Protect Taiwan by further integrating it into the global community

If we learned anything from the long, exhausting year of 2023, it was that public interest in international affairs is finite.

All eyes were on Ukraine in the first half of the year as the Ukrainian Armed Forces prepared for the major counteroffensive that began early in June. At the Shangri-La Dialogue security conference in Singapore, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin gave a speech that tried to remind Americans of U.S. commitments in the Indo-Pacific. Everything changed on Oct. 7, when Hamas terrorists launched a major attack on southern Israel. The ensuing conflict in Gaza, as the Israeli Defense Forces responded, has devoured all the oxygen of publicity since.

An enduring challenge for policymakers is that events do not patiently wait their turn or line up in an orderly fashion. Taiwan’s presidential election on Jan. 13 is a timely reminder that this is a ticking timebomb in the South China Sea.

The Chinese leader, Xi Jinping, is determined to make progress on his country’s claim to Taiwan: in 2019, he refused to rule out the use of force to achieve what the Chinese regime regards as “reunification,” and in 2022 the government published its first white paper on Taiwan in more than 20 years. The paper encouraged Taiwan to become a special administrative region of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and, unlike previous statements in 1993 and 2000, omitted a pledge that it “will not send troops or administrative personnel to be based in Taiwan.”

An attempted seizure of Taiwan by force is now very much on the table. In 2021, Admiral Philip Davidson, head of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, told the Senate that there was a substantial threat of China making a move against the island by 2027; the following year, the Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Michael Gilday, expressed the view that it could be as early as 2024. Last February, CIA Director Bill Burns said at a conference that it was “a matter of intelligence” that Xi had told the leadership of the People’s Liberation Army to be ready to mount an assault on Taiwan by 2027.

This does not necessarily mean that a full-scale military assault, some modernized homage to the opening scene of “Saving Private Ryan,” is looming. China has already begun exerting pressure on Taiwan, employing so-called “gray zone” tactics like sending military aircraft into Taiwanese airspace — on one day last September, 103 Chinese planes entered Taiwan’s air defense identification zone — infringing its territorial waters and imposing economic sanctions on imports. But the drumbeat is increasing.

This leaves the United States to decide how it reacts. Under the terms of the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979, the U.S. must supply weaponry and assistance “to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability” and “maintain the capacity of the United States to resist any resort to force or other forms of coercion that would jeopardize the security, or social or economic system, of the people on Taiwan.” But this is not an absolute commitment to use military force to defend Taiwan, and the absence of such a commitment has been at the heart of America’s concept of “strategic ambiguity” for nearly 45 years.

There are more subtle measures at work too. Last month, with no fanfare at all, the State Department announced that officials had met with counterparts from the Taiwanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs to discuss expanding Taiwan’s participation in international organizations. The press release referred specifically to the UN, the World Health Organization and the International Civil Aviation Organization, and praised the “world-class expertise Taiwan brings in many areas of global concern, including health, food security, aviation green fuels, and bolstering women’s economic and political empowerment.” It also talked about engagement with other countries “who share our concerns regarding attempts to exclude Taiwan from the international community.”

This is clever diplomacy. Until Congress passed the Taiwan Relations Act in 1979, the American government recognized Taiwan — officially styled the Republic of China — as the sole legitimate government of all of China. Indeed, until 1974, there were nuclear weapons deployed on the island as part of the U.S. Taiwan Defense Command. Since the U.S. recognized the government in Beijing, however, it can no longer treat Taiwan as an independent state.

What the U.S. can do, and is doing, is try to hardwire an autonomous Taipei administration into the international system and essentially “normalize” Taiwan’s freedom from control by China. This achieves two objectives: First, it makes Taiwan the closest thing to a normal independent country that can be achieved without abandoning strategic ambiguity; second, perhaps more importantly, it internationalizes the issue. If other countries are dealing on a regular multilateral basis with Taiwan through the UN, the WHO, the ICAO and other forums, it raises the stakes of any attempt by Beijing to annex the island.

I have little doubt that some kind of action by China against Taiwan will take place, probably within the next five years. It may be an economic blockade or a massive cyberattack rather than PLA Marine Corps soldiers wading ashore at Xishu Beach, but Xi has made his intentions clear.

If and when it happens, it will be a massive test of will for the U.S. and its allies — what do American security guarantees mean when it comes to the crunch? Until that point, Washington needs to make any aggressive action by China as unattractive and costly as possible. Though it may seem mundane, binding Taiwan into international and multilateral institutions and agreements on everyday issues like transport, health and women’s rights is a very smart move.

Eliot Wilson is a freelance writer on politics and international affairs. He was senior official in the U.K. House of Commons from 2005 to 2016, including serving as a clerk of the Defence Committee and secretary of the U.K. delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly.