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moment is not far away when we will face what is most conveniently
referred to as The Taiwan Question. The
tense fortnight
following the EP-3 incident taught us nothing conclusive, but demonstrated
once again the profound nationalistic mood of the people of China.
A summary of what we learned (or, of what we were reminded) was
brilliantly done by John Derbyshire, writing in the current National
Review. In his essay on China he writes, "Find a mainlander,
preferably one under the age of thirty, and ask him which of the
following he would prefer: for the Communists to stay in power indefinitely,
unreformed, but in full control of the 'three T's' (Tibet, Turkestan,
Taiwan); or a democratic, constitutional government without
the three T's. His answer will depress you. You can even try this
unhappy little experiment with dissidents: same answer."
It is all
the more remarkable, from a Western perspective, when we are reminded
not only that Taiwan has been under Peking supervision a mere four
years in the last century, but that before it was taken by the Japanese
in 1895 it was less than an integral part of China, being a mere
prefecture of Fujian Province under the Manchu dynasty. But that
has not lessened the passion of the Chinese for reannexation, and
of course it has helped the historical dilemma not at all that everybody
in sight — not only the Chinese, but the Taiwanese, the Americans,
and the United Nations — repeat the catechism of One China. What
impends is the dark moment when China opines that this being so,
it is downright unfriendly for the United States to supply Taiwan
with such weapons as are necessary to protect it from becoming de
facto One China.
In Commentary
magazine a year ago, observers were asked to comment on likely
crises in the foreign policy of the next president. One writer conjectured
that there was no way that any constitutional policy formulation
would absolutely guide the United States. There aren't, really,
policy templates that tell us exactly what to do. There are schools
of thought. Some say, "When a nation threatens other nations,
the U.S. will intervene." Others, "When a nation threatens
its own people, we will intervene." Some would shade that:
"When a nondemocratic nation can reasonably be assumed to be
developing an ABC (atomic/biological/chemical) capability, we will
intervene."
Suppose that
at some point ahead Peking were to say that at the end of the then-current
month, Taipei must disband its military forces and receive a delegation
from Peking which will, upon landing, take effective control of
the government. The moment is imaginable when Peking, confident
of its resources and of its cause, can look us in the face and ask:
Do you want Taiwan so badly as to countenance a nuclear bomb on
Honolulu? And we are right back to balance of terror/mutual assured
destruction.
There will
be advisers who counsel Mr. Bush to do nothing truly provocative.
To sell Taiwan Aegis-style naval weapons would be that, as also,
probably, to sell submarines with relevant capability. They will
counsel that we can cover our implicit retreat by strengthening
our own patrols of the Strait of Formosa, constructing a kind of
oceanic Maginot Line.
The trouble
here is obvious. Hitler maneuvered around his Maginot Line by relatively
simple geographical deployment. In the showdown ahead, the United
States would need to face the question whether to activate a deterrent
force in our Maginot Line afloat on the China seas. The problem
then would be at least as difficult as the problem now, indeed more
so. It is in better harmony with the protocols of international
behavior for Taiwan to defend itself against a Chinese ultimatum
or invasion than for the United States to do so. But the same balance
of strategic thinking that would deny to Taiwan the weapons it needs
would almost certainly deny to the Seventh Fleet authority to use
conclusive defense weapons against a China at war to restore the
Manchu frontiers.
How would
we like it (we hear this from time to time) if the Chinese were
poking about our own coastline? Mr. Derbyshire handles the question
bluntly: "The answer is that the United States is a democracy
of free people, whose government derives its just powers from the
consent of the governed, so that the wider America's influence spreads,
the better for humanity; while China is a corrupt, brutish, and
lawless despotism, the close containment of which is a pressing
interest for the whole human race." One cannot, of course,
expect the Chinese people to be very receptive to his answer.
Which imposes
upon the president the obligation to take measures that are not
congenial to the Chinese people.
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