By Lyle Goldstein
During a press conference with Australian senior officials in early December, American secretary of state Anthony Blinken revealed his contention that the futures of both Ukraine and Taiwan are inextricably linked. He said that the major efforts undertaken by the U.S. and its allies to help Ukraine “impacted on China’s thinking about the future and about what it may be looking at in terms of Taiwan.”
It is true that the circumstances of both Ukraine and Taiwan have a certain symmetry. Located at either end of the Eurasian supercontinent, they each confront existential pressure from major and proximate powers. At stake in each conflict is not simply territory and ideology but also, crucially, identity and history. Language is a factor, too, but not in a way of which Americans seem to be aware: just as Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky’s first language is not actually Ukrainian, but instead Russian, the official language of Taiwan is not Taiwanese but, rather, Mandarin Chinese.
Unfortunately, however, Blinken’s analysis is not only simplistic, but also harmful to America’s strategic interests. The Biden administration has adopted a neo-Wilsonian position on Ukraine that seeks to bolster the country’s democracy against Russian authoritarian aggression. In this, it has achieved some genuine successes, helping to drive Putin’s forces back from Kyiv, Kharkiv, and most recently Kherson.
This piece was originally published in Unherd on December 27, 2022. Read more HERE.