US concerns that the referendum called by President Chen Shui-bian (
At the same time, the officials slammed China's deployment of some 500 ballistic missiles targeting Taiwan as a clear attempt by Beijing at intimidation, and called the action a serious threat to cross-strait stability.
Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Randall Schriver and Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Lawless were speaking during a hearing of the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission on military modernization and the cross-strait military balance.
Both cited a provision in the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979 that requires the US to "maintain the capacity ... to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion" by China against Taiwan.
US President George W. Bush warned Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (
So, while the act was not a "formal defense treaty," Schriver said, "questions about our involvement and questions about our obligations I think lead us in the direction that we do have to be very mindful of how we're prepared" in case of a flare-up between the two sides.
The provision in the act, Lawless added, had made it "incumbent upon us to encourage the Taiwanese to do what they need to do to dissuade China to the maximum extent possible from taking risks that they otherwise would not take" to settle cross-strait conflict by "non-peaceful means or coercive means."
The US' "charge is to engage the Taiwanese fairly aggressively" in this regard, he said.
Yet, "If deterrence fails, Taiwan, supported by the US and its allies, must be prepared to swiftly defeat [China's] use of force," he said.
He urged Taiwan to develop a "national will" and bring about "improved national consensus" over the need to develop military capabilities to deal with any use of force.
It was the legal obligation contained in the act that led Washington to be so firm in pushing Taiwan to come up with the money to buy the weapons systems which Bush agreed to sell in April 2001, the two said.
Arguing that the US has a "direct equity" in the Taiwan Strait, Schriver said: "If there are steps [the Taiwanese] don't take, there are scenarios under which [we] are presented with filling that gap."
Consequently, "it's important that we help shape the debate in Taiwan," Schriver said.
Lawless said that China's missile buildup was just one part of the growing military threat that China posed as a result of its military modernization in recent years.
This modernization, Lawless said, "casts a cloud over Beijing's declared preference for resolving differences" peacefully.
"The modernization is focused on exploiting vulnerabilities in Taiwan's national- and operational-level command and control systems, its integrated air-defense system and reliance on sea lines for communications," he said.
As China rapidly modernizes its military, "Taiwan's relative military strength will deteriorate, unless it makes significant investments into its defense," Lawless warned.
The situation was exacerbated by Taiwan's international isolation in the area of security cooperation with other countries, he added.
The challenges were not at all insurmountable, he said.
The US-Taiwan defense relationship sought to reverse the negative trends, "possibly obviating the need for massive US intervention in a crisis," he said.
Schriver also reiterated US opposition to recent suggestions that the EU lift its embargo on sales of arms to China.
"We have been in contact with every member of the EU on this issue, stating clearly our position, and at the senior-most level ... [Colin Powell and others below him] have engaged [our] European counterparts at almost every opportunity," Schriver said.
Lawless said that if Europe sold China arms, Beijing's ability to use those arms would be far more advanced then when the EU embargo was imposed in the wake of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.
"China's ability to acquire, integrate and thereby multiply its force posture has really increased dramatically," he said.
"What the EU may have to offer now may make a lot more sense in the context of where China needs to go than it ever has in the past," he said.
Former Czech Republic-based Taiwanese researcher Cheng Yu-chin (鄭宇欽) has been sentenced to seven years in prison on espionage-related charges, China’s Ministry of State Security announced yesterday. China said Cheng was a spy for Taiwan who “masqueraded as a professor” and that he was previously an assistant to former Cabinet secretary-general Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰). President-elect William Lai (賴清德) on Wednesday last week announced Cho would be his premier when Lai is inaugurated next month. Today is China’s “National Security Education Day.” The Chinese ministry yesterday released a video online showing arrests over the past 10 years of people alleged to be
THE HAWAII FACTOR: While a 1965 opinion said an attack on Hawaii would not trigger Article 5, the text of the treaty suggests the state is covered, the report says NATO could be drawn into a conflict in the Taiwan Strait if Chinese forces attacked the US mainland or Hawaii, a NATO Defense College report published on Monday says. The report, written by James Lee, an assistant research fellow at Academia Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies, states that under certain conditions a Taiwan contingency could trigger Article 5 of NATO, under which an attack against any member of the alliance is considered an attack against all members, necessitating a response. Article 6 of the North Atlantic Treaty specifies that an armed attack in the territory of any member in Europe,
LIKE FAMILY: People now treat dogs and cats as family members. They receive the same medical treatments and tests as humans do, a veterinary association official said The number of pet dogs and cats in Taiwan has officially outnumbered the number of human newborns last year, data from the Ministry of Agriculture’s pet registration information system showed. As of last year, Taiwan had 94,544 registered pet dogs and 137,652 pet cats, the data showed. By contrast, 135,571 babies were born last year. Demand for medical care for pet animals has also risen. As of Feb. 29, there were 5,773 veterinarians in Taiwan, 3,993 of whom were for pet animals, statistics from the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Agency showed. In 2022, the nation had 3,077 pediatricians. As of last
XINJIANG: Officials are conducting a report into amending an existing law or to enact a special law to prohibit goods using forced labor Taiwan is mulling an amendment prohibiting the importation of goods using forced labor, similar to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (UFLPA) passed by the US Congress in 2021 that imposed limits on goods produced using forced labor in China’s Xinjiang region. A government official who wished to remain anonymous said yesterday that as the US customs law explicitly prohibits the importation of goods made using forced labor, in 2021 it passed the specialized UFLPA to limit the importation of cotton and other goods from China’s Xinjiang Uyghur region. Taiwan does not have the legal basis to prohibit the importation of goods