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[Page: S10166]

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The column was written some weeks ago but makes as much sense today as it did when it first appeared.

I urge my colleagues to read the Arthur Waldron column, and I ask that it be printed in the Record at this point.

The column follows:

From the Wall Street Journal, May 29, 1991

One China Gets MFN, the Other Deserves GATT

Earlier this month a young lawyer from Taiwan named C.V. Chen met in Beijing with the elderly Chinese Vice Premier Wu Xueqian. It was an unprecedented encounter, signaling changes in the relationship between Taipei and Beijing that may prove as important for Asia as the end of the Berlin Wall was for Europe.

Mr. Chen and 13 colleagues represented a new body called the Straits Exchange Foundation that Taipei has created to deal `unofficially' with Beijing, just as its Coordination Council for North American Affairs deals `unofficially' with Washington. For Taipei, this is a promising move.

It is essential that the U.S. watch these developments closely and do all it can to foster their peaceful progress. For the possibility of conflict in the Taiwan Strait remains real, and could even increase if the cautious reconciliation between Taipei and Beijing fails. That reconciliation will proceed more smoothly if both China and Taiwan are full-fledged members of the international community. President Bush's decision this week to extend, with restrictions, China's most favored nation trading status is important in furthering that end. What is now needed are steps to end Taiwan's isolation.

That Taipei cannot handle its key relationships with Washington and Beijing through regular diplomatic channels is a measure of just how severe its diplomatic setbacks have been over the past 20 years, as nation after nation has derecognized it. Mr. Chen's visit, however, suggests that this process of marginalization is being reversed. The envoy from Taipei represents a government whose leverage and confidence are increasing. The government of his Chinese host is watching its once formidable international clout dwindle.

From this changing balance of power comes both promise and risk. The promise is that Taiwan--wealthy, militarily strong and increasingly democratic--will find the confidence to compromise with China. The risk is that the government of the People's Republic, beleaguered at home and increasingly ignored internationally, will be unwilling to accept Taiwan's best offer, and instead try for the whole cake.

The risk is intensified by the fact that competition between Taiwan and the mainland is not just between governments, but between two kinds of Chinese societies. The meeting between C.V. Chen and Wu Xueqian suggests how much the psychological equation between the two Chinas has shifted. On the vexing issue of whether Beijing is the `central' government and Taipei a `local' one, Mr. Chen said the issue is not one of territorial size or population but of system. The choice, he said, has to be made by the Chinese people.

A decade ago most observers would have argued that the Chinese people had already made their choice--communism. But the democracy movement of 1989 showed that is not the case, and the Tiananmen massacre showed how far the Chinese government was willing to go to hold on to power. Talks between Taiwan and China present a diplomatic version of the same set of issues.

Policy toward Taiwan (and also Hong Kong) is a bone of contention in internal Chinese politics. For hard-liners, the incorporation of both territories into the People's Republic on Beijing's terms is part of the oldtime religion of communism. Hence increasing intervention in Hong Kong's affairs and the unwillingness to drop the threat of force against Taiwan. For reformers, Taiwan (and Hong Kong) are sources of capital, ideas and leverage. The reformers welcome contacts, in the hope that they will push the mainland forward, and are not particular about points concerning the status of governments, flags, etc. that regularly hang up negotiations.

The strength of this second group in China is cause for long-term optimism. But as long as it is stalemated by hard-liners, no decisive breakthrough in Taiwan-China negotiations is likely. The longer the situation remains unresolved, however, the greater the risk that things will go sour.

Thus there is a danger that frustration in negotiations will strengthen extremists on both sides of the strait in ways that could lead to confrontation. It is not hard to evision nightmare scenarios. Suppose that Beijing, troubled by unrest at home, decided that some saber-rattling (say, a blockade) to `liberate' Taiwan was just the patriotic tonic China needed? Or that elections in Taiwan produced a government that gave up on China and decided instead to declare the island independent? Under such circumstances Beijing has promised to respond with force.

No such scenario offers much comfort. Unlike Iraq, China is a nuclear power; unlike Kuwait, Taiwan can resist. The U.S. and Japan would become involved.

These are not pleasant prospects, and enough people understand them well enough that they will probably be avoided. But they serve to remind us that what happens between China and Taiwan is not simply an Asian curiosity: It is something in which the world has a stake.

Is there anything constructive the world powers can do? The key variable is internal politics on both sides of the Taiwan Strait, and in each case the threat comes from extreme or uncompromising positions. China is difficult to influence, but at a minimum we must strive to maintain contacts and confidence--such as MFN status. In Taiwan, the danger is that a Taiwan isolated from the world community and unable to be Chinese except on Beijing's terms will opt for independence.

Avoiding this means bringing Taiwan back into the world community. The major powers should move to upgrade their relations with Taipei. They should support Taipei's entrance into the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. They should involve Taipei in international economic and security consultations.

China is hostile to this approach. So are hard-liners in Taiwan. But it's the only way to strengthen the moderates on both sides and help the world avoid some very real perils.

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