Posted on 03/29/2005 5:47:36 PM PST by RWR8189
Imagine the following "European rockets sink U.S. aircraft carrier in Taiwan Straits." Such a headline is unlikely, of course. If such an event were ever to happen, it would mean a massive crisis had erupted both in Asia and across the Atlantic. Very likely, it would indicate the end of the Atlantic alliance -- and perhaps a new cold war between the United States and a new Euro-Chinese axis.
But such a headline is far from impossible if two current political trends continue uninterrupted.
The first such trend was seen in the streets of Taipei last weekend. Demonstrators favoring full independence for Taiwan protested against a new Chinese law threatening military intervention by Beijing if the island-province were to secede. And Washington is on both sides of this dispute. It is well-known that the United States is committed to defending Taiwan against an unprovoked attack by Beijing. President Bush made this unambiguously clear early in his presidency. That puts America on Taiwan's side.
But the American guarantee protects only the de facto independence Taiwan enjoys. American policy has always accepted the legal fiction of "One China" that both Beijing and Taipei accepted until recent years. Washington favors the democratic and free-market polity into which Taiwan has gradually evolved. But the United States has never supported the claim that Taiwan is an independent nation. That puts Washington on China's side.
History has thus forced an unwanted ambiguity on the Bush administration. Bush is seeking to resolve it in the following way: He would help defend Taiwan against an unprovoked Chinese attack, but he would not support a Taiwanese declaration of independence.
In practice, this balancing act is extremely difficult. What would he do if the Taiwanese did declare independence or if a referendum voted for it? My guess -- it can be no more -- is that he would ask Beijing to hold off from any military response while he placed enormous diplomatic pressure on the Taipei government to withdraw the declaration.
And if the Taiwanese were rash enough to ignore this warning -- thus putting their real existing democratic independence at risk for a purely formal status -- he would extract in return for U.S. inaction a Chinese promise that a post-conflict Taiwan would enjoy the same kind of "special" status that Hong Kong has enjoyed since 1997.
It is not certain a Chinese attack across the straits would succeed even against a Taiwan unprotected by the United States. Taiwan is formidably armed, and as D-Day should warn us, amphibious operations are always very risky. That is why the Chinese are desperate to acquire the most modern weapons from whomever will sell them.
That is where the European Union comes in. At a time when the Bush administration is doing all it can to restrain Taiwan, the EU is proposing to aggravate this extraordinarily serious crisis by lifting its arms embargo on Beijing imposed after the massacre in Tiananmen Square. This decision is being firmly pushed by France and Germany, strongly supported by the nascent EU diplomatic staff headed by Javier Solana, and resisted by the Brits and the East Europeans.
Exactly why are the French, Germans and the Euro-diplomats pushing this controversial proposal so strongly? After all, it has some very obvious drawbacks. It risks a major trans-Atlantic rift at a time when U.S.-European relations were manifestly improving as a result of the recent Bush visit. It gives aid and comfort to a despotic Chinese regime with territorial ambitions. And it threatens to destabilize a part of the world -- northeast Asia -- where a number of important strategic threats already fester, for instance, North Korean nukes.
Quite simply, France under President Jacques Chirac and Germany under Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder want to forge a strategic partnership with China against the American "hyperpower" to bring about a "multi-polar world." The EU diplomatic machinery under Solana is going along with all that because its overriding impulse is to forge a common foreign policy distinct from U.S. foreign policy. And what could be more distinct than a policy of arming a major state that is threatening to invade a U.S. ally? It must give Solana a positive frisson of Euro-excitement -- reminding him perhaps of the days when he led anti-American demonstrations to keep Spain out of NATO.
It will seem much less exciting if, somewhere down the road, Bush's balancing act fails, the Chinese invade, America comes to the help of Taiwan, and an American aircraft carrier is attacked with French or German weapons sold by the EU. That dangerous situation will be even more dangerous if, by then, the EU has forged its strategic partnership with the Beijing dictatorship. We would then be in a new cold war.
The United States is seeking to avoid such a disaster by encouraging the Brits and others to delay the lifting of the embargo. But their ability to do so gets weaker with every step toward a common EU foreign policy. So does their willingness as they get absorbed by the anti-American political culture of Brussels and the EU. Yet it is American policy to encourage this Euro-integration and the common European foreign policy that is its latest expression.
If that U.S. aircraft carrier ever is sunk, maybe the battle honors should be displayed in the State Department.
Scary stuff, huh.
the Chinese invade, America comes to the help of Taiwan, and an American aircraft carrier is attacked with French or German weapons sold by the EU. That dangerous situation will be even more dangerous if, by then, the EU has forged its strategic partnership with the Beijing dictatorship. We would then be in a new cold war.
No, at that point we would be in a very HOT war~!
Yeah -- to them. Would it be better for the US to pull out all its NATO contingent now, and help screw the EU economy, or to leave the troops on the ground there in case we ever have to kick all their asses?
RE: "Would it be better for the US to pull out all its NATO contingent now, and help screw the EU economy...?"
Did you see this?...:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-4902279,00.html
"While some Puerto Ricans cheered the naval base's April 1, 2004, closing as the end of a colonial relic," those who weren't brain-dead knew they were going to be royally screwed. ;')
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