US Taiwan Policy by Øystein Tunsjø

Author:Øystein Tunsjø [Tunsjø, Øystein]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Military, General, Political Science
ISBN: 9781134056316
Google: 04N9AgAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2008-02-18T01:15:23+00:00

The burden of leadership

Although the White House still adheres to the one-China principle, the re-writing and re-production of US identity in the post-Cold War era, together with increased attention on the binary opposites that differentiate the political systems on either side of the Taiwan Strait, are increasingly compromising the one-China policy. The fixing of a US identity is never completed. In other words, the identity constructed for the US is essentially precarious. It is by its very nature continually under attack and therefore constantly needs to be reasserted and reinforced.145 Indeed, without a clear identity, US national security cannot be safeguarded, for there will be no basis upon which national interest can be defended. After all, ‘securing something requires its differentiation, classification and definition. It has, in short, to be identified.’146

The question therefore is not how to defend the national interest but how decision-makers define it and identify threats to the nation. Identities which give meaning to beliefs and expectations help to specify, among other things, which objects are to be protected and which constitute threats. There are few strategic incentives for a conflict between the US and China over Taiwan. China possesses intercontinental ballistic missiles which can reach the US and does not need Taiwan to interrupt strategic sea lines of communication in the Taiwan Strait or the South China Sea. Indeed, the ports of Taiwan are further from the contested areas of the South China Sea than are the major Chinese naval bases in Hainan and Guangdong provinces.

The United States no longer needs Taiwan as an ‘unsinkable aircraft carrier’, if indeed it ever did. As Nathan has pointed out, ‘Chinese naval technology lags so far behind that of the United States and its allies that the occupation of Taiwan would swing matters in the west Pacific or the South China Sea only if the United States were to pull out of Asia and cede these waters to the Chinese.’147 Nevertheless, the US would probably not stand idly by if China attacked Taiwan, even if the attack were provoked by reckless Taiwanese behaviour. In order to understand such eventualities, identities and discourses should be our starting point, while strategic calculations, traditionally the main focus of analysis, should play a secondary role.

Several decision-makers and other observers have argued that America’s ability to keep peace in the Taiwan Strait is essential to its credibility.148 Rodman argues that a Chinese attempt to use force would inevitably involve the US, because ‘American words and the spirit behind them have wider meaning. America’s allies and others who rely on us will be watching how we live up to our commitments.’149 And Richard Bush forcefully maintains that ‘[t]he U.S. stake in peace and security in the Taiwan Strait is so great and the need to preserve its credibility among all regional actors so profound that it cannot simply wash its hands of the issue’.150

Credibility, however, remains essentially socially constructed. The objectivity of US credibility exists and arises from the construction of a particular US identity.

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