Taiwan should boost its military deterrence against China: scholars
ROC Central News Agency
2009/03/29 16:12:52
Taipei, March 29 (CNA) Taiwan should beef up its military deterrence in the face of China’s ever-growing military power, a group of noted scholars said Saturday at a roundtable discussion on the challenges Taiwan faces in regards to the U.S. security commitment stipulated in the Taiwan Relations Act (TRA) as the U.S. law enters its 30th anniversary.
“Taiwan ought to do everything it can to enhance its defense credibility and capability,”Stephen Krasner, a professor at Stanford University said at the meeting jointly hosted by the non-governmental Institute for National Policy Research (INPR) and Academic Sinica’s Institute of European and American Studies (IEAS).
“The kind of ambiguity that existed over the last few years about exactly what Taiwan has committed to doing ought to be eliminated. Taiwan ought to commit itself to the most robust defense relationship that it could establish with the U.S,”he added.
The U.S. Congress passed the TRA in 1979 after Washington established diplomatic relations with Beijing and severed formal diplomatic ties with Taipei.
The act requires the U.S. to guarantee defensive arms sales to Taiwan and to maintain the capacity of the U.S. to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or the social or economic system of the people of Taiwan.
The TRA, however, does not require the U.S. to intervene militarily if the People’s Republic of China attacks or invades Taiwan and the U.S. has adopted a policy of“strategic ambiguity,”in which it neither confirms nor denies that it would intervene in such a scenario.
According to an annual report released March 25 by the U.S. Department of Defense, China has continued with a military modernization program and remains a threat to Taiwan, with the military balance continuing to shift in Beijing’s favor despite reduced tensions in the region over the past year since the inauguration of President Ma Ying-jeou.
Michael Pillsbury, a consultant of the U.S. Department of Defense, expressed the same view as Krasner at the roundtable discussion, saying that Taiwan needs to increase its military deterrence to a level that is much higher than it is today.
According to Pillsbury, there are too many alarms that have been sounded about the hardening of Taiwan’s defense and it goes back to the Clinton administration’s efforts in 1997 and 1998 by resuming with Taiwan bilateral military contacts that included sending survey teams and much faster action on arms sales requests.
In addition to increasing military deterrence, Krasner, however, proposed an idea that was described by other discussants as rather“ revolutionary”or“radical, ”saying that while enhancing its defense capability, Taiwan should at the same time give up its formal recognitions by 23 countries that it is a sovereign nation.
Doing so, he said, would“demonstrate Taiwan’s commitment to maintaining its autonomy and independence, and at the same time not give the appearance that Taiwan is absolutely committed to a path to formal independence.”
Rebutting this view, Taiwan's Vice Foreign Minister Andrew Hsia said at the roundtable that as a sovereignty state, there is no way Taiwan would ever consider doing so.
“We are not saying that our being sovereign is based on recognition, but I think without recognition, the legitimacy of our sovereignty will be challenged,”he said.
John Tkacik, another participant at the roundtable who is a senior research fellow at the U.S. think tank Heritage Foundation, said that since Taiwan has lost its military leverage against China, with no comparison to Beijing’s military power, it should be careful not to give up anymore bargaining chips.
As to the question of whether the TRA in practice implies the statehood of Taiwan, Tkacik said the only reason why it is even being discussed is because China threatens war over Taiwan.
“There is no philosophical problem that the U.S. has with Taiwan ’s statehood. Taiwan is completely a state as far as the America is concerned except one thing -- China threatens war over it,”he said. (By Rachel Chan) Enditem/cs
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