Posted on 01/04/2005 8:18:32 PM PST by nanak
China is attempting to justify its inevitable invasion of Taiwan with some legal maneuvering – an anti-secession law.
The free world's response to this grotesque violation of human rights and militaristic, imperialistic threat should be to recognize Taiwan once and for all as an independent, free and sovereign nation-state.
But don't hold your breath. Washington doesn't want any more crises on its plate. The Bush administration has its hands full with the war on Islamo-fascist terrorists. It doesn't want any trouble with China right now. Washington would prefer to live in the world of make-believe and wishful-thinking – pretending that China will forget about its promise to reunite free Taiwan with totalitarian mainland.
Taiwan split from the mainland at the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, but Beijing still sees the island of 23 million as part of Chinese territory and has pledged to bring it back into the fold, by force if necessary. Beijing means what it says. And the tyrants there are only encouraged by the mixed messages they are hearing from U.S. officials in the Defense Department and State Department.
Meanwhile, the courage of the Taiwanese people is inspiring. It is reminiscent of the courage our own founding fathers showed in the 18th century.
"We once again urge the Chinese Communist Party authorities not to underestimate the will of the Taiwan people in defending the sovereignty, security and dignity of the Republic of China," said President Chen Shui-bian last weekend.
For more than a decade now, Beijing has invested heavily in a modernized military. At $65 billion, it now has the second largest military budget in the world, after the United States. That spending is expected to increase three or four times over in the next 10 years.
The No. 1 military objective in China's strategic planning remains reunification with Taiwan.
Along these lines, China has developed submarine and other sophisticated naval abilities. It has invested in new kinds of combat and support aircraft. It has improved the expeditionary capacities of its army.
In addition, China continues to expand its ballistic missile arsenal, now over 500, and growing at a rate of 75 per year. It is also developing a variety of anti-satellite weapons.
Our old friends Germany and France don't think China's military is a threat to anyone – certainly not them – and want to sell even more sophisticated, high-tech weaponry to Beijing. There's good money to be made, they say. Appease the beast, they say.
All this accommodation, including the inability of U.S. leaders even to stand up for freedom, human rights, independence and sovereignty for the people of Taiwan, makes war in the future more likely, not less.
Appeasement never works.
The United States is hoping and praying China won't get trigger-happy. China is biding its time, telling the whole world, over and over again, that some day in the future there will be a reckoning over Taiwan. Beijing doesn't want to act now. It wants to act on its own timetable.
It's time to make certain the whole world knows what is at stake for the 26 million free people of Taiwan.
It's time for the United States to get some backbone and tell the Chinese they will never be allowed to force Taiwan into reunification.
It's time to let the people of Taiwan know we are behind them and encourage them to prepare to defend themselves.
After all, why do we talk about spreading freedom around the world while ignoring the plight of the people of Taiwan?
Appeasement didn't work with the Soviet Union and it won't work with the budding Evil Empire in Beijing. It's time to call China's bluff. It's time to give the tyrants in Beijing something to worry about. It's time to stop acting so tentative and fearful about offending them.
They must be put on notice that their dreams of conquering Taiwan militarily will be their own undoing.
The world is not willing.
We are not able--stretched too thin with too much internal conflict and tooooo compromised in a list of ways; too little political will etc.
And China would go ballistic literally and in about every other way.
Maybe back before Carter recognized Beijing we could have gotten away with it if the puppet masters had not existed and had not ordered the opposite.
Sigh.
I'd prefer successful recognition. Just don't think we could get away with it.
If the West is serious about freedom and the rights of freedom loving people to self-determination, it must support Taiwan against the tyranny posed by China.
Bush is not helping himself.
No.
Taiwan was never part of "mainland China". It was ceded to japan in 1895. Prior to that the Ching dynasty claim jurisdiction over Chinese people there and for ten years, 1885 to 1895 designated Taiwan a province. The they ceded Taiwan to Japan.
Taiwan then formed their own nation which the Japanese easily defeated in a matter of months.
In 1951 japanese renounced sovereignty over Taiwan and it ends there.
I'm as pro-Taiwan as you can possibly get, but status quo all around is the better option. Unfortunately, a declaration of independence, without an initial aggressive act by Beijing, would paint Taiwan as the bad guy in the court of international opinion -- and ESPECIALLY within the halls of the US State Dep't.
Hard to do that if the PRC manufactures 90 percent of the type steel needed for the US armor kits for their HUMMWV and trucks in Iraq. Hard to do that if the vender for rechargeable lithium ion cells used in current military batteries are outsourced and made in China.
Not exactly right. Except for periods of occupation by foreign powers,i.e. rogue Chinese elements, Portugese and Japanese, Taiwan has been and is a soverign nation.
The "one China" myth is false. It was created by the communist Chinese as justification of their plans to occupy and conquer Taiwan.
The "legal" status of Taiwan has not been helped by the ambiguity of the various Taiwanese documents thru-out history.
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