{"id":74265,"date":"2022-08-03T12:00:42","date_gmt":"2022-08-03T02:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=74265"},"modified":"2022-08-03T12:37:22","modified_gmt":"2022-08-03T02:37:22","slug":"pelosis-visit-and-the-coming-taiwan-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/pelosis-visit-and-the-coming-taiwan-crisis\/","title":{"rendered":"Pelosi\u2019s visit and the coming Taiwan crisis"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n

US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi\u2019s arrival in Taiwan has incited a predictably strong response from China. Chinese warplanes have brushed up against<\/a> the median line dividing the Taiwan Strait. The Chinese foreign ministry has warned<\/a> of \u2018serious consequences\u2019 as a result of Pelosi\u2019s visit to the island. Chinese President Xi Jinping has told<\/a> US President Joe Biden that \u2018those who play with fire will perish by it\u2019. And now, China has announced<\/a> a major military exercise with live-fire drills starting tomorrow (just after Pelosi leaves Taiwan). The spectre of military confrontation looms large.<\/p>\n

But Pelosi is hardly responsible for today\u2019s heightened tensions over the island. Even if she had decided to skip Taipei on her tour of Asia, China\u2019s bellicosity toward Taiwan would have continued to intensify, possibly triggering another Taiwan Strait crisis in the near future.<\/p>\n

Contrary to the prevailing narrative, this is not primarily because Xi is committed to reunifying Taiwan during his rule. Although reunification is indeed one of his long-term objectives (it would be a crowning achievement for both him and the Chinese Communist Party more broadly), any attempt to achieve it by force would be extremely costly. It might even carry existential risks for the CCP regime, the survival of which would be jeopardised by a failed military campaign.<\/p>\n

For a Chinese invasion of Taiwan to have a good chance of succeeding, China would need first to insulate its economy from Western sanctions and acquire military capabilities that can credibly deter an American intervention. Each of these processes would take at least a decade.<\/p>\n

The main reasons for China\u2019s current sabre-rattling over Taiwan are more immediate. Chinese authorities are signalling to Taiwanese leaders and their supporters in the West that their relations with one another and with China are on an unacceptable trajectory. The implication is that if they do not change course, China will have no choice but to escalate.<\/p>\n

Until relatively recently, China\u2019s leaders viewed the situation in the Taiwan Strait as unsatisfactory but tolerable. When Taiwan was ruled by the traditionally China-friendly Kuomintang (KMT) party, China was able to pursue a gradual strategy of economic integration, diplomatic isolation and military pressure\u2014one that it believed would eventually make peaceful reunification Taiwan\u2019s only option.<\/p>\n

But in January 2016, the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party returned to power in Taiwan, upending China\u2019s plans. While the KMT claims<\/a> that Taiwan and China have different interpretations of the 1992 Consensus\u2014the agreement the party reached with mainland Chinese authorities 30 years ago asserting the existence of \u2018one China\u2019\u2014the DPP rejects it altogether.<\/p>\n

Though it is difficult to pinpoint precisely when the new status quo became intolerable to China, a key turning point probably came in January 2020, when Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen of the DPP easily won a second term, and when her party trounced the KMT in legislative elections. As the DPP solidified its political dominance, China\u2019s dream of achieving peaceful reunification moved further out of reach.<\/p>\n

It also did not help that the United States had been gradually shifting its Taiwan policy. Under Donald Trump\u2019s administration, the US lifted restrictions<\/a> on contacts between US officials and their Taiwanese counterparts, subtly changed the formulation of its \u2018one-China\u2019 policy by placing more emphasis on American commitments to Taiwan, and transferred<\/a> advanced weapons systems to the island. Such challenges to China have continued under Biden. Last year, US marines openly trained<\/a> with Taiwan\u2019s military. And in May, Biden signalled<\/a> that the US would intervene militarily if China attacked Taiwan (although the White House quickly walked back his statement).<\/p>\n

The Ukraine war also seems to have heightened the sense among Western leaders that Taiwan is in grave and immediate danger. They appear to believe that only robust and vocal support, including high-level visits and military assistance, can avert a Chinese attack. What they fail to recognise is that, viewed from Beijing, their support for Taiwan looks more like an attempt to humiliate China than anything else. It is thus more provocation than deterrent.<\/p>\n

China now fears that if DPP leaders and their Western supporters do not pay a price for their affronts, it will lose its grip on the situation. This would not only undermine Xi\u2019s chance of achieving his long-term goal of reunification, it also could invite accusations of weakness that would undermine his standing both within and outside China.<\/p>\n

China is probably not planning to launch an immediate and deliberate attack on Taiwan. But it may decide to engage the US in a game of chicken in the Taiwan Strait. It is impossible to predict such a confrontation\u2019s exact form or timing. But it is safe to assume that it would be extremely dangerous, because China believes that only brinkmanship can concentrate all the players\u2019 minds.<\/p>\n

Like the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, a new Taiwan Strait crisis might end up stabilising the status quo\u2014albeit after a few hair-raising days. And that may well be China\u2019s plan. But such a gambit could also go horribly wrong. We mustn\u2019t forget that the fact nuclear war did not break out in 1962 was largely a matter of luck.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi\u2019s arrival in Taiwan has incited a predictably strong response from China. Chinese warplanes have brushed up against the median line dividing the Taiwan Strait. 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