The visit of the speaker of the United States House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, to Taiwan in August 2022 raised a tension between Beijing and Washington that continues rampant, with the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, more assertive than ever in the historical claim of “one China” that includes the island and a Biden Administration that, while acknowledging that principle, claims to be willing to defend Taiwan in the event of an invasion. It is not strange that a think tank, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, has designed up to 24 scenarios of an attempted invasion in the form of war games whose consequences would be disastrous in all cases for the Chinese, the Americans and the Taiwanese.
Vanguardia Dossier addresses the issue in its latest issue, Taiwan, the pearl of the Indo-Pacific , but not so much in terms of the war hypothesis as the reasons for raising it and the centrality of the island, both economic (it is the great manufacturer of semiconductors ) as geostrategic in a region that contains 60% of world GDP. This includes the particularities that make Taiwan – which is only recognized as an independent State by 14 countries – a participant in international institutions.
“Informal relations with the developed powers of the West are gaining in depth and dimension in parallel to the rarefaction of their relations with China,” says Xulio Ríos in his article. It is one of the Taiwanese paradoxes, like the fact that China and Taiwan today are more politically divided when at the same time they are more economically integrated. More than 40% of the island’s exports go to mainland China.
President Tsai Ingwen was responsible for Chinese affairs in the Democratic Progressive Party government 20 years ago and told La Vanguardia at the time that “Chinese democratization is essential to improve relations, although we know that this could take decades.” The phrase would not have lost its validity, but today Tsai defends the country’s independence not as an aspiration, but as a fait accompli in practice. Gone are the days of the best relations with Beijing, that of President Ma Ying Jeou (2008-2016) at the head of the Kuomintang, the historical party, founder of the self-styled Republic of China.
The generation of “natural independence” – which no longer feels ties to the continental territory of origin – is the one that predominates today, despite the aging (another paradox) of the population, which has largely caused the campaigns to fail. of Beijing aimed at increasing sympathy for reunification, Wu Jiehmin and Brian Chee-Shing Hioe point out in their articles, which are very focused on Taiwanese demography.
Steve Chan, for his part, wonders why Beijing should accept the situation that most interests Washington: better a divided China than a reunified one; and that nothing changes. Thus, threats of invasion would serve to make the US try to prevent the formal independence of Taiwan. The problem is that the tendencies in one and another part can destabilize everything.
