U.S. DEFENSE SECRETARY Lloyd Austin blasted China’s “growing coercion” towards Taiwan at the Shangri-La Dialogue security summit held last June 10-12 in Singapore. Convened by the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), the Shangri-La Dialogue is Asia’s premier security summit. A unique annual event, it allows heads of state, ministers and other senior figures from global defense and security establishments to meet in person in Singapore to discuss the region’s most pressing security challenges. It features plenary debates led by government ministers, as well as important opportunities for bilateral discussions among delegations.
Launched in 2002, the Shangri-La Dialogue has attracted top-level military officials, diplomats, experts, commentators and defense-industry executives from across the world. The summit did not take place in 2020 and 2021 due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The 2022 Shangri-La Dialogue is the 19th Security Summit. Military officials and diplomats attend it from more than 40 countries.
James Crabtree, Executive Director at IISS–Asia, said: “The IISS continues to believe in the role of face-to-face diplomacy to solve global problems. At a time of ever-rising interest in Asian security affairs.” Indeed, it has become the main platform for geopolitical issues such as the Taiwan issue that has taken center stage in this year’s Shangri-La Dialogue.
US-China rivalry
In a face-to-face exchange between Austin and China’s Defense Minister, Wei Fenghe, Wei warned Austin that Beijing will “not hesitate to start a war” if Taiwan declares independence. Beijing has always treated Taiwan as its territory and has vowed to one day seize the island, by force if necessary, which has caused tensions to soar in recent months. To be more precise, Wei warned Austin “if anyone dares to split Taiwan from China, the Chinese army will definitely not hesitate to start a war no matter the cost.”
Wei vowed that Beijing would “smash to smithereens” any ‘Taiwan independence’ plot” and resolutely uphold the unification of the motherland. He “stressed that Taiwan is China’s Taiwan… Using Taiwan to contain China will never prevail,” he said.
Adding more tension to the issue, US President Joe Biden, during a visit to Japan last month, appeared to break decades of US policy when, in response to a question, he said Washington would defend Taiwan militarily if it is attacked by China. Whoa! Coming from Biden himself, it increased the tension tenfold. The US has used its policy of “strategic ambiguity” before; that is, never say whether or not the US would intervene if China invades Taiwan. In other words, keep Beijing guessing. However, the US has always been resolute on the provisions of the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979, “which maintains commercial, cultural, and other relations through the unofficial relations in the form of a nonprofit corporation under the laws of the District of Columbia—the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT)—without official government representation and without formal diplomatic relations.”
The Taiwan Relations Act authorizes de facto diplomatic relations with the governing authorities by giving special powers to the AIT to the level that it is the de facto embassy, and states that any international agreements made between the Republic of China (ROC/Taiwan) and U.S. before 1979 are still valid unless otherwise terminated. One agreement that was unilaterally terminated by President Jimmy Carter upon the establishment of relations with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) was the Sino-American Mutual Defense Treaty.
Strategic ambiguity
While the Taiwan Relations Act does not guarantee the U.S. will intervene militarily if China attacks or invades Taiwan nor does it relinquish it, its primary purpose is to ensure the US’s Taiwan policy will not be changed unilaterally by the president and ensure that any decision to defend Taiwan will be made with the consent of Congress. The Act also states that “the United States will make available to Taiwan such defense articles and defense services in such quantity as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capabilities.” However, the decision about the nature and quantity of defense services that America will provide to Taiwan is to be determined by the President and Congress. And this is where the US’s policy of “strategic ambiguity” comes in. It is designed to dissuade Taiwan from unilaterally declaring its independence, and to dissuade China from unilaterally unifying Taiwan with China.
With the provisions of the Taiwan Relations Act, China and Taiwan are dissuaded from joining into one government, unless China decides to invade Taiwan or on the other hand, Taiwan unilaterally declared independence. But Taiwan under the terms of the Taiwan Relations Act would not unilaterally declare its independence. Unless, it goes rogue, which is unthinkable. Therefore for war to erupt between China and Taiwan, it’s all up to China. And if China attacks Taiwan, then the US has the prerogative to exercise its policy of “strategic ambiguity.”
Status quo
It would appear then that the status quo would remain in effect unless China decides to attack Taiwan, which could lead to World War III. So what is China doing by saber-rattling unless the Chinese leadership is yearning for a fight with Taiwan?
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin then was right when he blasted China’s “provocative and destabilizing” military activity near Taiwan. China should—nay, must—stop sending its bombers and jet fighters across the Taiwan Strait towards Taiwan in an attempt to test Taiwan’s defenses. China has conducted dozens of incursions into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone for over a year now. And each time Chinese warplanes were sent across the strait, Taiwan had to scramble its jet fighters to meet the intruders in combat. By then, the Chinese warplanes had turned around and flew back to China. It’s an exercise in futility but at the same time it tests Taiwan’s determination to defend itself because nobody knows if and when China would invade Taiwan.
(PerryDiaz@gmail.com)