The US won't come to Taiwan's aid should China attack the country for making a unilateral declaration of independence, US Senator Joseph Biden said on Monday.
Speaking to the National Press Club in Washington, Biden warned both sides of the Strait to refrain from "reckless action."
The US politician, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, visited Taiwan early last month and met with President Chen Shui-bian (
During that trip, Biden said the Taiwan Relations Act remained the key document governing America's commitments to Taiwan -- remarks widely seen as an attempt to counter a promise by US President George W. Bush that America would do "whatever it took" to defend the country.
Biden in his speech argued for the retention of what he called the "studied ambiguity'' of the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act, whereby the US would remain ambiguous on whether it would help Taiwan repel a Chinese attack.
That act, he said, told Taiwan "you are no longer an independent country. You are no longer an independent nation-state. We've agreed that you are going to be part of China and that you will work it out."
Biden also punctuated his comments with a clear warning: "So don't go declaring independence, because we are not willing to go to war over your unilateral declaration of independence."
President Chen has said there is no need to declare independence, as the country is already sovereign and the master of its own affairs.
Biden said the ambiguous wording of the Taiwan Relations Act leaves unanswered the question of whether the US would defend Taiwan, "so we don't encourage reckless action on either side."
"Depending on how each of the parties behaves," he said, "we reserve the right, as we do in every circumstance, to use American forces. ... It will depend upon the circumstances. That's how it's been for seven presidents. That's how it should remain."
The US senator also warned China, saying that the Taiwan Relations Act also lets Beijing know that "if the mainland attempts to [unify with Taiwan] by force and not dialogue, then the United States will provide the military means in terms of material to prevent that from happening."
Biden said that America's "one China" policy rests on cross-strait dialogue, "where the parties mutually arrive at how unification will take place."
Turning his attention to US military spending, Biden said US resources would be better spent helping Taiwan to improve its defenses rather pursuing a multi-billion-dollar national missile defense system.
The senator outlined a number of alternative ways money could be spent -- in particular drawing attention to the condition of plumbing systems at Taiwan's military installations.
"While we're at it, we may fix the plumbing in the barracks at Taipei, which I just visited ... they had to bring in water hoses from outside to allow the women and men in there to be able to shave, to be able to use the bathroom, let alone drink any water," he said.
Biden's comments -- the first since he visited Taiwan -- dealt mainly with his opposition to Bush's missile defense plan.
He warned that the defense shield could spark an arms race, with China, India, Pakistan and other countries boosting their nuclear missile capabilities in response.
US PUBLICATION: The results indicated a change in attitude after a 2023 survey showed 55 percent supported full-scale war to achieve unification, the report said More than half of Chinese were against the use of force to unify with Taiwan under any circumstances, a survey conducted by the Atlanta, Georgia-based Carter Center and Emory University found. The survey results, which were released on Wednesday in a report titled “Sovereignty, Security, & US-China Relations: Chinese Public Opinion,” showed that 55.1 percent of respondents agreed or somewhat agreed that “the Taiwan problem should not be resolved using force under any circumstances,” while 24.5 percent “strongly” or “somewhat” disagreed with the statement. The results indicated a change in attitude after a survey published in “Assessing Public Support for (Non)Peaceful Unification
The CIA has a message for Chinese government officials worried about their place in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government: Come work with us. The agency released two Mandarin-language videos on social media on Thursday inviting disgruntled officials to contact the CIA. The recruitment videos posted on YouTube and X racked up more than 5 million views combined in their first day. The outreach comes as CIA Director John Ratcliffe has vowed to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China, which has recently targeted US officials with its own espionage operations. The videos are “aimed at
‘MISGUIDED EDICT’: Two US representatives warned that Somalia’s passport move could result in severe retaliatory consequences and urged it to reverse its decision Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) has ordered that a special project be launched to counter China’s “legal warfare” distorting UN Resolution 2758, a foreign affairs official said yesterday. Somalia’s Civil Aviation Authority on Wednesday cited UN Resolution 2758 and Mogadishu’s compliance with the “one China” principle as it banned people from entering or transiting in the African nation using Taiwanese passports or other Taiwanese travel documents. The International Air Transport Association’s system shows that Taiwanese passport holders cannot enter Somalia or transit there. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) protested the move and warned Taiwanese against traveling to Somalia or Somaliland
SECURITY: Grassroots civil servants would only need to disclose their travel, while those who have access to classified information would be subject to stricter regulations The government is considering requiring legislators and elected officials to obtain prior approval before traveling to China to prevent Chinese infiltration, an official familiar with national security said yesterday. President William Lai (賴清德) in March announced 17 measures to counter China’s growing infiltration efforts, including requiring all civil servants to make trips to China more transparent so they can be held publicly accountable. The official said that the government is considering amending the Act Governing Relations Between the People of the Taiwan Area and Mainland Area (臺灣地區與大陸地區人民關係條例) to require all civil servants to follow strict regulations before traveling to China.
RSS