Taiwan has never been more vulnerable to invasion, and America is to blame

Telegraph

02-04-2025

The second Trump presidency has thrown Europe into turmoil with its radical change of policy on the war in Ukraine. But an even greater storm is brewing as the elements of Trump's China policy emerge by fits and starts. As a result the crucial bilateral issue, Taiwan, is becoming more dangerously unstable – a hotspot that could rapidly become a flashpoint. Why has this happened, and what, if anything, can be done to prevent meltdown?
China will hardly have been surprised to find itself in Trump 2.0's sights over tariffs. These punches had been well signalled. From Beijing's standpoint however, hefty tariffs imposed on a troubled export-led super-economy are not merely trade competition, but an existential threat. Xi Jinping laid down red lines for US China relations at his final meeting with President Biden in Lima last November. One was that the US must not try to constrain China's growth as part of its economic statecraft. While the intended impact of Washington's China tariffs are still unclear, no talk of 'deals' with China can alter Beijing's zero-sum perspective.
Equally adversative, from China's viewpoint, have been US efforts to revive relations with Putin and Russia. Described by some as a 'Reverse Nixon' ploy to split a weakened Russia away from a far stronger China, this challenges the expedient alliance which both regard as central to the success of their anti-US geostrategies. There are few indications to date that this alliance has been significantly weakened, despite the ground the US has already ceded in pursuit of an imaginary deal.
Indications are emerging that US decoupling from Europe is intended to free up US energies for use in Asia to contain and defeat China's ambitions for global dominance. This strategy reportedly includes regaining US control of critical resources over which China has acquired de facto monopolies. Annexing Greenland forms part of this scheme; echoes of Ukraine and Taiwan's plight seem not to figure.
Yet at this point in the evolving contest, Taiwan inevitably becomes the epicentre of potential armed conflict between these opponent superpowers. Since this was almost inevitable, it must be supposed that Washington has considered carefully how to manage this reality, given the global catastrophe that could so easily be triggered. But contradictory signals have added to the problem. Trump asked Bloomberg last July why the US should 'insure' Taiwan when the US got nothing in return, sowing widespread concern that Taiwan's main protector might withdraw support. Similar doubts eroded regional support for the Taiwanese cause.
In his lecture on red lines for the next US President relayed to Biden in Lima, Xi began with Taiwan, on which 'China must not be challenged'. But this familiar mantra has been so challenged. An internal Pentagon directive on deterring Chinese annexation of Taiwan has been corroborated during US defence secretary Hegseth's recent visit to Asia, where he spoke of reviving 'credible (US) deterrence' against China in the Indo-Pacific, 'including across the Taiwan Strait'. Here too, however, doubt remains about whether the US stands ready to manage the likely consequences.
China's claim to Taiwan is as indefensible and coercive as Putin's in Ukraine, and even more dangerous. But at this stage in Trump 2:0 it seems quixotic to throw down the Taiwan gauntlet so publicly. Beijing has so far led with propaganda that Trump cares nothing for Taiwan and will simply 'throw it away'. Now they can more readily state that the US remains a hegemonic aggressor bent on crushing China's territorial sovereignty.
The results are already apparent – the sudden deployment of another coercive blockade exercise to show the irresistible strength of China's intention and rapidly evolving capability. Whatever may still be construed as to China's military capacity to mount a successful invasion, Taiwan is simply too vulnerable to a sustained blockade to hold up long. The US bluff, in effect, has already been called, at a time when its regional and global alliances are fragmented, and its ability to succeed alone pre-emptively is also in question.
For the Chinese Communist regime, it is hard to imagine that any transactional deal tabled by the US could secure Taiwan's continued independence. The world now hangs in the balance between survival and disaster. When Xi and Trump eventually meet, we must all pray that they both understand precisely what is at stake.