Taiwán

The Taiwan Fixation

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The fate of Taiwan keeps American policymakers up at night, and it should. A Chinese invasion of the island would confront the United States with one of its gravest foreign policy choices ever. Letting Taiwan fall to Beijing would dent Washington’s credibility and create new challenges for U.S. military forces in Asia. But the benefits of keeping Taiwan free would have to be weighed against the costs of waging the first armed conflict between great powers since 1945. Even if the United States prevailed—and it might well lose—an outright war with China would likely kill more Americans and destroy more wealth than any conflict since the Vietnam War and perhaps since World War II.…  Seguir leyendo »

Tres soldados taiwaneses observan un mapa durante un ejercicio militar. Foto: 總統府 (Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 2.0).

MundoAsiaEuropaUnión EuropeaPolítica Exterior, , ,

En caso de que estallase una guerra con China por Taiwán, muchos observadores parecen considerar que Europa sería prácticamente irrelevante en lo que concierne al combate real. Quienes esgrimen esta opinión suelen apuntar a las reticencias de Europa a enfrentarse a China o a la falta de capacidades militares sólidas que poder poner encima de la mesa. O bien prefieren que Europa se ocupe de sus asuntos, que se centre en la amenaza rusa, mucho más cercana a su territorio, y deje vía libre a EEUU para poner el foco en China.

Nuestro punto de vista es algo diferente.

Con toda probabilidad, una guerra por Taiwán que arrastrara a EEUU y a sus aliados asiáticos se convertiría en una lucha cruenta y prolongada que se propagaría más allá del Pacífico occidental.…  Seguir leyendo »

Lawmakers from the Democratic Progressive Party and opposition party Kuomintang (in white) brawl over the third reading of amendments to the Civil Servants Election and Recall Act and other controversial bills at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei on Dec. 20, 2024. I-Hwa Cheng/AFP via Getty Images

MundoAsia

In the final weeks of 2024, Taiwan’s parliament once again turned into a pugilistic arena, as ruling-party lawmakers brawled with their opposition counterparts over barricades of furniture at the chamber entrances. It was at least the fourth such bust-up in 2024. Legislative brawls have a long tradition in Taiwan, but mostly they’re performative flailing. The fighting in 2024 saw lawmakers exchange punches, wrestle, throw water bottles, and even saw a male ruling-party legislator tackle and throw a female opposition counterpart to the ground.

As appalling as it was, the clashes were almost all instigated by the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which still holds the presidency but is the minority in the legislature, where the opposition holds 62 out of 113 seats.…  Seguir leyendo »

A Taiwanese soldier in 2022. Lam Yik Fei for The New York Times

MundoAméricaMundoAsia, ,

China’s military exercises in the waters around Taiwan this month — the largest in almost three decades — highlight the growing risk of a total breakdown in United States-China relations. A full-scale invasion of Taiwan is one eventuality; last year, the C.I.A. director, William Burns, noted that China’s president, Xi Jinping, has instructed his armed forces to be ready for an invasion by 2027.

That isn’t Mr. Xi’s only option. He could use his far larger coast guard and military to impose a “quarantine”, allowing merchant shippers and commercial airlines to travel in and out of Taiwan only on China’s terms.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwan Is Ready to Defend Democracy. Is Trump?

MundoAméricaMundoAsia, ,

I don’t envy American voters. Your presidential choices have an impact halfway across the planet. Your soldiers fight and die in other countries’ wars. I know you’re tired of feeling you have to fix the world’s problems. But like it or not, this unique privilege and responsibility comes with being a citizen of the greatest country in the world.

So spare a thought for one of these faraway places affected by your vote: my island home, Taiwan.

When I was growing up, we idolized America. I loved the idea of it — the land of opportunity and protector of democracy. I inherited this from my father, who was born in Taiwan in 1950, a year after the Chinese civil war forced his family to flee there from mainland China.…  Seguir leyendo »

Members of the Taiwanese Navy in Taoyuan, Taiwan, October 2024. Tyrone Siu / Reuters

MundoAsia, ,

In mid-October, China conducted yet another round of large-scale military drills in the Taiwan Strait, including practicing a blockade of Taiwanese ports. This time, the trigger was a series of unremarkable comments by Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te on the occasion of Taiwan’s National Day a few days prior. Beijing “has no right to represent Taiwan”, Lai had asserted, describing Taiwan as a place where “democracy and freedom are growing and thriving”. Although Lai gave no indication that he would pursue independence or seek to change Taiwan’s international status, Beijing used his remarks as a new pretext to ramp up the pressure.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te attending a military academy graduation ceremony in Taipei, Taiwan, June 2024. Ann Wang / Reuters

MundoAsia, ,

Since 1996, all of Taiwan’s elected presidents have at some point during their time in office declared that theirs is a sovereign, independent state. The new president of Taiwan, Lai Ching-te, who was elected in January and inaugurated in May, is the first to make that declaration at the beginning of his term. The chair of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and a self-described pragmatic worker for Taiwan independence, Lai delivered an inaugural speech that made clear that Taiwan is a de facto sovereign and independent country that is neither a part of nor subordinate to China. At the same time, however, Lai pledged not to provoke China or change the cross-Strait status quo.…  Seguir leyendo »

An outdoor screen in Beijing shows a news coverage of China's military drills around Taiwan on May 23. (Jade Gao/AFP/Getty Images)

MundoAsia, ,

The central question for our time, if we are to avoid war across the Taiwan Strait, is to understand how Chinese President Xi Jinping actually interprets the deterrence strategies of the United States, Taiwan itself, and U.S. allies and strategic partners.

What strategy is China now embarking upon, short of preparation for an actual invasion, to achieve its political objectives in relation to Taiwan? And what is the role of deterrence in responding to such a strategy?

The key to understanding Beijing’s red line on Taiwan’s political status is China’s fear that Taiwan will become an independent state, and be recognized by the international community as such, thereby destroying the possibility of unification with the mainland.…  Seguir leyendo »

A screen broadcasting Chinese naval exercises near Taiwan, in Beijing, April 2023. Tingshu Wang / Reuters

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Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee in 2021, Admiral Philip Davidson, the retiring commander of U.S. military joint forces in the Indo-Pacific, expressed concern that China was accelerating its timeline to unify with Taiwan by amphibious invasion. “I think the threat is manifest during this decade, in fact in the next six years”, he warned. This assessment that the United States is up against an urgent deadline to head off a Chinese attack on Taiwan—dubbed the “Davidson Window”—has since become a driving force in U.S. defense strategy and policy in Asia.

Indeed, the Defense Department has defined a potential Chinese invasion of Taiwan as the “pacing scenario” around which U.S.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwanese President-elect Lai Ching-te holds a press conference in Taipei, Taiwan, January 2024. Ann Wang / Reuters

MundoAsia, ,

On May 20, in a ceremony in Taipei, Lai Ching-te is scheduled to be inaugurated as the next leader of Taiwan. Currently vice president, Lai is taking over from President Tsai Ing-wen at a delicate moment in Taiwan’s relations with Beijing. The Chinese Communist Party regards the self-ruling island of 23 million people as a renegade province to be unified with the mainland by force, if necessary. And although Taiwan has managed to maintain significant trade and interpersonal ties to mainland China while postponing discussions over its sovereignty, this ambiguous status quo has recently frayed amid political headwinds from both Beijing and Taipei.…  Seguir leyendo »

"In Taipei, I can walk down dark alleyways long past midnight with my purse wide open without fear of getting robbed," says Clarissa Wei, adding it's something she wouldn't feel comfortable doing in the US. Billy H.C. Kwok/Getty Images

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When my parents were growing up in the 1970s, they did not consider Taiwan an idyllic place to start a family. It was under martial law and the steady drumbeat of threats from China only seemed to be getting louder with each passing year. My dad still remembers the anxiety that engulfed the island when the United States cut off diplomatic recognition of Taiwan in favor of the People’s Republic of China in 1979. “We weren’t sure if America would protect us if there was conflict”, he told me.

And so, in their late 20s, they left everything they knew and moved to the suburbs of Los Angeles where I was born.…  Seguir leyendo »

Cómo evitar una guerra por Taiwán

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¿Es posible que China ataque a Taiwán en 2027? Eso creía en 2021 el jefe saliente del Comando de EE. UU. del Indo-Pacífico, Philip Davidson, quien recientemente insistió con ese análisis; pero no está escrito que Estados Unidos y China estén destinados a una guerra por esa isla. Aunque el peligro es real, no se trata de un resultado inevitable.

China considera que Taiwán es una provincia renegada, vestigio de la guerra civil de la década de 1940, y aunque las relaciones entre Estados Unidos y China se normalizaron en la década de 1970, Taiwán sigue siendo motivo de discusión... sin embargo, esas potencias hallaron una fórmula diplomática para ocultar el desacuerdo: desde ambos lados del estrecho de Taiwán los chinos acordaron que existe «una sola China».…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwanese President-elect William Lai and his running mate Hsiao Bi-khim speak to supporters at the Democratic Progressive Party's headquarters in Taipei, Taiwan. Annabelle Chih/Getty Images

MundoAsia, ,

At first blush, the results of Taiwan’s national elections last month read like a clear rebuke of China’s coercive reunification agenda. Despite Beijing’s incessant branding of Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) as “separatist”, Taiwanese voters extended the DPP’s presidential reign for an unprecedented third consecutive term. International headlines hailed the election as a major “setback” for China, which had warned that casting a ballot for the DPP was tantamount to voting for war with the mainland. Some media even framed the DPP’s victory as an act of defiance by the Taiwanese people, rebuffing Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s assertion in his recent New Year’s address that reunification between China and Taiwan is “inevitable”.…  Seguir leyendo »

Un élevage d'huîtres sur la côte ouest de Kinmen, à quelques kilomètres de la ville chinoise de Xiamen. ANN WANG / REUTERS

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Si l'élection de William Lai à la présidence de Taïwan, le 13 janvier dernier, réaffirme l'identité de la nation taïwanaise au sein du monde chinois, elle ouvre une nouvelle phase de tension entre les deux rives du détroit de Formose dont les conséquences, à terme, seront loin d'être négligeables. La décision unilatérale de Pékin de modifier la trajectoire de la route aérienne civile M503, près de la ligne médiane, le 31 janvier, et l'incident mortel du 15 février, confirment les contours d'une stratégie chinoise de tensions sous le seuil, aux parades incertaines.

Le 15 février 2024, deux pêcheurs chinois se sont noyés donc à environ un mile marin au large de l'archipel de Kinmen après avoir été pourchassés par les garde-côtes taïwanais.…  Seguir leyendo »

China Is Running Out of Lines to Cross in the Taiwan Strait

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In 2020 the balance of military power in the Taiwan Strait began a gradual but profound shift in China’s favor.

That August, Alex Azar, then the health and human services secretary, became the highest-ranking U.S. cabinet official to visit Taiwan in more than four decades. Though he was there to talk about the pandemic, China’s People’s Liberation Army (P.L.A.) responded by carrying out large-scale military exercises around the self-governing island, sending aircraft over the median line of the Taiwan Strait, the halfway point between China and Taiwan, for only the third time in more than 20 years. Since then, China has responded to such visits and other perceived provocations by flying more than 4,800 sorties, with growing numbers of aircraft flying in locations previously seen as off-limits and conducting dozens of increasingly complex air and naval military exercises around Taiwan.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwanese soldiers at a military base in Taitung, Taiwan, January 2024. Carlos Garcia Rawlins / Reuters

MundoAsia, ,

Washington and its allies face many potential geopolitical catastrophes over the next decade, but nearly all pale in comparison to what would ensue if China annexed or invaded Taiwan. Such an outcome, one U.S. official put it, “would be a disaster of utmost importance to the United States, and I am convinced that time is of the essence”. That was General Douglas MacArthur in June 1950, then overseeing occupied Japan and worrying in a top-secret memo to Washington about the prospect that the Communists in China might seek to vanquish their Nationalist enemies once and for all. More than 70 years later, MacArthur’s words ring truer than ever.…  Seguir leyendo »

Palacio Presidencial de Taipéi, sede del gobierno de la República de China (Taiwán). Foto: SU TSUI LING / Getty Images

MundoAsia,
Tema

Se analizan los resultados de las elecciones generales taiwanesas y sus implicaciones internacionales, planteando posibles escenarios de evolución en el estrecho de Taiwán a corto y medio plazo.

Resumen

El escenario base para el estrecho de Taiwán tras las elecciones taiwanesas será continuista sin grandes iniciativas para modificar el statu quo desde Pekín, Taipéi o Washington. El desgaste del Partido Progresista Democrático (PPD), que ha perdido apoyos en las últimas elecciones y perdido el control del parlamento, dificulta una política aventurista por parte del nuevo gobierno. Por su parte, tanto Biden como Xi han apostado en los últimos meses por reducir las tensiones bilaterales para centrarse en asuntos domésticos en un 2024 que estará marcado por las elecciones presidenciales estadounidenses y los esfuerzos de las autoridades chinas por reactivar su economía.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwan: una democracia modélica en peligro

MundoAsia

Si una certeza dejaron las recientes elecciones presidenciales y legislativas celebradas en Taiwan es que la taiwanesa es una democracia modélica. Mientras una ola de populismo, polarización y posverdad se propaga por todo el planeta, afectando también a muchas democracias consolidadas, Taiwan ha dado una lección de sensatez política y madurez democrática pese a que, con la salvedad de Ucrania, sobre ningún otro país se cierne la amenaza de que una todopoderosa potencia autoritaria -situada a sólo 160 kilómetros de sus costas- lance contra él una invasión militar para anexionárselo.

En vez de alimentar divisiones irreconciliables, la campaña electoral no fue conflictiva y los candidatos evitaron los ataques personales.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia,

El pasado sábado Taiwán volvió a demostrar al mundo lo vibrante que es su democracia, con una participación de más del 70% para elegir al nuevo presidente y a su órgano legislativo, el Yuan. Lai Ching-te, candidato del Partido Progresista Democrático (PPD) ganó las elecciones presidenciales pero su partido no obtuvo los votos suficientes para controlar el Parlamento. El antiguo partido que ha dominado la escena política en Taiwán desde décadas, con mejores vínculos con China continental, el Kuomintang (KMT) superó al PPD por un escaño en el Yuan legislativo mientras que el más recientemente creado Partido Popular de Taiwán (PPT), aunque cuenta con pocos escaños tiene la clave para que el PPD pueda legislar.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia, ,

Los obstáculos para una invasión exitosa de la isla por parte de China siguen siendo formidables.

Xi Jinping cree que la historia se mueve a su favor. En su visita a Vladimir Putin en Moscú el pasado mes de marzo, el líder chino le dijo al presidente ruso: "Ahora mismo, estamos asistiendo a un cambio nunca visto en 100 años y estamos impulsando este cambio juntos".

Aquella frase dio la vuelta al mundo. Las palabras de Xi fueron vistas como un claro respaldo a la invasión rusa de Ucrania - y una sugerencia de que China, también, pronto desempeñará su papel para "impulsar este cambio".…  Seguir leyendo »