It has been nearly 20 years since China fired missiles just outside the Taiwanese ports of Keelung and Kaohsiung ahead of the island’s first direct presidential election in March 1996. The missile tests were designed to rattle the Taiwanese electorate and send a message that President Lee Teng-hui’s subtle drift away from the One-China policy was not to be tolerated. As with Hong Kong, it was Beijing’s expectation that the island would be “reunited” with the mainland — and quickly. But as disruptive as the tests were to sea and air traffic, the election went ahead and Lee won a solid majority for a second term as Taiwan’s president.
Leap forward two decades, and Beijing is still fussing over a Taiwan presidential election and the prospect that the island’s next president will ignore the One-China principle. Democratic Progressive Party candidate Tsai Ing-wen, the overwhelming favorite to win the election on Jan. 16, has made it clear that she has no interest in roiling cross-Strait waters. But she has refused to accept the One-China policy as diktat, reasoning that Taiwan is a sovereign, self-governing country whose history and development have foreclosed formal ties with mainland China. From the Chinese side this has elicited the warning that “peaceful development of cross-Strait relations will encounter terrifying waves, or even capsize.”
Such a warning is not something to be ignored. After all, China’s military threat to Taiwan has not decreased in recent years. Quite the opposite. Moreover, this is a Chinese regime and Chinese Communist Party headed by Xi Jinping, who has not been shy about asserting Chinese strength and putting forward a vision in which China reclaims a central role on the world stage.
Sensitive timing
That said, there is a world of difference between firing off words and firing off missiles. Indeed, given the many problems China faces internally, especially the widespread pessimism about the current state of the Chinese economy and forecasts for the future, one wonders if China’s leaders are willing to instigate an international crisis over Taiwan now.
Nor is it in China’s interest to sever the commercial and people-to-people ties that have increased significantly between the mainland and Taiwan in recent years. Over the past two years, on average more than 300,000 mainlanders visited the island monthly, with nearly 900 non-stop flights operating across the Taiwan Strait weekly. Trade between the two is also significant. Taiwan is China’s seventh largest trade partner and its sixth largest source of imports. In short, there are substantial economic interests at play here and, for a wobbling economy like China, the time is probably not right to “capsize” those ties.
Ironically, although Beijing hoped that this heightened co-dependence would create momentum for progress on the One-China agenda, it has in fact created a backlash in Taiwan, igniting fears that the country is drawing too close and becoming too dependent on the mainland. Certainly, this worry was a key reason why the DPP did so well in the 2014 local elections and the Kuomintang (KMT), the party most associated with establishing closer ties to the mainland, was soundly defeated. It also appears to be a key reason, along with questions of domestic economic equality, why Tsai Ing-wen is likely to win.
Rebalancing the parties
What this most likely means for the KMT going forward is that it will need to be seen as more of a Taiwanese political party and less as a party of former mainlanders. When Ma Ying-jeou, Taiwan’s current president, was first running for office in 2008, he was careful to stress that increased ties with the mainland would not come at the expense of Taiwan sovereignty and that it was up to the citizens of Taiwan to decide the island’s future.
However, by this second term, those same citizens seemed to conclude that his government’s efforts to establish deeper ties with China were moving too rapidly and without a nationwide consensus for doing so. The next KMT leader, if they are to be successful electorally, will not make the same mistake. In recent polling, fewer than 10% of Taiwanese have supported unification, while only 3.3% regarded themselves as Chinese. Nearly 60% identify themselves now as simply “Taiwanese.”
Conversely, the DPP would come to office having won the presidency in 2000 and 2004 under the leadership of Chen Shui-bian. As a party originally populated by former dissidents against the one-party rule of the KMT, it, like many dissident parties around the world when they first come to power, found itself lacking the experience to run the ship of state smoothly. It turned out the DPP was excellent at being in opposition but less skilled at running a government. As a result, the party was convincingly beaten in the 2008 election. But, with another chance at the presidency, the DPP will have individuals who have had experience in government and, presumably, a better sense of the limits of what they can do and cannot do.
The likely changes in both parties are not unusual in young democracies. They are part of the normal processes that often take place with the advent of popular rule.
This normalizing of Taiwanese politics, combined with China’s own preoccupations, might well be an opening for other countries to step up normalization with Taiwan itself. After all, if you were an alien from outer space and someone tried to explain to you the One-China policy — which dates from a strategic era long gone, lacks any real support among Taiwanese, and involves the isolation of a globally important economy and democracy — you might assume they were talking gibberish.
U.S. proactivity – easy steps
To lessen Taiwan’s isolation, the U.S. will have to take the lead. There are various ways Washington can do this. First, with the presidents of Taiwan and China now having met face-to-face, there is no compelling reason why the president of the U.S. cannot take advantage of that precedent to meet with his counterpart from Taipei. Likewise, Washington should get rid of its self-imposed restrictions on who in the U.S. government and military can visit Taiwan. Given the range of important security and economic issues between the two countries, it is counterproductive to artificially constrain dialogue between the two capitals.
Next, a greater effort should be made to bring Taiwan into the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. Not only would TPP membership lessen Taiwan’s dependence on a slowing Chinese economy, it would also bolster the pact itself by including an important player in both the regional and global economy.
Finally, seeing Taiwan as a “normal country” would free up U.S. government officials to take fuller advantage of the island’s geostrategic position, sitting as it does astride vital sea-trade lanes and between two American allies: Japan and the Philippines. Certainly, given Japan’s own intention to become a normal strategic partner with the U.S. and allies in the region, a more regularized relationship with Taipei could provide increased security to Japan itself.
Taiwan’s presidential election could well be a watershed moment for Taiwan domestically and internationally. It will not happen unless there is sound governance in Taipei and more imaginative policies coming from Washington. Neither is guaranteed, but the opportunity to help make Taiwan a more “normal country” is certainly there.
Gary Schmitt is director of the Marilyn Ware Center for Security Studies at the American Enterprise Institute.
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