Taiwan: the best deterrent against China?

China is also not stopping on its own. For example, it took the Scarborough Reef in the Philippines in early 2012. The Obama administration, while Vice President Joe Biden was in charge of foreign policy, did not oppose this bold Chinese takeover .

When Chinese leaders saw Washington's inaction, they quickly attacked the Second Thomas Reef and other Philippine reefs in the South China Sea, attacked Japanese islets in the East China Sea, and began claiming and to militarize elements of the Spratly Islands archipelago. Obama and Biden legitimized the worst elements of China's political system by proving to everyone that aggression worked.

China is now in full action, waging proxy wars in Ukraine (China gave the green light to the invasion with its declaration of “unlimited” partnership just before Vladimir Putin's attack), in Africa in the North and the Middle East. The best way to stop China from attacking Taiwan is to defeat its proxies, particularly Russia in Europe.

“Ukraine will not influence Beijing’s decision to attack Taiwan,” said Elbridge Colby, who led the charge against Ukraine's defense. “On the contrary, what is most important to deter a war against Taiwan is the military balance in Asia. » At present, this balance may or may not favor China, but the most critical factor, in my view, is Beijing's assessment, which fears loss of life, of the willingness of the United States and its partners to defend Taiwan.

Indeed, it was this lack of will that led Putin to believe he could invade Ukraine. The invasion closely followed Biden's disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan and his unconvincing public statements in the days before the attack.

It is this withdrawal that has emboldened China. As Afghanistan collapsed, Beijing's main propaganda argument was that the United States could not hope to counter China because it could not even confront the Taliban.

Beijing then attacked the Democratic Progressive Party, the organization that governs Taiwan. “The PDP authorities must keep a cool head and the secessionist forces must retain the capacity to emerge from their dreams”said an editorial in the Global Times, controlled by the People's Daily. “Given what happened in Afghanistan, they should understand that once a war breaks out across the strait, the island's defense will collapse within hours and the US military will not come to their aid . »

Worse still, Chinese leaders seem to think the United States is incapable of doing so. “They can no longer win a war”Lu Xiang of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences told the Global Times as the Taliban seized Kabul.

Losing Ukraine would further strengthen China's confidence in this assessment.

The Taiwanese believe that their security is closely linked to events in Eastern Europe. “The survival of Ukraine is the survival of Taiwan”Bi-khim Hsaio said last year when he was Taiwan's representative in Washington and before becoming vice president of the island republic. “Ukraine’s success is Taiwan’s success. Our futures are closely linked. »

As Tsai Ing-wen, who left Taiwan's presidency in May, said on November 23, “A Ukrainian victory will constitute the most effective deterrent against future aggression.”

Gordon G. Chang is the author of Plan Red: China's Project to Destroy America and The Coming Collapse of China, a distinguished fellow of the Gatestone Institute, and a member of its advisory board.

JForum.fr with www.gatestoneinstitute.org

Pictured: Taiwanese protest in support of Ukraine, in Taipei, March 13, 2022. (Photo by Sam Yeh/AFP via Getty Images)