China’s rubber-stamp parliament, the National People’s Congress, has given Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) a precedent-breaking third term in office. It also announced a national defense budget of 1.56 trillion yuan (US$226.6 billion) for this year, 7.2 percent more than last year. Taiwan should take this as reason to be more determined in the face of its authoritarian neighbor.
While calling for “peaceful unification,” China has increased its military budget by at least 6.6 percent every year for the past three decades, which has been perceived as being aimed at preparing for the annexation of Taiwan and domination of the Western Pacific amid a growing rivalry with the US.
Despite its GDP growth rate of 3 percent last year, China not only increased its national defense budget, but also raised its public security budget, which is used to maintain public order, to 6.4 percent — its biggest increase in five years. China has also reportedly doubled its public security budget in 10 years, surpassing the defense budget.
Yasuhiro Matsuda, professor of international politics at the University of Tokyo’s Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, has said that these budget increases reveal China’s insecurity regarding international competition and domestic pressure. It is also a way for Xi to secure his leadership and divert domestic criticism of Beijing’s expansionist plans.
China has repeatedly said it wants to build a “world-class force” by 2047 to be the basis for Xi’s “Chinese Dream” and coincide with the 100th anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army. China’s ambitions and military assertiveness have led to speculation about an invasion of Taiwan and intensified disputes in the South China Sea, which are harmful to regional and international peace.
Taiwan increased its defense budget for this year to 2.4 percent of GDP. Taiwan is not aiming to compete with China’s military, but to focus on the development of the nation’s asymmetric combat capabilities for self-defense.
Beijing’s increases in military spending have resulted in more countries uniting against China. Taiwan should further develop this international counterforce to China’s military expansion to back it up in the event of an invasion.
Washington increased its military budget to US$773 billion for this year, and the Pentagon is reportedly asking for US$842 for next year, putting China at a distant second. The US has also passed bills, including the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2023, to grant Taiwan the same status as its major allies that are not members of NATO, such as Thailand and South Korea.
Japan raised its defense budget for this year to US$52 billion, and is seeking to increase it to 2 percent of GDP by 2027, which would give it the world’s third-largest defense budget. China’s launching of missiles into Japan’s territorial waters pushed Tokyo to bolster its military in line with former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe’s statement that a “Taiwan emergency is a Japanese emergency.”
Other international actors are also becoming more involved. The UK said it would permanently deploy two warships in Asia, and Germany sent a warship to the South China Sea for the first time in almost 20 years. After a record number of Chinese incursions in Phillipine waters, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr is granting the US greater military access to his country. These developments show that more countries are joining like-minded democratic nations to cooperate against the military threat posed by China.
No country should be engaged in an arms race, but to have peace, a nation must prepare for war. Russia’s setbacks in Ukraine should show China that any military invasion or blockade in the Taiwan Strait or elsewhere in Asia would definitely come at a huge cost.
When Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) sits down with US President Donald Trump in Beijing on Thursday next week, Xi is unlikely to demand a dramatic public betrayal of Taiwan. He does not need to. Beijing’s preferred victory is smaller, quieter and in some ways far more dangerous: a subtle shift in American wording that appears technical, but carries major strategic meaning. The ask is simple: replace the longstanding US formulation that Washington “does not support Taiwan independence” with a harder one — that Washington “opposes” Taiwan independence. One word changes; a deterrence structure built over decades begins to shift.
Recently, Taipei’s streets have been plagued by the bizarre sight of rats running rampant and the city government’s countermeasures have devolved into an anti-intellectual farce. The Taipei Parks and Street Lights Office has attempted to eradicate rats by filling their burrows with polyurethane foam, seeming to believe that rats could not simply dig another path out. Meanwhile, as the nation’s capital slowly deteriorates into a rat hive, the Taipei Department of Environmental Protection has proudly pointed to the increase in the number of poisoned rats reported in February and March as a sign of success. When confronted with public concerns over young
Taipei is facing a severe rat infestation, and the city government is reportedly considering large-scale use of rodenticides as its primary control measure. However, this move could trigger an ecological disaster, including mass deaths of birds of prey. In the past, black kites, relatives of eagles, took more than three decades to return to the skies above the Taipei Basin. Taiwan’s black kite population was nearly wiped out by the combined effects of habitat destruction, pesticides and rodenticides. By 1992, fewer than 200 black kites remained on the island. Fortunately, thanks to more than 30 years of collective effort to preserve their remaining
After Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) met Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in Beijing, most headlines referred to her as the leader of the opposition in Taiwan. Is she really, though? Being the chairwoman of the KMT does not automatically translate into being the leader of the opposition in the sense that most foreign readers would understand it. “Leader of the opposition” is a very British term. It applies to the Westminster system of parliamentary democracy, and to some extent, to other democracies. If you look at the UK right now, Conservative Party head Kemi Badenoch is
RSS