FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
January 13, 2024
Contact: press@defensepriorities.org
WASHINGTON, DC—Taiwan’s presidential election results show that the candidate representing the current ruling party has secured a victory. Defense Priorities Director of Asia Engagement Lyle Goldstein issued the following statement in response:
“Taiwan’s election result poses major challenges for regional and global security. China has repeatedly made it clear that it regards DPP rule as anathema, since DPP leaders insist that Taiwan has already achieved independence. Taiwan’s current leader, Tsai Ing-wen, has adopted a rather cautious approach, and hopefully her successor Lai will do the same.
“Taiwan should increase its self-reliance, by readjusting its defensive strategy in an asymmetric direction, while simultaneously boosting defense expenditures and strengthening its long-neglected reserve forces. It should reduce its tendency to rely on external aid. Unfortunately, efforts, largely driven by Washington, to increase the salience of Taiwan-U.S. ties, mean that U.S.-China ties remain dangerously close to the brink of military conflict. In recent years, such deleterious steps have included increased numbers of high-level U.S. officials visiting Taiwan, increased arms sales that don’t meet Taiwan’s defensive needs, and even the deployment of some U.S. troops to Taiwan, as well as a vastly increased pattern of military exercises in the proximate areas. Washington should help safeguard the peaceful status quo, maintaining strategic ambiguity, along with reassurances that it does not seek Taiwan’s indefinite separation from China.
“A U.S.-China war over Taiwan would mean catastrophic consequences, war between two nuclear superpowers. This can be avoided, but only with skillful diplomacy on all sides. Washington should reaffirm the original One China policy and abjure the increasingly fashionable idea in the U.S. of using Taiwan as ‘a cork in the bottle’ of China’s maritime expansion. Above all, the U.S. should seek deep and broad engagement with China and limit its preparations to fight a war to defend Taiwan. It’s time to stop sleepwalking into a war with another nuclear power over an island of no particular strategic importance.”
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