Although Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) did not mention Taiwan in his high-profile meeting with US President Donald Trump last week, Taiwan should keep its eyes peeled for a new wave of “united front” operations to co-opt pro-China forces to promote “peaceful unification” across the Taiwan Strait.
After the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) on Oct. 19 elected Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) as its new chairwoman, who has gone from once advocating independence to leaning toward China, Xi — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) general secretary — sent his congratulations and expressed his expectation that the two parties would cooperate more to adhere to the so-called “1992 consensus.”
On Oct. 25, a date China distorts as a “commemoration of Taiwan’s retrocession,” Wang Huning (王滬寧), the CCP’s fourth-ranked leader and Beijing’s top official in charge of Taiwan policy, reiterated that China would communicate with Taiwan’s pro-China forces to promote “one country, two systems” and “peaceful unification.”
China’s state-run Xinhua news agency from Sunday to Tuesday last week published three opinion pieces calling “unification with China” the only solution for Taiwan and mapping out how “patriots could rule Taiwan after reunification” to guarantee “Taiwan’s existing social system and way of life would be respected.”
The Chinese authorities and their mouthpiece have intensified their “united front” tactics to incorporate pro-China politicians and parties in Taiwan to promote cross-strait unification under the veil of the “1992 consensus” and the “one China” ideology. Such work has increased since the KMT allied with the Taiwan People’s Party to gain a legislative majority and will continue to increase after Cheng’s win.
China surely has high expectations that the KMT would return to power under Cheng’s leadership and contribute to “peaceful unification.”
That would save China from needing to use force, likely with catastrophic results, as Trump has said that Beijing would not take military action against Taiwan during his presidency because “the Chinese leaders know the consequences.”
China’s “one country, two systems” has proved a failure in Hong Kong. Its promise of autonomy has been replaced with a “patriots-only” rule system — meaning only people deemed loyal to the CCP can hold public office — and the 2020 National Security Law, ensuring Beijing’s control over the territory. The result is the rapid erosion of Hong Kong’s autonomy, democracy, freedom and human rights.
Meanwhile, polls consistently show that Taiwanese reject Beijing’s “one country, two systems” and “one China” principle.
However, Cheng and her team are apparently making efforts to meet China’s expectations. Aside from saying; “I am Chinese” and “I will make all Taiwanese proud to be Chinese,” Cheng said that Russian President Vladimir Putin is “not a dictator,” a specious argument widely seen as making excuses for a possible invasion of Taiwan ordered by Xi.
Velina Tchakarova, a Vienna-based geopolitical strategist, warned of a “cognitive shift within parts of Taiwan’s political spectrum that fits precisely into China’s ‘death by a thousand cuts’ approach toward Taiwan.”
Cheng has objected to defense budget increases and sent KMT Vice Chairman Hsiao Hsu-tsen (蕭旭成) to meet with the head of China’s Taiwan Affairs Office to set up a possible Cheng-Xi meeting. Hsiao told the Chinese side that the KMT firmly opposes Taiwanese independence and supports cross-strait unification.
China has found its “patriots” in Taiwan. Taiwanese must remain vigilant.
Donald Trump’s return to the White House has offered Taiwan a paradoxical mix of reassurance and risk. Trump’s visceral hostility toward China could reinforce deterrence in the Taiwan Strait. Yet his disdain for alliances and penchant for transactional bargaining threaten to erode what Taiwan needs most: a reliable US commitment. Taiwan’s security depends less on US power than on US reliability, but Trump is undermining the latter. Deterrence without credibility is a hollow shield. Trump’s China policy in his second term has oscillated wildly between confrontation and conciliation. One day, he threatens Beijing with “massive” tariffs and calls China America’s “greatest geopolitical
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) made the astonishing assertion during an interview with Germany’s Deutsche Welle, published on Friday last week, that Russian President Vladimir Putin is not a dictator. She also essentially absolved Putin of blame for initiating the war in Ukraine. Commentators have since listed the reasons that Cheng’s assertion was not only absurd, but bordered on dangerous. Her claim is certainly absurd to the extent that there is no need to discuss the substance of it: It would be far more useful to assess what drove her to make the point and stick so
The central bank has launched a redesign of the New Taiwan dollar banknotes, prompting questions from Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) legislators — “Are we not promoting digital payments? Why spend NT$5 billion on a redesign?” Many assume that cash will disappear in the digital age, but they forget that it represents the ultimate trust in the system. Banknotes do not become obsolete, they do not crash, they cannot be frozen and they leave no record of transactions. They remain the cleanest means of exchange in a free society. In a fully digitized world, every purchase, donation and action leaves behind data.
A large majority of Taiwanese favor strengthening national defense and oppose unification with China, according to the results of a survey by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC). In the poll, 81.8 percent of respondents disagreed with Beijing’s claim that “there is only one China and Taiwan is part of China,” MAC Deputy Minister Liang Wen-chieh (梁文傑) told a news conference on Thursday last week, adding that about 75 percent supported the creation of a “T-Dome” air defense system. President William Lai (賴清德) referred to such a system in his Double Ten National Day address, saying it would integrate air defenses into a
RSS