen before, sending militaristic signals and appealing to nationalistic sentiment, while relying on the Coast Guard Administration to flex some muscles at sea over the Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台) dispute.
Even though most people in the know agree that the front-page-earning water cannon battles between Taiwanese and Japanese coast guard vessels are for the most part orchestrated, this is nevertheless not the type of behavior usually associated with peaceful Taiwan, especially at a time when it is endeavoring to relaunch long-stalled talks on fisheries with Japan.
Ma’s efforts to improve relations with Beijing have also created the impression in some minds that Taiwan is cooperating with China, which also claims the islets, in pressuring Japan; an illusion that no amount of negation by Taipei has managed to fully dispel.
Critics argue that as part of a grand bargain to further appease China, Ma is seeking to weaken the armed forces, for which there seems to be ample evidence. Live-fire drills have become less frequent under his watch, while his administration has been wishy-washy on efforts to procure new F-16s. Its efforts to create an all-volunteer military also seem half-hearted and threaten to undermine morale. Rumors abound that intelligence agencies are pulling out of espionage in China and that in the not-so-distant-future Taiwan and China might sign a peace accord.
However, while there might be an element of truth to the above, the military has mass-produced Hsiung Feng IIE land-attack cruise missiles, is equipping its navy vessels with HF-3 supersonic anti-ship cruise missiles, is seeking to extend the range of the latter and has embarked on a program to develop the Yunfeng (“Cloud Peak”), a 1,200km surface-to-surface missile capable of reaching central China, with plans to begin production as early as next year.
Ironically, while the development of offensive weapons could serve to undermine the oft-heard argument that Ma is “soft” on national defense, it also risks causing friction with Taiwan’s principal ally, the US, which has long opposed the development of missiles whose range or warhead yield go beyond those stipulated by the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR). Yet, when Defense News asked whether the Yunfeng program, which is a “1,000 percent violation” of MTCR, risked causing difficulties with Washington, a source in the government replied: “I don’t care what the [expletive] Americans think.”
Only an administration that wants it all could contend straight-faced that relations between Taiwan, China, Japan and the US are the best they have been in decades. Although international relations are not exactly zero-sum, countries cannot have it all, especially at a time when the divide between China and the US seems to be widening, forcing countries in the region to take sides.
Taiwan cannot have it all and the Ma administration had better improve its messaging soon, or the delicate balancing act, too rife with contradictions to be sustainable in the long run, will come crashing down.
In the event of a war with China, Taiwan has some surprisingly tough defenses that could make it as difficult to tackle as a porcupine: A shoreline dotted with swamps, rocks and concrete barriers; conscription for all adult men; highways and airports that are built to double as hardened combat facilities. This porcupine has a soft underbelly, though, and the war in Iran is exposing it: energy. About 39,000 ships dock at Taiwan’s ports each year, more than the 30,000 that transit the Strait of Hormuz. About one-fifth of their inbound tonnage is coal, oil, refined fuels and liquefied natural gas (LNG),
To counter the CCP’s escalating threats, Taiwan must build a national consensus and demonstrate the capability and the will to fight. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) often leans on a seductive mantra to soften its threats, such as “Chinese do not kill Chinese.” The slogan is designed to frame territorial conquest (annexation) as a domestic family matter. A look at the historical ledger reveals a different truth. For the CCP, being labeled “family” has never been a guarantee of safety; it has been the primary prerequisite for state-sanctioned slaughter. From the forced starvation of 150,000 civilians at the Siege of Changchun
The two major opposition parties, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), jointly announced on Tuesday last week that former TPP lawmaker Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) would be their joint candidate for Chiayi mayor, following polling conducted earlier this month. It is the first case of blue-white (KMT-TPP) cooperation in selecting a joint candidate under an agreement signed by their chairpersons last month. KMT and TPP supporters have blamed their 2024 presidential election loss on failing to decide on a joint candidate, which ended in a dramatic breakdown with participants pointing fingers, calling polls unfair, sobbing and walking
In the opening remarks of her meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Friday, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) framed her visit as a historic occasion. In his own remarks, Xi had also emphasized the history of the relationship between the KMT and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Where they differed was that Cheng’s account, while flawed by its omissions, at least partially corresponded to reality. The meeting was certainly historic, albeit not in the way that Cheng and Xi were signaling, and not from the perspective
RSS