Taiwán (Continuación)

Televisiones muestran la visita de la presidenta de la Cámara de Representantes de Estados Unidos, Nancy Pelosi, a Taipei, Taiwán, el 2 de agosto de 2022. (Lam Yik Fei/Bloomberg)

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Hace unos 43 años, el Congreso de Estados Unidos aprobó con una abrumadora mayoría la Ley de Relaciones de Taiwán (la cual posteriormente fue promulgada por el presidente Jimmy Carter), uno de los pilares más importantes de la política exterior de Estados Unidos en Asia Pacífico.

La Ley de Relaciones de Taiwán estableció el compromiso de Estados Unidos con un Taiwán democrático, y proporcionó el marco para una relación económica y diplomática que rápidamente se convertiría en una alianza clave. Fomentó una profunda amistad arraigada en intereses y valores compartidos: autodeterminación y un gobierno autónomo, democracia y libertad, dignidad humana y derechos humanos.…  Seguir leyendo »

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Some 43 years ago, the United States Congress overwhelmingly passed — and President Jimmy Carter signed into law — the Taiwan Relations Act, one of the most important pillars of U.S. foreign policy in the Asia Pacific.

The Taiwan Relations Act set out America’s commitment to a democratic Taiwan, providing the framework for an economic and diplomatic relationship that would quickly flourish into a key partnership. It fostered a deep friendship rooted in shared interests and values: self-determination and self-government, democracy and freedom, human dignity and human rights.

And it made a solemn vow by the United States to support the defense of Taiwan: “to consider any effort to determine the future of Taiwan by other than peaceful means … a threat to the peace and security of the Western Pacific area and of grave concern to the United States”.…  Seguir leyendo »

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El pasado 11 de julio, el Círculo Ecuestre de Barcelona organizó un coloquio con el recién nombrado embajador de la Unión Europea en China, Jorge Toledo Albiñana, antiguo embajador de España en Japón. Albiñana asumirá su nuevo puesto en septiembre. Durante la charla, al ser preguntado por Taiwán, el diplomático afirmó que "[España, la UE, Estados Unidos] creen, defienden y proclaman que la eventual unificación fáctica, ya que ambos [China y Taiwán] son un país, ha de realizarse por medios pacíficos".

Estas controvertidas declaraciones fueron recogidas por la prensa española y posteriormente traducidas por medios extranjeros al inglés, lo que propició que la noticia se internacionalizase.…  Seguir leyendo »

A Chinese dredger pumps sand to reclaim land just outside a port in the Sri Lankan capital, Colombo, on Sept. 6, 2017. Shara S. Kodikara/AFP via Getty Images

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At the end of April, the Taiwan Coast Guard Administration received a new frigate, the Hsinchu. At 4,000 tons, it’s a massive beast and was immediately assigned for duty in Taiwan’s Northern Pacific Flotilla to protect one of Taiwan’s most precious maritime resources: sand. China is increasing its dredging of sand in the islands’ waters. It’s a devious activity that gets Beijing much-needed sand—and presents Taiwan with large expenses and maritime degradation.

“The Hsinchu is the second of four planned CGA [Coast Guard Administration] frigates and is equipped with three high-pressure water cannons that are able to shoot at targets up to 120 meters away”, Taiwan News reported when the new frigate was received.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwanese defenses near Kenting National Park in Pingdong, July 2007. Wolf Kern / Redux

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Concern is growing in Taiwan, in the United States, and among U.S. allies in Asia that China is preparing to attack Taiwan in the near future. Testifying before the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee last year, Admiral Philip Davidson, then the commander of the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, warned that Beijing might attempt to seize the island in the next six years. Unifying Taiwan with mainland China is a key element of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s “Chinese dream”. And as the political scientist Oriana Skylar Mastro has argued in these pages, Xi wants “unification with Taiwan to be part of his personal legacy”, suggesting that an armed invasion could come before the end of his third term as secretary-general of the Chinese Communist Party in 2027 and almost certainly before the end of his probable fourth term in 2032.…  Seguir leyendo »

Chinese fighter jets taking off in the Yellow Sea, December 2016. AFP / STR / Getty Images

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Of all the intractable issues that could spark a hot war between the United States and China, Taiwan is at the very top of the list. And the potential geopolitical consequences of such a war would be profound. Taiwan—“an unsinkable aircraft carrier and submarine tender”, as U.S. Army General Douglas MacArthur once described it—has important, often underappreciated military value as a gateway to the Philippine Sea, a vital theater for defending Japan, the Philippines, and South Korea from possible Chinese coercion or attack. There is no guarantee that China would win a war for the island—or that such a conflict wouldn’t drag on for years and weaken China.…  Seguir leyendo »

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While appealing to Asian nations for support to fend off Russia’s invasion on Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the international community should help Taiwan resist China’s aggression now, before Beijing attacks the island democracy it claims as its own province.

The comments risk upsetting Ukraine’s delicate balancing act with China; nevertheless, Zelensky insisted that aggressors must be confronted wherever they emerge. Asian countries must not wait for the crisis to act on Taiwan’s behalf, which would be repeating the mistake Europe made before Russian President Vladimir Putin’s attack on Ukraine.

Zelensky’s remarks followed a video address he made to the Shangri-La Dialogue, an annual conference of Asian and Pacific defense and diplomatic officials organized by the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwan: preparing for a potential Chinese invasion

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When Joe Biden pledged last month to intervene militarily if China were ever to attack Taiwan, his comment was met with a harsh response from Beijing.

“If the US continues to go down the wrong path”, a foreign ministry spokesperson said, “the US will have to pay an unbearable price”.

The phrase was widely read as a warning about war. The same day, China and Russia flew a joint nuclear bomber exercise near Japan.

The exchange was the latest in a spiral of martial messaging between the US and China. It was also a reflection of the mounting fears in Washington, Taipei and among US allies that Beijing could try to annex Taiwan in the next few years.…  Seguir leyendo »

Joe Biden solo ha dicho de Taiwán lo que ya sabe todo el mundo

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La decisión del presidente Joe Biden de afirmar categóricamente que Estados Unidos intervendrá militarmente en caso de que China ataque Taiwán, como hizo durante la conferencia de prensa conjunta del lunes en Tokio con el primer ministro japonés, Fumio Kishida, ha provocado indignación en Pekín y mucho malestar en gran parte, incluso la mayoría, de los responsables de la política exterior estadounidense, entre ellos muchos partidarios del presidente tanto fuera como dentro de la Administración. Un hecho que lo demuestra fue que, pocas horas después de las declaraciones de Biden, el Departamento de Estado estaba, como dicen eufemísticamente en Washington, “retractándose” de los comentarios del presidente e insistiendo en que la política de Estados Unidos respecto a Taiwán no había cambiado.…  Seguir leyendo »

This is the third time in less than a year that Biden has declared the US would use force to keep Beijing from seizing Taiwan. Photograph: Mark Schiefelbein/AP

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Joe Biden made a potentially dangerous statement on Monday. In Tokyo, he gave a flat “yes” to a reporter’s question of whether he was willing to “get involved militarily to defend Taiwan”. “That’s the commitment we made”, the president claimed. In fact, the United States scrapped its formal commitment to defend Taiwan in 1979, replacing a treaty of alliance with the Taiwan Relations Act, which obligates the United States to help equip Taiwan to defend itself.

This is the third time in less than a year that Biden has publicly declared that the United States would use force to keep Beijing from seizing the island.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwanese demonstrators staging a pro-Ukrainian "die-in" protest in Taipei, April 2022. Reuters / I-Hwa Cheng

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Beyond Europe, the impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is being felt most keenly 5,000 miles away, on the island of Taiwan. Many Taiwanese worry that they might be the next to suffer an invasion by a more powerful neighbor. Those fears are not unreasonable. While Ukraine and Taiwan differ in many ways, as relatively young democracies living alongside larger authoritarian neighbors with long-standing designs on their territory, the two face strikingly similar strategic predicaments.

Much as Russian President Vladimir Putin has described restoring the “historical unity” between Russia and Ukraine as a kind of spiritual mission, Chinese President Xi Jinping believes that reuniting mainland China with what he views as its lost province of Taiwan will help cement his place in history.…  Seguir leyendo »

Protesters in Taipei, Taiwan, rally in support of the Ukrainian people on April 17. (Ritchie B Tongo/EPA-EFE)

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Chinese President Xi Jinping is watching his friend Russian President Vladimir Putin fumble Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and learning from Putin’s errors, senior U.S. military officials believe. And if China should ever decide to attack Taiwan, Xi will surely apply the lessons he has learned — which means we in the West must also quickly adjust our plans for Taiwan’s defense.

The Chinese government insists that the Ukraine and Taiwan situations are different and that China has no plans to attack the island it claims as its own. But the Taiwanese government correctly recognizes the overwhelming similarity between its situation and that of Ukraine: Both are small democracies menaced by aggressive, nuclear-armed dictatorships threatening to wipe them off the map.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwanese Air Force pilots leave after President Tsai Ing-wen delivered a speech at a military base in Hsinchu, Taiwan, on April 1. SAM YEH/AFP via Getty Images

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In September 2020, Richard Haass and David Sacks reignited a debate over providing a formal U.S. security guarantee to Taiwan, ending decades of strategic ambiguity regarding U.S. intentions. They reiterated their support for “strategic clarity”—“to make explicit to China that the United States would respond to an attack against Taiwan with … severe economic sanctions and military force”—in late 2021, two months before Russia’s latest invasion of Ukraine.

Following the invasion, former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe argued, “The time has come for the U.S. to make clear that it will defend Taiwan against any attempted Chinese invasion”. Similarly citing the Russia-Ukraine war example, Eric Edelman and Franklin Miller lobbied for “a clearly stated U.S.…  Seguir leyendo »

Taiwan's Ta Chiang vessel, a domestically produced Tuo Chiang-class corvette, fires off flares during a drill on the seas off the northern Taiwanese city of Keelung on Jan. 7. Sam Yeh/AFP via Getty Images

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As Russia edges toward a full-scale invasion, U.S. thinking is understandably focused on Ukraine. But spare a thought for how Chinese President Xi Jinping might emulate his Russian counterpart’s strategy. While there is much debate in Washington about a bolt-from-the-blue Chinese invasion of Taiwan, Beijing may instead generate a political-military crisis by threatening to use force. If the United States wants to avoid being caught flat-footed, it needs to begin preparing today.

Beijing’s goal is to force Taiwan to meet its political demands—the acceptance of Chinese control over the island—while preventing the United States from standing in the way. While it could invade Taiwan to achieve this outcome, it does not necessarily need to do so.…  Seguir leyendo »

Lithuania tests the EU’s resolve on Chinese economic coercion

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The name of a small office at the top of a drab skyscraper in the centre of Vilnius has set off a geopolitical firestorm that threatens billions of dollars in trade.

This is the Taiwanese Representative Office in Lithuania, a diplomatic outpost so new that the chief of mission’s business cards still carry the address of his previous posting in Latvia.

At issue is the fact that the name of the mission explicitly refers to the disputed island of Taiwan — and not, as is more common, its capital city of Taipei. To Eric Huang, who heads up the office, this makes complete sense.…  Seguir leyendo »

Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, and Chinese President Xi Jinping in April 2019 in Beijing. (Kenzaburo Fukuhara/Pool/Getty Images)

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What makes a nation-state? That question is not just the stuff of esoteric academic debates. It lies at the heart of two of the most dangerous military confrontations in the world. Russia might be on the brink of a wider invasion of Ukraine because its president, Vladimir Putin, doesn’t accept Ukraine’s sovereignty, while China might someday find itself at war with Taiwan because its president, Xi Jinping, doesn’t accept Taiwan’s sovereignty.

Putin actually said in 2008 “that Ukraine is not even a state,” and in July he published a lengthy article making the case that “that Russians and Ukrainians were one people — a single whole.”…  Seguir leyendo »

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Hay dos peligrosos puntos calientes en Europa y Asia que pueden llevar a Estados Unidos, Rusia y China a un conflicto abierto. Las crisis por Ucrania y Taiwán admiten solución, pero todas las partes deben respetar los legítimos intereses de seguridad de las otras. La base para una desescalada duradera de las tensiones es reconocer esos intereses en forma objetiva.

Tomemos el caso de Ucrania. Aunque su derecho a la soberanía y a la seguridad contra una invasión rusa es indudable, no tiene derecho a debilitar la seguridad de Rusia en el proceso.

La crisis actual por Ucrania es resultado de excesos de Rusia y de Estados Unidos.…  Seguir leyendo »

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El 1 de septiembre de 1939, Adolf Hitler tomó una decisión que le costó la vida y la destrucción de Alemania: invadir Polonia e iniciar la Segunda Guerra Mundial. Francia e Inglaterra tuvieron claro que la ocupación desbordaba todos los límites de un dominio nazi sobre el continente europeo. Y no estaban dispuestos a admitirlo.

Ahora suenan tambores de guerra en el estrecho de Taiwán, que separa el continente asiático 180 kilómetros de la antigua isla de Formosa. Un estrecho que es la vía de comunicación que une el mar de la China Meridional con el mar de la China Oriental.…  Seguir leyendo »

What Taiwan Really Wants

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It started with an innocuous question from a town hall audience: A student asked President Biden whether he would vow to protect Taiwan from China.

Mr. Biden’s response — a quick “yes,” then “yes” again when pressed by a CNN anchor — was instant breaking news globally. The White House almost immediately moved to walk back the comments.

The foreign policy kerfuffle was brief but underscored the high stakes when it comes to Taiwan.

Relations between China and Taiwan are at their worst point in decades. Military provocations are rising: Record numbers of Chinese warplanes have crossed into Taiwan’s air defense zone in recent weeks, a stark reminder of Beijing’s desire to absorb Taiwan.…  Seguir leyendo »

Two J-11 fighter jets and a H-6K bomber fly in formation on May 11, 2018. Shortly thereafter, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) air force conducted patrol training over China’s Island of Taiwan. LI GANG / XINHUA / Xinhua via AFP

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What is happening?

The first days of October brought a significant spike in Chinese military aircraft entering into the south west corner of Taiwan’s Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ).  The number of such aircraft in the ADIZ broke records three times, on Friday 1 October with 38 planes, Saturday 2 October 39 planes and Monday 4 October 56 planes. Prior to this streak, the record for the largest number of Chinese military planes to enter Taiwan’s ADIZ in one day was set on 15 June 2021, when 28 entered.

The area that the planes flew through is not Taiwan’s territorial air space, which starts twelve nautical miles from its coast.…  Seguir leyendo »