I also don't expect a military response to this particular round of verbal confrontation; China simply has more to lose than it does to gain. But it does seem odd that President Lee would choose this moment to make a clearly provocative statement that he must have known would evoke a round of saber-rattling in Beijing. Not that the statement isn't true: Taiwan is in fact an independent state and has functioned as such for years. But I have to wonder what Lee was trying to accomplish by publicly underlining this fact at this particular time. The only conclusion I can reach is that Lee was reacting to and attempting to encourage the anti-Chinese climate which now exists in Washington DC. I also believe this anti-Chinese climate has been artificially concocted to alter the domestic political balance; if this belief is correct, we are already seeing what the repercussions of dragging foreign policy into our domestic squabbles can be.
It's not helping anyone, and it's doing a good deal of damage.
if Chinese policy is to stir up regional tensions over an old
communist/nationalist dispute, then we can basically assume the pluralization of Chinese society is all a sham.
Is this China's policy, or Taiwan's? The mainland seems content to let the status quo rest; it is Taiwan that is rocking the boat. By doing so, they are strengthening the hand of the Chinese hardliners and ultimately weakening their own position.
I fully support a massive response by the US and the UN.
I would think a limited response - using military force against ships or aircraft engaged in aggressive actions directed at Taiwan - would be more appropriate. The kind of "massive force" which was directed at the Serbs or the Iraqis, e.g. bombing military targets on the mainland that were not directly associated with the attack, would be pretty dangerous. They do still have nukes, and any military confrontation between nuclear powers calls for serious consideration on all sides.
I don't think it's going to happen, not this time around, anyway. But the word war is moving us closer to confrontation, a direction I don't think anybody wants to go.
we look forward to the conquest of Taiwan, then the Koreas, and then Japan...
I really don't see that as very likely. Taiwan has always been part of China, and reunification has been on the Chinese agenda since the revolution. Conquest of neighboring countries is another story altogether; I think China would like to be the dominant military and economic power in Asia, but I don't think they have any illusions about physically conquering it. |
