Taiwan situation comes to a head: How the conflict with China came about - and what it's about
Created: 08/03/2022, 12:19 p.m
By: Sven Hauberg
Taiwan's President with a Kestrel anti-tank missile launcher: The country is preparing for a Chinese invasion.
© Chien Chih-Hung/Imago
Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan has China in turmoil.
Why actually?
The background of the conflict.
Munich/Beijing/Taipei – Everything went well again – at least for the time being: Late on Tuesday evening (local time), Nancy Pelosi landed safely at Taipei Airport.
There had previously been speculation that the US politician's plane could be pushed aside or even shot down by Chinese fighter jets.
According to everything that is currently known, however, happened during the flight: nothing.
The controversial visit by the chairmen of the US House of Representatives did not go unnoticed either.
Beijing sent military planes near Taiwan on Tuesday.
From Thursday, Beijing also wants to hold maneuvers around Taiwan, during which there will also be live shooting.
Nancy Pelosi, number three in the US political hierarchy, is a representative of one democratic state visiting the representatives of another democratic state: This is how one could look at this visit.
The communist leadership in Beijing naturally sees things completely differently.
For the People's Republic of China, Taiwan is part of its own territory, a "breakaway province" over which Beijing has no power, but which is firmly part of its own national territory.
In fact, however, Taiwan is its own country, with its own government, its own army and a democracy that could hardly be more vibrant.
In the Economist
's Democracy Index
, the country was ranked 8th, even ahead of Germany (the People's Republic of China is ranked 148th).
The Taiwanese are considered to be extremely protesting (a few of them also demonstrated against Pelosi's visit on Tuesday), same-sex couples have been allowed to say yes for three years.
President Tsai Ing-wen is one of Asia's most progressive politicians.
So it's hardly surprising that less than two percent of Taiwan's citizens want a quick return to China.
The overwhelming majority of people have long since developed their own Taiwanese identity.
For them, the idea of becoming part of the Chinese communist dictatorship is terrifying.
China threatens Taiwan with "reunification" - if necessary with violence
For years, however, China has been threatening to “reunite” Taiwan with the communist mainland.
If necessary, this should be done with military force, state and party leader Xi Jinping emphasized several times.
Despite the martial tones, Beijing is also hoping for a peaceful solution to the Taiwan problem.
After all, a military invasion of the island would be anything but child's play, even for a highly armed China.
Taiwan has modern defensive weapons and many reservists, and the country's citizens also regularly practice for emergencies.
The war in Ukraine may also have shown Beijing what happens when you invade a country and are not welcomed with open arms, but with massive resistance.
Nevertheless, some analysts believe that Beijing could soon get serious.
For example, as early as 2027, when the People's Liberation Army - China's military, which is actually the armed wing of the Communist Party - will mark the 100th anniversary of its founding.
Or only in 2049, when the People's Republic will be 100 years old.
Either way, for China's communists, "reunification" with Taiwan is a "historic task" that must be accomplished, peacefully or militarily or through economic pressure.
China and Taiwan: A conflict that has been smoldering for decades
The conflict between China and Taiwan dates back to the Chinese Civil War, which broke out in 1927 - a few years after the end of the empire and the founding of the Republic of China: after the communist victory and the proclamation of the People's Republic of China by Mao Zedong in 1949 the defeated nationalists, the Kuomintang, fled to Taiwan, where the Republic of China, founded in 1912, has lived on ever since.
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Taiwan had only been released from Japanese colonial rule a few years earlier, so it was in fact never part of the People's Republic.
Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek ruled Taiwan with an iron fist as a dictator for decades and even wanted to retake the communist mainland.
It was his son Chiang Ching-kuo that slowly opened Taiwan to democracy in the 1980s.
Tsai Ing-wen is the country's fourth freely elected president.
However, the Asian model democracy is only officially recognized by very few countries, not even by the Federal Republic of Germany.
China would prefer to prevent visits from top foreign politicians like Nancy Pelosi.
Nevertheless, representatives of Western democracies keep traveling to Taiwan, most recently the Vice President of the European Parliament, Nicola Beer.
The US made contact with Communist China in 1972 when Richard Nixon met Mao Zedong and Premier Zhou Enlai in Beijing.
Seven years later, Washington broke off diplomatic relations with Taipei and recognized the government in Beijing as part of the so-called "One China Policy".
The "One China Policy" states that states that establish diplomatic relations with the People's Republic must recognize that Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan are part of China.
Washington maintains only informal relations with the government in Taipei.
At the same time, however, the US government has pledged to supply Taiwan with defense weapons and has insisted that unification with China should only be achieved through peaceful means.
Taiwan: Important for the world economy – and US geopolitics
Recently, however, Joe Biden has repeatedly made statements that promised the Taiwanese more than just the delivery of weapons.
In May, during a visit to Japan, the US President pledged military support to Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion.
"That's the commitment we made," Biden said.
China "plays with danger," he stressed.
The US would support the One China policy, but not the idea of using force to implement it.
"That's just not appropriate." A little later, the White House backtracked - the previous policy of the US government would not change, it said.
Washington had so far left it open how it would react to a Chinese invasion.
This so-called "strategic ambiguity" should act as a deterrent to China.
The fact is, a Chinese attack on Taiwan would have a huge impact on the entire world.
Above all economically, because one of the most important semiconductor manufacturers, the company TSMC, is based on the island.
The chips from TSMC are found in mobile phones and countless other electronic products worldwide.
Taiwan is also of outstanding strategic importance for the USA.
Because together with other countries in the region - South Korea, Japan and the Philippines - it forms a kind of American-dominated chain around China.
If Taiwan falls, the gateway to the Pacific would open for Beijing.
Hard to imagine that the world power USA would allow that.
(sh)
