Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) recently said that NT$41.5 billion (US$1.31 billion) in diplomatic funding has been stalled, affecting many of Taiwan’s diplomatic initiatives.
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) has deliberately attempted to sabotage those efforts to prevent Taiwan’s diplomatic expansion, he said.
However, that line of thinking is flawed. Diplomacy is not the issue. Instead, the government must prioritize a goals-oriented approach, rather than repeating vague claims of “continued efforts” — a model that has persisted for three decades since the administration of former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝), yet has no tangible progress to show for it.
That is because Taiwan lacks initiative and strategy. Whether to establish diplomatic relations with Taiwan, sign a free-trade agreement or station troops here are ultimately decisions to be made by US President Donald Trump and the US Congress. In other words, if even the quasi-official Taiwan-US relationship is subject to such constraints, Taiwan’s prospects with other countries are even less optimistic.
If half of that NT$41.5 billion were allocated to the Overseas Community Affairs Council, the benefits would likely outweigh those of formal diplomacy. Although Taiwan’s international status is relatively low, the Republic of China’s (ROC) visibility would be higher in the eyes of overseas communities. Compared with the complex diplomatic considerations of countries such as the US, Japan and South Korea, hometown associations and immigrant communities in the US — regardless of which flag they display — ultimately align with either Taiwan or China. Thus, increasing the ROC’s visibility among those communities would naturally bolster its voice and overall influence overseas.
The council could work through Chinese and Taiwanese-style restaurants willing to operate as intermediaries in the US to win over hometown associations that fly the Chinese flag, enlisting them to influence the Republican Party and mobilize pro-ROC groups in the US. If Taiwan fails to even persuade or convert pro-Beijing overseas communities and associations, initiating Taiwan-US diplomatic recognition talks with Trump, or even with figures such as US Vice President J.D. Vance or US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, would be virtually impossible.
The primary reason for relying on restaurants is their strong cultural recognizability. Pro-Beijing overseas groups and hometown associations are eager to gain access to the Republican Party. Taiwan would not even need to persuade them to fly the ROC flag — instead, it could leverage their “united front” resources. If such channels could assist Taiwan in reaching figures it has thus far struggled to engage with — such as Trump and the “make America great again” camp — the impact on China would not only be damaging, but also deeply humiliating.
There is another advantage to this approach. Amid the US’ broader shift to the right, pro-Beijing overseas communities are themselves eager to engage in “united front” work targeting the Republican Party. If, more than two years from now, the Democratic Party were to return to power, Taiwan would not have offended anyone because it would not have bet exclusively on either side. That would be far more practical and likely to yield tangible progress than diplomatic practices such as op-eds, advertisements that sell curated stories, congressional exchanges, informal “track II” engagement with think tanks, or even holding concerts.
Wang Wen-sheng is a doctoral student at Jindal University in India.
Translated by Kyra Gustavsen
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