The US wants to be a partner of Taiwan and help it succeed, former acting US secretary of the army John Whitley said in a media interview on Thursday.
Whitley, a senior fellow at the US-based think tank Institute for Defense Analyses, spoke to reporters in Taipei after presenting a speech, “An Economist Goes to the Army,” at National Taiwan University.
The economist-turned-military official is visiting Taiwan for the first time at the invitation of the university’s Department of Economics.
Photo courtesy of the Taiwan Academy of Banking and Finance
Visiting Taiwan has provided him with valuable first-hand knowledge about the situation “on the ground,” which he can provide to the US government, Whitley said.
“The US wants to be a partner here. The US wants to help Taiwan succeed,” he said, but added that there are not many experts on Taiwan in the US.
A trip like this can help the US assess its strategy and impact in Taiwan, and adjust them accordingly “to be helpful,” he said.
Very few US officials have visited Taiwan and only have “a sense” of how the Taiwanese government operates, its defense budget allocation process and military training, he said.
“But until you’re actually here and you actually talk to the people doing that, you actually see it, you really don’t know,” he added.
The US “is going through an evolution” regarding its policy toward China compared with 25 years ago, he said.
At the time, the dominant view in the US was the best way to make China a responsible global citizen was to closely engage with it economically, Whitley said.
“The US has now come to the conclusion that that was wrong and that that did not work,” he said.
The US “encapsulated that lesson learned in the 2018 National Defense Strategy,” a new course of plans formed after recognizing China’s increased aggressiveness, he said.
Asked whether the US would be willing to come to Taiwan’s aid in the event of a Chinese invasion, Whitley said how Taiwan and the US would react to such an event is unknowable until it actually occurs.
“What I can tell you is that the US military ... they are working very hard right now so that they can, if they are directed, provide support,” he said.
However, the West’s experience from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine serves as a warning, he said.
Although US intelligence had served notice that a Russian military buildup would likely lead to an invasion, only minor sanctions were imposed on Moscow, he said.
The US wants to help, but the commission of military requires domestic political decisionmaking and coordination with allies and partners, he said.
“Taiwanese have to have a clear-eyed realization about what a timeline might actually look like” and plan accordingly, he said, adding that the Taiwanese forces “got to be able to last.”
He reiterated the stance he took at a panel discussion at the Atlantic Council last month, when he urged the US to learn from the invasion of Ukraine and consider how it could help Taiwan hold on until the US and its allies arrive after overcoming logistical challenges.
Hopefully, cross-strait tensions can be resolved without military aggression, but no one knows how to make the Chinese government become a better global citizen to achieve that, he said.
The US does not want “war in any way, shape or form, which everybody’s going to lose in that situation,” he said.
To deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, “economic sanctions always have been and always will be a tool,” along with military preparedness and diplomacy, he said.
However, the key lies in how Taiwan, Japan, the US and other partners “work together to combine all instruments of power to achieve a peaceful resolution and de-escalation of tensions,” he said.
ANOTHER EMERGES: The CWA yesterday said this year’s fourth storm of the typhoon season had formed in the South China Sea, but was not expected to affect Taiwan Tropical Storm Gaemi has intensified slightly as it heads toward Taiwan, where it is expected to affect the country in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 8am yesterday, the 120km-radius storm was 800km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost tip, moving at 9kph northwest, the agency said. A sea warning for Gaemi could be issued tonight at the earliest, it said, adding that the storm is projected to be closest to Taiwan on Wednesday or Thursday. Gaemi’s potential effect on Taiwan remains unclear, as that would depend on its direction, radius and intensity, forecasters said. Former Weather Forecast
As COVID-19 cases in Japan have been increasing for 10 consecutive weeks, people should get vaccinated before visiting the nation, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said. The centers reported 773 hospitalizations and 124 deaths related to COVID-19 in Taiwan last week. CDC Epidemic Intelligence Center Director Guo Hung-wei (郭宏偉) on Tuesday said the number of weekly COVID-19 cases reported in Japan has been increasing since mid-May and surpassed 55,000 cases from July 8 to July 14. The average number of COVID-19 patients at Japan’s healthcare facilities that week was also 1.39 times that of the week before and KP.3 is the dominant
The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) working group for Taiwan-related policies is likely to be upgraded to a committee-level body, a report commissioned by the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said. As Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is increasingly likely to upgrade the CCP’s Central Leading Group for Taiwan Affairs, Taiwanese authorities should prepare by researching Xi and the CCP, the report said. At the third plenary session of the 20th Central Committee of the CCP, which ended on Thursday last week, the party set a target of 2029 for the completion of some tasks, meaning that Xi is likely preparing to
US-CHINA TRADE DISPUTE: Despite Beijing’s offer of preferential treatment, the lure of China has dimmed as Taiwanese and international investors move out Japan and the US have become the favored destinations for Taiwanese graduates as China’s attraction has waned over the years, the Ministry of Labor said. According to the ministry’s latest income and employment advisory published this month, 3,215 Taiwanese university graduates from the class of 2020 went to Japan, surpassing for the first time the 2,881 graduates who went to China. A total of 2,300 graduates from the class of 2021 went to the US, compared with the 2,262 who went to China, the document showed. The trend continued for the class of 2023, of whom 1,460 went to Japan, 1,334 went to