China’s increased bullying of Taiwan is boosting global support for the nation, former US deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage said.
“The more China bullies Taiwan, the more international support comes to Taiwan,” Armitage said in an interview with Voice of America on Wednesday last week.
Armitage recently visited Taiwan, during which he attended the inauguration of President William Lai (賴清德) and Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) and brought a message of bipartisan US support for Lai.
Photo courtesy of the Presidential Office
Asked how he interpreted China’s drills near Taiwan following Lai’s inauguration speech, Armitage said they were expected.
“Lai said: ‘We are open for dialogue on the basis of mutual respect and dignity,’ thereby putting Taiwan on the high road. And I think China was not expecting it,” he said.
Armitage described Taiwan’s geographic position as the “tyranny of proximity,” and said that despite China’s efforts at coercion and intimidation, more countries around the world are speaking up for Taiwan.
On the issue of defense, Armitage said that Taiwan should learn from Ukraine’s defense against Russia’s invasion by incorporating unconventional asymmetrical methods of warfare, including greater use of drones and air defense systems.
Taiwan must also increase military recruitment, which is at 80 percent, he added.
Commenting on how this could be done, Armitage said women should be encouraged to enroll and that more should be done to improve the image of military service.
“More and more Taiwan citizens have to be able to respect those who choose to serve for the defense of Taiwan,” he said.
Taiwan is also not facing the China threat alone, Armitage said.
“People who were not very interested historically, in security terms, in the Taiwan Strait have all of a sudden become very interested,” he said. “Canadians, French, Germans, British and always the US, we’re all patrolling around the area. It’s been brought about by China.”
Asked what security conflict was of the greatest importance to the US, Armitage said that while the US was heavily invested in the defense of Ukraine at the moment, Washington always keeps a global perspective.
“If you remember in 1950, our secretary of state famously said that Korea was outside the defense perimeter of the US. And what happened? Several months later, North Korea invaded,” he said. “So, I would say it’s bad business to try to put anything in an order.”
As for whether tensions in the Taiwan Strait would worsen under Lai, Armitage said that although Beijing has labeled Lai a “separatist,” many security officials in his administration were kept on from Tsai’s government — which would calm Beijing’s concerns.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) yesterday reported the first case of a new COVID-19 subvariant — BA.3.2 — in a 10-year-old Singaporean girl who had a fever upon arrival in Taiwan and tested positive for the disease. The girl left Taiwan on March 20 and the case did not have a direct impact on the local community, it said. The WHO added the BA.3.2 strain to its list of Variants Under Monitoring in December last year, but this was the first imported case of the COVID-19 variant in Taiwan, CDC Deputy Director-General Lin Ming-cheng (林明誠) said. The girl arrived in Taiwan on
South Korea is planning to revise its controversial electronic arrival card, a step Taiwanese officials said prompted them to hold off on planned retaliatory measures, a South Korean media report said yesterday. A Yonhap News Agency report said that the South Korean Ministry of Foreign Affairs is planning to remove the “previous departure place” and “next destination” fields from its e-arrival card system. The plan, reached after interagency consultations, is under review and aims to simplify entry procedures and align the electronic form with the paper version, a South Korean ministry official said. The fields — which appeared only on the electronic form
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is suspending retaliation measures against South Korea that were set to take effect tomorrow, after Seoul said it is updating its e-arrival system, MOFA said today. The measures were to be a new round of retaliation after Taiwan on March 1 changed South Korea's designation on government-issued alien resident certificates held by South Korean nationals to "South Korea” from the "Republic of Korea," the country’s official name. The move came after months of protests to Seoul over its listing of Taiwan as "China (Taiwan)" in dropdown menus on its new online immigration entry system. MOFA last week
A bipartisan group of US senators has introduced a bill to enhance cooperation with Taiwan on drone development and to reduce reliance on supply chains linked to China. The proposed Blue Skies for Taiwan Act of 2026 was introduced by Republican US senators Ted Cruz and John Curtis, and Democratic US senators Jeff Merkley and Andy Kim. The legislation seeks to ease constraints on Taiwan-US cooperation in uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), including dependence on China-sourced components, limited access to capital and regulatory barriers under US export controls, a news release issued by Cruz on Wednesday said. The bill would establish a "Blue UAS
RSS