Taiwanese academics yesterday said that US military actions in Venezuela and Iran have strengthened Washington’s hand ahead of US President Donald Trump’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), but their interpretations on the implications for Taiwan differed.
“The US recently struck Venezuela and Iran... Cuba is now at risk, and Washington is also tightening its control over Panama,” National Taiwan University emeritus professor of political science Ming Chu-cheng (明居正) told a forum in Taipei.
The forum, hosted by the Institute for National Policy Research, was held while the Chinese National People’s Congress and Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference were in session and before Trump’s planned state visit to China slated for March 31 to April 2.
Photo: AFP
Venezuela and Iran are Beijing-backed, oil-producing countries, while Cuba, also friendly to China, and Panama (where Hong Kong-linked port operations exist) have come under increased US pressure in the past few months.
Such developments are “more favorable to the US and highly unfavorable to the Chinese Communist Party,” Ming said, adding that they had “significantly changed” the leverage each side has ahead of their planned meeting.
With China’s major ally Russia mired in its war in Ukraine, any support Moscow can offer Beijing is likely to be “very limited,” Ming said, adding that Beijing has “far fewer cards to play” in what he described as a “broader strategic confrontation” between the US and China.
Academia Sinica Institute of Political Science assistant research fellow Ronan Fu (傅澤民) said a “recalibration” was needed when assessing US-China relations, especially after developments in the Middle East.
China buys about 90 percent of Iran’s oil exports — which accounted for about 13 percent of China’s seaborne crude imports last year, according to Reuters — and the US’ aerial campaign targeting Iran shows that Washington understands how “vulnerable” China is on the energy front, Fu said.
“The implication is very clear: The Iran war can in effect be seen as a form of US pressure on China,” Fu said.
The two academics had slightly different views on how the edge they felt the US had going into the Trump-Xi meeting would affect Taiwan.
Former American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) chairman Richard Bush has said that Xi could ask Trump during his visit to Beijing to announce that the US “opposes Taiwanese independence.”
Such a statement would mark a subtle but important shift from the current US policy, which is that Washington “does not support” Taiwanese independence.
Ming said it is “unlikely” that Trump would agree to any change in Washington’s wording on Taiwanese independence, because he has the “upper hand.”
Such a change would be a “major concession,” he said, adding that Trump holds more leverage than Xi and therefore has little incentive to compromise.
It is “not entirely impossible” that Trump could make such a statement, Fu said.
However, the US position on cross-strait relations remains “very clear” in opposing any “unilateral change of the status quo,” he added.
Any shift in wording would be akin to propaganda aimed at the Chinese public and would not carry “substantive meaning,” he said, urging observers to focus instead on whether Washington’s core policy stance has changed.
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