My Take | Zelensky’s Oval Office flare-up should be a Taiwan wake-up call
As the island is now even more exposed to America’s unreliability, it is time to test Beijing’s sincerity by switching to a diplomatic approach
Here’s a crazy idea for Taiwan. How about trying to improve relations with mainland China? It will be much cheaper and safer for everyone in the Asia-Pacific, not just for the Chinese race.
“Porcupine defence”, “silicon shield”, American arms, really? Diplomatic finesse is the best guarantee of peace across the Taiwan Strait.
For a decade now, the island under the independence-seeking Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has bet the ranch on America’s diplomatic and defence support.
The fireworks in the Oval Office between US President Donald Trump and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky on Friday should finally wake up more Taiwanese to their misguided reliance on the Americans. Washington will turn on you or drop you at the drop of a hat.
To justify its US-centric policy, the DPP under Tsai Ing-wen and now Lai Ching-te has to keep tensions high and provoke Beijing at every opportunity. That has been a costly and dangerous game.
Beijing, though, has made it clear that the use of force is the last, not the first resort. It cares more about the well-being and prosperity of people on the island – the vast majority of whom are ethnic Chinese – than any Western government with its own agenda.
This is not a struggle for “democracy” causing endless tensions and destabilising the whole region, but for peace and national dignity.