The US will not endorse Taiwan's "defensive referendum" no matter what the government's high-level delegation prepares to say in the US next week, a visiting American academic said yesterday.
John J. Tkacik, research fellow at the Asian Studies Center of the Washington-based think tank the Heritage Foundation, warned the Taiwanese delegation of the possible outcome of its US trip, but nevertheless believed now "is the right time to send a delegation."
Members of the delegation, led by Deputy Presidential Office Secretary-General Joseph Wu (
The National Security Council, which is coordinating three delegations to the US, Europe and Asian countries, has not revealed details of the delegations' itineraries.
Previous visits by government officials to the US failed to convince Washington of the thinking behind the referendum. The US delegation will leave for the US this Saturday and is scheduled to return on Jan. 20.
Tkacik, however, said the communications problem was on the American rather the Taiwanese side. The US government wholly expects Taiwan to have a missile referendum on March 20, also the day of the presidential election.
"My understanding is that the US government has not planned any reaction. The US has made its position known that no matter what the Taiwan delegation says next week, the US government will not endorse this [referendum]," Tkacik said.
Nevertheless, he said, it was worthwhile for the delegation to make a government-to-government presentation on what the referendum is really about, the academic said.
The delegation needs to make it clear that Taiwan's government understands Washington's concerns about its obligations in defending Taiwan, Tkacik said.
"The US government then is owed the courtesy of some consultation ahead of time on the wording of the referendum," he said.
The delegation also has a responsibility to let the US realize that Taiwan's government has taken into account US concerns and that the referendum is not about independence or unification, Tkacik said.
"What we are talking about is a national demonstration by Taiwan of the indignation of the people of Taiwan at being targeted by 500 missiles from mainland China," he said.
Challenging some people's perception that President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) had not consulted with the US before announcing sensitive issues such as the referendum and a new constitution, Tkacik said Taiwan has done its best to communicate.
Tkacik and key participants of the closed-door US-Japan-Taiwan Trilateral Strategic Dialogue conference in Taipei met with Chen in the Presidential Office yesterday.
"President Chen has made an effort to craft the concept of the defensive referendum to meet the American concerns," Tkacik said.
Some senior US government officials understand Chen's efforts, he said, but the understanding has not gone through to US President George W. Bush because "iron guards" surrounding the president led him to be "misinformed" of Taiwan's referendum plan, Tkacik said.
Taiwan-US ties have been through worse times than this, according to the academic. Relations were worse when former president Lee Teng-hui (
Meanwhile, Hisahiko Okazaki, former Japanese ambassador to Thailand and Saudi Arabia, who also met with Chen yesterday, said that Japan was keeping out of the referendum issue.
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