Print

Mail

wiki links

Analysis: Official Washington eager to size up Hsieh

Democratic Progressive Party presidential candidate Frank Hsieh shakes hands with a supporter yesterday at the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport before he left on a 10-day trip to the US. PHOTO: CHU PEI-HSIUNG, TAIPEI TIMES

Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) left for the US yesterday on a visit that will give him and US officials the chance to size each other up.

While Hsieh is expected to gain access to high-level administration officials, his visit will be relatively low-key, with few public events. Sources say that Hsieh prefers not to make many public appearances and has sought to limit the number of such events.

Taiwan-watchers in Washington are certain to try to compare Hsieh's four-day visit to the enthusiastic reception that Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) received when he came here in March last year as the then newly-elected KMT chairman.

The Bush administration was planning to treat Hsieh as well as it treated Ma, Representative to Washington Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said on Thursday.

"As far as I know, the US government has the full intention to make similar arrangements for Frank Hsieh as they did for Ma," Wu told reporters.

The US "feels that Hsieh might be the next president of Taiwan," he said.

"US officials seem to be treating him as someone they are interested in talking to because he is the candidate for the ruling party and he has a fair chance of being elected," Wu said.

When Ma visited, he was seen by many as a virtual shoo-in to become Taiwan's next president, although he was not yet a candidate, and people concerned with Taiwan and China affairs were eager to fete him and find out what he thought.

He reportedly met such officials as then deputy secretary of state Robert Zoellick, deputy national security advisor J.D. Crouch and assistant defense secretary Peter Rodman.

All three have since left their positions, making precise comparisons with Hsieh's visit difficult.

But Ma's trip came before he made what some people considered to be several mistakes in his KMT leadership, and before his indictment in February on corruption charges.

However, Hsieh's showing in the race for Taipei mayor last year and his victory in the DPP presidential primary over such front-runners as former premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) have boosted his profile in Washington.

Few in the US capital are willing to predict which way next March's presidential election will go. Nor does the administration have a favorite, sources say.

Some observers credit Ma's entree into the halls of power last year to his KMT chairmanship, as well as his presidential prospects. Washington wanted the KMT to stop blocking the purchase of major arms systems from the US, and hoped to convince Ma to get the Legislative Yuan to approve the long-delayed package.

US officials are now said to be disappointed that he failed to do so.

By one measure, however, the two men are even -- Hsieh will stay in Omni Shoreham, just as Ma did.

So far, there are only three public events on Hsieh's Washington schedule.

He will be greeted by more than 900 Taiwanese-Americans from throughout the US at a gala dinner on Sunday evening after arriving from New York that afternoon.

On Monday afternoon, he will give a speech and hold a press conference at the National Press Club. On Wednesday afternoon, Hsieh will be honored at a congressional reception on Capitol Hill sponsored by the Formosan Association for Public Affairs.

He apparently will have no major events at any of the city's major think tanks, apparently at his own request.

In contrast, Ma made a highly publicized speech at the conservative American Enterprise Institute.

In that address he presented his five-point program for cross-strait relations centered on a long-term peace agreement with Beijing to "formally terminate the state of hostility across the Taiwan Strait."

It is uncertain just who among top-level administration officials Hsieh will meet in Washington.

Staff at the the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office (TECRO) has put together a list of top officials with whom Hsieh should request meetings and passed it on to DPP Legislator Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴), leader of the team organizing the Hsieh visit, a source said.

However, Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte, who would be an obvious US choice, will be out of town during Hsieh's visit. In his absence, some observers feel Hsieh would meet with Undersecretary for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns.

With Crouch gone, it was unclear whether Hsieh will meet with National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley or top Asia specialist Dennis Wilder.

At the Pentagon, Richard Lawless, the long-time top Asia official, has retired, as has Rodman.

In any event, the visit is seen as "a real test" for Hsieh, according to one Taiwanese source.

"His job is to convince the United States that he is the best man to enhance the mutual interests of the United States and Taiwan," the source said.

US officials are said to be anxious to hear in Hsieh's own words how he would deal with US-Taiwan relations, cross-strait relations and his attitude toward such issues as President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) plans for an election-day referendum on joining the UN under the name "Taiwan" and the arms deal.

"It is important to see this as a kind of an opening of a dialogue, not a session where everything is going to be nailed down," said Michael Fonte, the DPP's liaison in Washington.

"Both sides need to get to know each other better and they want to insure that whoever is the next president of Taiwan, that there's good communication," he said.

A key point, observers note, is that neither Washington nor Taipei fully understands the other.

Added to that, US officials do not know Hsieh very well, and want to find out "who he is and where he thinks he would go with the presidency. It's a gauging of the man," in the words of one observer familiar with both sides' perspectives.

The US side will also seek to know whether Hsieh understands US policies and desires.

The main US goal is "peace and security" in the region and the US side will stress that point.

Hsieh is seen by many here as a moderate, and his statements about political reconciliation domestically, reconciliation with China, greater US-Japan cooperation, and his recent comment about the US being a "strategic partner" have resonated favorably in Washington.

But official Washington will want to see "what that means in practice," one source said.
This story has been viewed 1980 times.