Lai Ching-te’s poll victory did not sit well with China, as it engages in military intimidation by conducting exercises around Taiwan
The Chinese have been playing some hardball with Taiwan. And, in all fairness, Taipei has been giving as good as it got. However, at what point does hardball actually break the game and result in unforeseen consequences?
Last Thursday and Friday, China’s Eastern Theatre Command conducted joint military drills around Taiwan. The war games were deemed as “punishment” for the island, following the inaugural of the new President Lai Ching-te last Monday.
Over the past four years, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has staged regular military exercises around Taiwan to coerce the island’s government that China deems to be too pro-independence. But the war games this time expanded the area of the exercise to virtually encircle the island and several small islands that are close to the Chinese mainland.
Source: FocusTaiwan
From the outset, it has been clear that Beijing would not trust Lai Ching-te who has long viewed Taiwan as an independent country something that is unacceptable to China which insists that it must soon become part of the People’s Republic.
Lai’s speech at the inaugural called on Beijing to end “their political and military intimidation against Taiwan.” He said that China needed to recognise “the reality of the Republic of China’s existence”. He went on to add that Taiwan had sovereignty as outlined in its Constitution and that the PRC and the Republic of China (ROC) were not subordinate to each other.
Not surprisingly, China criticised Lai for sending “a dangerous signal” in relation to Taiwan seeking independence. A spokesman for the PRC State Council Taiwan Affairs Office Chen Binhua said that Lai’s speech had “stubbornly followed the ‘Taiwan independence stance.’ Wantonly advocated separatism, incited cross-strait confrontation….”
Observers of cross-strait relations say that Lai went beyond the formulations of his predecessor Tsai Ing-wen whose position was “neither yield, nor provoke” Beijing and maintain the status quo. But by his use of language and turn of phrase in referring to China and the cross-strait situation, Lai angered Bejing. The Financial Times headlined an analysis of his speech “China has a point about Taiwan’s new leader.”
The 1992 Consensus was a broad understanding between the CPC and the ruling KMT in 1992 that stated that there was only one “China” even while interpretations of what it constituted was left to the two sides.
It was also noted that Lai omitted any reference to the 1992 Consensus that was seen as a guide to their contemporary relationship. His predecessor Tsai had acknowledged it in her inaugural speech in 2016, even though this was done somewhat indirectly. That bothered Beijing which then chose to cut off official communications with ROC on that account. The 1992 Consensus was a broad understanding between the CPC and the ruling KMT in 1992 that stated that there was only one “China” even while interpretations of what it constituted was left to the two sides.
There are important differences in the manner Lai embraces the “Republic of China” as a distinct sovereign entity and the manner in which the leading Opposition Kuomintang (KMT) does. The KMT for its part believes that the ROC embraces all of China, just as the CPC believed that Taiwan is part of the People’s Republic of China.
Meanwhile, within Taiwan, there has been internal contention. Lai’s Democratic Progressive Party does not have a majority in the country’s Parliament. There the combined Opposition is attempting to push measures to give the parliamentarians more oversight over the government. The KMT, Taiwan’s main Opposition Party is now being seen as pro-Beijing, though the party says that all it wants is closer ties with China. Relations between the government and the Opposition in Parliament are rife with tension and there were fisticuffs in Parliament last week.
Meanwhile, the military drills around Taiwan ended on Friday. According to CCTV news, there are three new aspects to the exercise. The first was that it established a new normal and sought to counter the US-Taiwanese salami-slicing tactics in relation to the status of Taiwan. The second was that the exercise also included two outlying islands of Taiwan near the Chinese coast.
The third was the nature of the exercise which seemed to suggest that a blockade could well be the chosen Chinese tactic, instead of an outright invasion. As the report noted, “Taiwan’s economy is export-oriented and most of its energy consumption depends on exports. Once besieged and blockaded, it is easy to cause economic collapse and turn it into a dead island.”
A blockade may not have the immediacy of a military attack, but it would nevertheless have devastating consequences for the world economy.
This is an important signal and there has been considerable debate over how, if at all, a blockade would be effective. For one thing, it would be preferable to a direct assault and it would be more difficult for the US and Taiwan to respond to. It could range from occasional stopping and search of maritime traffic to Taiwan to a full-scale blockade. This could, in turn, be vulnerable to a counter-blockade effort which could hurt China which is dependent on sea-borne trade for food and energy.
A blockade may not have the immediacy of a military attack, but it would nevertheless have devastating consequences for the world economy. This could have the negative effect of turning global opinion against China as ships from different countries could be stopped and searched.
American and Taiwanese perspectives on Taiwan have been shaped by the revelation in February 2023, by the CIA Director William Burns who told the House Intelligence Committee that President Xi Jinping should not be underestimated on issues relating to Taiwan and that the US knew “as a matter of intelligence” that Xi had ordered the PLA to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027.
No doubt that the US and Taiwan have been thinking through possible Chinese military options including blockades, but more recently the Americans have been working on a military strategy to deal with a Taiwan contingency.
Earlier this month, troops from the US and the Philippines simulated repelling a maritime invasion near the coastal city of Laoag—the closest Philippine province to China, just south of Taiwan. They were participating in the largest ever Balikatan or shoulder-to-shoulder exercise in recent times. The US also deployed a new mid-range missile launcher for the Typhon system which fires Tomahawk and SM-6 missiles. The former can reach targets in Taiwan and Chinese bases and infrastructure in the South China Sea and China itself and the latter can defend targets against Chinese hypersonic missiles.
Troops from the US and the Philippines simulated repelling a maritime invasion near the coastal city of Laoag—the closest Philippine province to China, just south of Taiwan.
A part of the exercise took place on the islands of Ithbayat and Mavulis which are just 80-100 miles from Taiwan. The US Marines who were involved in the exercise are evolving new tactics to use small and agile forces and new equipment like small drones and sensors to slow down any possible Chinese military action in the area till the US can mobilise larger forces.
The military activities around the Straits of Taiwan do not bode well for the future. There is always a chance that a localised event goes out of control. The stakes involved are not just regional, but global. So there is a need to keep track of the situation and act fast to prevent any escalation, inadvertent or otherwise.
Manoj Joshi is a Distinguished Fellow at the Observer Research Foundation
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Manoj Joshi is a Distinguished Fellow at the ORF. He has been a journalist specialising on national and international politics and is a commentator and ...
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