Nancy Pelosi faced significant resistance to her Taiwan travel plans, from the White House to the Chinese foreign ministry. Senior administration officials sought to deter her from making the trip, briefing her on the risks, while Communist Chinese propagandists huffed and puffed about potentially shooting down the plane on which she would travel to Taiwan.
The House speaker landed this morning, defying the naysayers and, not for the first time in her career, sticking it to the Chinese Communist Party. But she did not do so as a provocation but rather to support the party’s apparent next intended victim.
In a Washington Post op-ed released after her landing in Taipei, she explained the rationale for her trip. Supporting Taiwan is, she wrote, about standing with its 23 million people “but also to millions of others oppressed and menaced by the PRC”:
Thirty years ago, I traveled in a bipartisan congressional delegation to China, where, in Tiananmen Square, we unfurled a black-and-white banner that read, “To those who died for democracy in China.” Uniformed police pursued us as we left the square. Since then, Beijing’s abysmal human rights record and disregard for the rule of law continue, as President Xi Jinping tightens his grip on power.
The CCP’s brutal crackdown against Hong Kong’s political freedoms and human rights — even arresting Catholic Cardinal Joseph Zen — cast the promises of “one-country, two-systems” into the dustbin. In Tibet, the CCP has long led a campaign to erase the Tibetan people’s language, culture, religion and identity. In Xinjiang, Beijing is perpetrating genocide against Muslim Uyghurs and other minorities. And throughout the mainland, the CCP continues to target and arrest activists, religious-freedom leaders and others who dare to defy the regime.
We cannot stand by as the CCP proceeds to threaten Taiwan — and democracy itself.
Pelosi gets it. Deterring the Chinese party-state calls for partnering with all its victims and targets — and deterring aggression early.
It’s hardly an exaggeration to say that Americans are ultimately in the PLA’s crosshairs. For years, the party has exercised vast influence over American business and culture to soften U.S. impressions of its totalitarian rule. It has exploited U.S. financial markets to fuel its military buildup and transfer American tech toward those aims. Anything that begins in the Taiwan Strait will not end there, and deterrence, while it is still possible, remains Washington’s best option.
The Chinese Communist Party has already indicated that it will respond to Pelosi’s trip with fury. Chinese state media announced that the PLA will conduct live-fire exercises around Taiwan from August 4-7. Prior to Pelosi’s arrival, Beijing already announced a series of retaliatory trade measures. Hackers, presumably from the PLA, also took the Taiwanese president’s website offline for 20 or so minute this morning.
But again, this trip is not a provocation. Pelosi is traveling abroad, as is her prerogative as a member of Congress, and as plenty of lawmakers have done in recent months. Chinese officials are linking their military exercises and other threats to Pelosi’s visit, but only the Leninist zealots in Beijing are in the wrong here. Americans ought not forget that.