A new analysis of China’s latest defense white paper concludes that it is part and parcel of Beijing’s “political warfare against Taiwan.”
The analysis by Richard Fisher, a senior fellow on Asian military affairs at the Washington-based International Assessment and Strategy Center, said the white paper “provides a disturbing insight into the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) strategy of coercive envelopment of Taiwan.”
Fisher said the paper was “a stark reminder of the PRC’s [People’s Republic of China] ongoing strategy of economic and political ‘united front’ warfare combined with military intimidation, which the PRC could decide to change into a direct military campaign at any point in the future.”
The white paper, released on March 31, should be seen as a weapon to convey the CCP’s “divide and conquer” strategy against Taiwan, he said.
Fisher said passages in the white paper that are ostensibly addressed to the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) are “calm and straightforward,” but make clear it is time to begin political negotiations that could ultimately end Taiwan’s era of freedom.
Pro-PRC factions within the KMT are “quite willing” to push the CCP’s goals, Fisher wrote.
Meanwhile, passages seemingly targeted at the Democratic Progressive Party are “harsh and likely presage how the CCP will treat the Taiwanese once they gain control,” Fisher wrote.
Carefully going through the white paper point by point, Fisher said it amounts to an “emphatic rejection” of the current “status quo” and that the PRC makes it clear the growth in economic relations and personal contacts with Taiwan that it has allowed since 2008 “are not for the benefit of the people of Taiwan but to assist the PRC’s ultimate goal of conquest.”
“The CCP wants the KMT to start political negotiations regarding Taiwan’s future now,” he wrote.
The PRC’s defense white paper is another “douse of cold water” for Washington from Beijing, Fisher wrote.
“The agenda that it reveals should diminish further hopes that the PRC will eventually become a partner that shares US and Western global interests,” he wrote.
“The white paper’s direct intervention into Taiwan’s political debate about its future is coercive in nature and affirms that despite its many recent actions to alleviate tensions with Taiwan, it is doing so to advance its consistent goal of taking over Taiwan,” he said.
Fisher said that given the growing military imbalance against Taiwan, it is imperative that the US Department of State review its longstanding restrictive interpretation of the Taiwan Relations Act’s requirement that the US sell only “defensive weapons” to Taiwan.
“State Department restrictive interpretations serve to deny Taiwan access to modern weapons such as the Lockheed Martin ATACMS (deep strike precision surface to surface missiles) that could effectively deter a PLA [People’s Liberation Army] invasion, and thus a PRC decision to attack Taiwan,” Fisher wrote.
The National Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology yesterday showcased its locally developed variants of the Vision 60 robotic patrol dog, which it plans to deploy on the nation’s outlying territories in the South China Sea. The variants were produced under the Joint Lab project — created by the institute and domestic companies — and assembled with domestically produced motors, lenses and artificial intelligence (AI) systems alongside licensed tech from the US, Missile and Rocket Systems Research Division deputy director Jen Kuo-kang (任國光) told the media event at a military base in Taipei’s Dazhi (大直) area. Taiwan has built up its strengths
RIGHT DIRECTION: Taiwan’s efforts to prevent forced labor include a proposal to ‘fully prohibit’ employers from withholding workers’ documents, an official said Taiwan is to establish a mechanism to restrict imports of goods linked to forced labor, the Executive Yuan said yesterday, after the US proposed imposing additional tariffs on Taiwanese goods over labor concerns. “The Ministry of Labor and the Ministry of Economic Affairs are to establish an interministerial review procedure,” Executive Yuan spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) said at a news briefing in Taipei. “The government is to use the Foreign Trade Act [貿易法] as the legal basis to restrict imports of goods produced with forced labor” and bring its supply chain governance more in line with international standards on human rights, resilience
NOT IMMEDIATE: Taiwan has a chance to appeal the proposed 10 percent tariff before it starts, while other countries face a 12.5 percent tariff from the trade office Taiwan is among 60 economies determined by the US to have failed to impose or enforce a ban on the importation of goods produced with forced labor, according to a notice released on Tuesday by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), which proposed imposing an additional 10 percent or more tariff on them. The USTR in a statement said that following an investigation, it had determined under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 that the failure of the 60 economies to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labor is
TIT-FOR-TAT: The US allegedly revoked the visa of a Chinese national working at Xinhua News Agency in the US in response to Beijing’s expulsion of Vivian Wang The Presidential Office yesterday condemned China for expelling a New York Times correspondent from Beijing following the newspaper’s interview with President William Lai (賴清德), saying the move highlighted Beijing’s suppression of press freedom and its threat to international news media. Taiwan has noted a series of recent incidents in which Beijing used similar tactics to “threaten and pressure international media outlets and journalists,” Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said in a statement. “This concerns not only press freedom and freedom of expression, but also the safety of journalists, and Taiwan and relevant partners are paying close attention to the situation,” she
RSS