Explained: The China-Taiwan tussle

But Taiwan is entirely dependent on the US for its defence against possible Chinese aggression — and that is why every spike in military tensions between China and Taiwan injects more hostility in the already strained relationship between Washington and Beijing.

1949: Founding of the PRC

Taiwan, earlier known as Formosa, a tiny island off the east coast of China, is where Chinese republicans of the Kuomintang government retreated after the 1949 victory of the communists — and it has since continued as the Republic of China (RoC). The island is located in the East China Sea, to the northeast of Hong Kong, north of the Philippines and south of South Korea, and southwest of Japan. What happens in and around Taiwan is of deep concern to all of East Asia.

Taiwan observes October 10 — “double 10” — as its national day; it was on this day in 1911 that sections of the Manchu army rose in rebellion, leading ultimately to the overthrow of the Qing dynasty and the end of 4,000 years of the monarchy. The RoC was declared on December 29, 1911, and it found its feet in the 1920s under the leadership of Dr Sun Yat-sen, founder of the Kuomintang (KMT) Party.

Sun was succeeded by General Chiang Kai-shek, whose actions against the Chinese communists, who were part of an alliance with the KMT, triggered the civil war that ended in victory for the communists and retreat of Chiang and the KMT to Taiwan.

Since its founding in 1949, the PRC has believed that Taiwan must be reunified with the mainland, while the RoC has held out as an “independent” country. The RoC became the non-communist frontier against China during the Cold War, and was the only ‘China’ recognised at the UN until 1971. That was when the US inaugurated ties with China through the secret diplomacy of Henry Kissinger, national security adviser to President Richard Nixon.

The US backs Taiwan’s independence, maintains ties with Taipei, and sells weapons to it — but officially subscribes to PRC’s “One China Policy”, which means there is only one legitimate Chinese government. Just 15, mostly very small, countries recognise Taiwan.

China-Taiwan tensions

In 1954-55, and in 1958, the PRC bombed the Jinmen, Mazu, and Dachen islands under Taiwan’s control, drawing in the US. Congress passed the Formosa Resolution authorising President Dwight D Eisenhower to defend RoC territory.

In 1955, Premier Zhou En-lai declared at the Bandung Conference that he wanted negotiations with the US. But as civil war broke out in Lebanon in 1958, China resumed the bombing, provoking the US to supply Taiwanese outposts on the islands. The PRC and ROC then arrived at an arrangement to bomb each other’s garrisons on alternate days — this continued until 1971. (‘Milestones in the History of US Foreign Relations’, history.state.gov)

The most serious encounter was in 1995-96, when China began testing missiles in the seas around Taiwan, triggering the biggest US mobilisation in the region since the Vietnam War. The tests led to the re-election in 1996 of President Lee Teng-hui, seen by the Chinese as a pro-independence leader.

Xi reiterated that Taiwan (map) must reunify with China.

Independence politics

In 1975, Chiang Kai-shek died, martial law was lifted, and Taiwan got its first democratic reforms. Starting from the 1990s, and despite the missile crisis, relations between the PRC and RoC improved, and trade ties were established. As the British prepared to exit Hong Kong in 1999, the “One China, Two Systems” solution was offered to Taiwan as well, but it was rejected by the Taiwanese.

In 2000, Taiwan got its first non-KMT government, when the Taiwanese nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won the presidency. In 2004, China started drafting an anti-secession law aimed at Taiwan; trade and connectivity, however, continued to improve.

Today, the two big players in Taiwan’s politics are the DPP and KMT, broadly the parties of the island’s Hakka inhabitants and the minority mainland Chinese respectively. The 2016 election of President Tsai marked the onset of a sharp pro-independence phase in Taiwan, and the current tensions with China coincided with her re-election in 2020.

Taiwan now has massive economic interests, including investments in China, and pro-independence sections worry that this might come in the way of their goals. Inversely, the pro-reunification sections of the polity, as well as China, hope that economic dependence and increasing people-to-people contacts will wear out the pro-independence lobbies.

Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing. (AP Photo/Andy Wong, File)

The current tensions

Last year, amid worsening US-China relations over Covid and trade, the State Department sent its highest ranking delegation yet to Taipei. During the visit, the Chinese conducted a military exercise in the Taiwan Strait, which separates Taiwan from mainland China.

In October 2020, President Xi Jinping asked the PLA to prepare for war, triggering alarm in Taiwan, which read it as an open threat.

Early in the Biden Administration, which has declared “rock solid” commitment to Taiwan, Taipei raised an alert about an incursion by Chinese warplanes. In April, Taiwan reported Chinese jets in its air defence zone. In July, Xi warned that he would “smash” any Taiwanese move towards independence.

At the beginning of this month, as the Chinese jets came back, Taiwanese Defence Minister Chiu Kuo-cheng told Parliament that China already has the capacity to invade Taiwan, and but would be able to “bring the cost and attrition to its lowest” by 2025.

In a speech on October 10, Xi appeared to allay fears of a forcible takeover, and spoke about “peaceful reunification”. But he underlined that “the historical task of the complete reunification of the motherland… will definitely be fulfilled.” That same day, the Taiwanese president said that while her government would not “act rashly”, the Taiwanese people would not “bow to pressure” either.

Challenge for the US

As tensions rise, the world is watching the US, whose status as the world’s pre-eminent power has been dented by the messy exit from Afghanistan. In East and Southeast Asia, several countries including Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines, which are sheltered under the protective umbrella of the US, are reading the tea leaves.

President Joe Biden has so far walked a thin line between pledging support for Taiwan, and keeping the lid on tensions with Beijing. After speaking with Xi earlier this month, he said they had agreed to abide by the “Taiwan Agreement”, under which US support for the “One China Policy” is premised on Beijing not invading Taiwan.

The AUKUS pact among the US, UK, and Australia, under which Australia will be supplied with nuclear submarines, has imparted a new dimension to the security dynamics of the Indo-Pacific. Taiwan has welcomed the pact, while China has denounced it as seriously undermining regional peace.

The UK, Japan and US sail to conduct multiple carrier strike group operations in the Philippine Sea, on Oct. 3, 2021. (Jason Tarleton/U.S. Navy via AP)

Implications for India

With India facing its own problems with China at the LAC, there have been suggestions that it should review its One China Policy — it has in any case long stopped reiterating this officially — and use not just the Tibet card, but also develop more robust relations with Taiwan to send a message to Beijing.

India and Taiwan currently maintain “trade and cultural exchange” offices in each other’s capitals. In May 2020, the swearing-in of Tsai was attended virtually by BJP MPs Meenakshi Lekhi (now MoS External Affairs) and Rahul Kaswan. In 2016, New Delhi had dropped plans to send two representatives for Tsai’s first inaugural at the last minute.

Bloomberg has reported that talks with Taipei are ongoing to bring a $7.5-billion semiconductor or chip manufacturing plant to India. Chips are used in a range of devices from computers to 5G smartphones, to electric cars and medical equipment. The deal was reported on the heels of a summit of the Quad, a grouping of the US, India, Japan and Australia seeking to contain China’s influence in the Indo-Pacific. One of the topics discussed at the meeting was the need to build a “safe supply chain for semiconductors”.

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