U.S. warship sails through Taiwan Strait for first time since Trump inauguration
The U.S. Navy said the guided-missile destroyer USS Ralph Johnson and survey ship USNS Bowditch had carried out a 'routine north-to-south Taiwan Strait transit' from Monday to Wednesday.
'Ships transit between the East China Sea and the South China Sea via the Taiwan Strait and have done so for many years,' U.S. Indo-Pacific Command spokesman Cmdr. Matthew Comer told The Japan Times. 'The transit occurred through a corridor in the Taiwan Strait that is beyond any coastal state's territorial seas. Within this corridor all nations enjoy high-seas freedom of navigation, overflight and other internationally lawful uses of the sea related to these freedoms.'
China and Taiwan also confirmed the transit, with Beijing deploying naval and air forces 'to monitor the entire passage of the U.S. vessels.'
'The actions of the U.S. sent the wrong signals and increased security risks,' Senior Capt. Li Xi, spokesperson for the Chinese military's Eastern Theater Command, said in a statement Wednesday.
Beijing views Taiwan — the democratic island that it says is a renegade province that must be united with the mainland, by force if necessary — as the 'core of its core interests.'
Much to China's chagrin, the U.S. Navy routinely sends ships through the Taiwan Strait, sometimes with other navies. Last September, Japan sent a Maritime Self-Defense Force destroyer through the strategic waterway for the first time ever following a series of unprecedented Chinese military moves inside Japanese airspace and waters.
Beijing says the Taiwan Strait belongs to it — a position that Taipei and Washington dispute, having said the waterway is international waters.
Asked about the transit, a spokesperson for China's Taiwan Affairs Office reiterated that Taiwan is a 'core interest' of China.
'We firmly oppose and will never allow any external interference,' spokesperson Zhu Fenglian said. 'We have the firm will, full confidence and sufficient ability to safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity.'
The last publicly reported U.S. Navy mission in the strait came in late November, when a P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft flew over the waterway, while the last time a U.S. warship was confirmed to have sailed through the waterway was in October, part of a joint mission with Canada's navy.
The latest transit may signal continuity of such sailings under Trump, who noted 'the importance of peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait' during his summit with Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba last week.
The actions could soften claims by Trump on the campaign trail for the U.S. presidency last year that Taiwan should pay the U.S. more for 'protection' and that it had 'stolen' America's semiconductor business.
The United States switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979, but has maintained unofficial relations with Taiwan and is bound by law to supply the island with weapons to help it defend itself.
While the U.S. has largely over the years maintained a policy of 'strategic ambiguity' as to whether or not it would come to Taiwan's defense in the event of any attack or invasion by China, former U.S. President Joe Biden — Trump's predecessor — repeatedly said that the United States would militarily defend the island.
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