When US budget carrier Southwest Airlines last week announced a new partnership with China Airlines, Southwest’s social media were filled with comments from travelers excited by the new opportunity to visit China. Of course, China Airlines is not based in China, but in Taiwan, and the new partnership connects Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport with 30 cities across the US.
At a time when China is increasing efforts on all fronts to falsely label Taiwan as “China” in all arenas, Taiwan does itself no favors by having its flagship carrier named China Airlines.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is eager to jump at any slight mention of Taiwan in foreign legislative resolutions or UN speeches by so-called allies as successes in raising Taiwan’s visibility around the world, but 99 percent of people are more likely to encounter Taiwan through its national airline, particularly when transiting Taoyuan airport, a major Asian travel hub.
It makes no sense to tell people that the national airline is from China, while at the same time claiming that UN Resolution 2758 has nothing to do with Taiwan.
Flying to Taiwan on China Airlines gives travelers the impression that Taiwan is part of China, or seeking to represent a singular China. When the carrier makes global news for its superb service or appears on airport signage viewed by millions of travelers, it in effect erases Taiwan from the world consciousness and replaces it with China.
During the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic — which originated in Wuhan, China — many European countries believed that Taiwanese medical aid was actually coming from China due to arriving on China Airlines cargo jets. Italy even went as far as to ban China Airlines and EVA Airways because authorities believed they were Chinese airlines.
In response to the latter incidents, Taiwan’s legislature passed a bill in 2020 to consider renaming the airline, but no action was taken because of fears that renaming it “Taiwan Airlines” would cause the carrier to lose access to Chinese or other Asian destinations, as China Airlines’ cargo planes with Taiwan-themed livery did.
That was a poorly thought-out decision. The Ministry of Transportation and Communications — led then by the bumbling Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍), now minister of foreign affairs — prioritized short-term profits for the national airline, while mortgaging Taiwan’s international visibility, and ultimately its national security.
China has long objected to any mentions of Taiwan on airplanes as part of its global campaign to erase Taiwan from the global consciousness, notably interfering in 2003 to pressure foreign airports to block access to a China Airlines plane with “Taiwan” in bold letters on the fuselage as part of the “Taiwan: Touch Your Heart” tourism campaign.
China Airlines immediately caved and the plane was repainted before it left Boeing’s facilities in Washington. I have long kept a rare model of that plane, ironically manufactured in China, on my desk to remind me of the possibilities for Taiwan to assert itself on the global stage.
China’s campaign against Taiwanese airlines is illogical, and Taiwan should not surrender to its bullying. In the Chinese view, Taiwan is a province of China, and thus cannot have its own airline.
That has not stopped Sichuan Airlines, Shandong Airlines, Hainan Airlines and even Tibet Airlines. China has even launched Genghis Khan Airlines, despite that Genghis Khan was Mongolian, not Chinese, to apparently no objection of the Mongolian government.
If China denies China Airlines permission to fly to China and Hong Kong, then so be it. Taiwan can similarly restrict Chinese flights to Taiwan, and it would only benefit Taiwan to increase its links with friendly countries rather than adversaries.
It is shocking that there are no direct flights between Taiwan and India when the two countries are increasing economic and security ties, facing the same revanchist enemy. Taiwan even lacks direct flights with the US capital, Washington, and underutilizes Taipei’s downtown Taipei International Airport (Songshan airport) for international flights, most of which now go to China.
It is true that a Taiwan Airlines might also face pushback from countries with stricter “one China” policies, seeking to avoid controversy. However, Taiwan Airlines is not the only option, the most elegant solution would simply be to use the name Chunghwa (中華), which is already the name in Chinese and the name in English for many Taiwanese state-owned enterprises such as Chunghwa Telecom.
Mandarin speakers would point out that Chunghwa more or less means “China,” but that is missing the point entirely — as a Mandarin speaker most likely already has an opinion on the cross-strait dispute, and the name of the airline would not influence a Chinese or Taiwanese who already has made up their mind.
By not changing the Chinese name of the airline at all, it would be hard for China to object.
With a foreign name essentially meaningless to most of the world, it would simply communicate that the carrier is an Asian airline, and leave space for passengers to see that it is a Taiwanese company, avoiding confusion with Beijing’s Air China.
Many major international flag carriers such as Etihad Airways, Deutsche Lufthansa and Aeroflot use non-English or ambiguous names, yet no one has any doubt that they are the flag carriers of the United Arab Emirates, Germany and Russia, and all have extremely effective global branding.
Freeing the name from “China” would allow the new Chunghwa Airlines to engage in international branding campaigns that make it clear it is Taiwanese, just as EVA and Starlux Airlines have done.
If Taiwan truly wants to be seen on the map, it must spread its wings and fly.
Sasha B. Chhabra is a visiting fellow at the Institute for National Defense and Security Research in Taipei.
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