China’s latest military drills around Taiwan have not changed the US’ assessment that Beijing would not try to seize Taiwan militarily in the next two years, US Undersecretary of Defense Colin Kahl told a news conference at the Pentagon on Monday.
Beijing launched the drills on Thursday in response to US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan earlier last week, raising concerns that it is taking a more aggressive posture in the Taiwan Strait.
In June, US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Mark Milley said there was a low probability of China taking over Taiwan militarily in the immediate and near term.
Photo: AP
Reporters on Monday asked Kahl whether the latest drills have led the US to change the assessment, to which he responded: “No.”
“Nothing that’s happened was unanticipated,” Kahl said of China’s reaction, which he described as “completely unnecessary” and a “manufactured crisis.”
“Nothing about the visit changed one iota of the US government’s policy toward Taiwan or toward China. We continue to have a ‘one China’ policy, and we continue to object to any unilateral change in the status quo, whether that be from the PRC [People’s Republic of China] or from Taiwan,” Kahl said.
However, the escalation by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army signals Beijing’s attempt to “salami slice to a new status quo,” Kahl said, but added that the US would not “play into that.”
“Clearly the PRC is trying to coerce Taiwan, clearly they’re trying to coerce the international community, and all I’ll say is we’re not going to take the bait and it’s not going to work,” he said.
The US would “continue to fly, to sail and to operate wherever international law allows us to do so, and that includes in the Taiwan Strait,” he said.
US President Joe Biden spoke about the issue for the first time since Pelosi’s visit.
“I’m concerned they are moving as much as they are,” Biden told reporters at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, referring to China. “But I don’t think they’re going to do anything more than they are.”
Speaking in a TV broadcast yesterday, Pelosi said her trip was “absolutely” worth it.
“We cannot allow the Chinese government to isolate Taiwan,” Pelosi said in an interview with NBC’s Today. “They’re not going to say who can go to Taiwan.”
Additional reporting by Reuters
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