[Salon] Fwd: Biden's 4th "Gaffe" on Taiwan

https://focustaiwan.tw/politics/202209200005https://focustaiwan.tw/politics/202209200005

Biden's remarks that U.S. would defend Taiwan 'speak for themselves': Campbell

09/20/2022

Washington, Sept. 19 (CNA) President Joe Biden's latest remarks that United States troops would help defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion "speak for themselves" while U.S. policy remains consistent and unchanged, a senior American official said Monday.

Kurt Campbell, deputy assistant to the president and coordinator for the Indo-Pacific, made the comments when asked about Biden's remarks, which is considered the clearest message the U.S. leader has made on the cross-Taiwan Strait issue since taking office.

In a pre-recorded interview with CBS' "60 Minutes" program that aired on Sunday evening in the U.S., Biden told host Scott Pelley that the U.S. would defend Taiwan "if in fact there was an unprecedented attack."

"So unlike Ukraine, to be clear, sir, U.S. forces -- U.S. men and women -- would defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion?" Pelley asked. "Yes," Biden replied.

After the interview, a White House official said U.S. policy on Taiwan had not changed, according to "60 Minutes."

Over the past few decades, the U.S. has intentionally maintained a stance characterized as "strategic ambiguity" regarding whether it would come to Taiwan's defense in the event of an attack by China.

Under this stance, Washington is deliberately vague about whether the U.S. would do more than just provide Taiwan with weapons based on the Taiwan Relations Act and actually send troops to help Taiwan fight China.

Since taking office in January 2021, however, Biden has repeatedly used language that appeared to diverge from this longstanding policy, with Sunday's interview being the clearest message he has made on the issue so far.

On each of those occasions, administration officials later walked back the comments and signaled that America's Taiwan policy had not changed, which also happening this time.

Asked to comment on Biden's remarks and the administration's follow-up clarification, Campbell said that he did not believe it was appropriate to call the comments made by the White House "as walking back the president's remarks."

"The president's remarks speak for themselves. I do think our policy has been consistent and is unchanged and will continue," he said during an online conference organized by the Washington-based think tank, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

He said Washington's primary goal is the maintenance of peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait to secure and stabilize the status quo, making sure there is a healthy dialogue and trying to avoid escalating situations of inadvertence.

"These continue to be the abiding goals and objectives of the Biden administration. And they are consistent with previous administrations as well," he added.

Meanwhile, commenting on the same issue, Taiwan's top envoy to the U.S. Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) told reporters in Washington Monday that she believed that President Biden "speaks his mind."

She added that Taipei and Washington would continue to work closely to maintain peace and security in the region and maintain the status quo.

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What does Biden
mean on Taiwan?

When Washington doesn’t speak with one voice, its
powers of strategic ambiguity are slowly chipped away.

Published 20 Sep 2022 

In the Cold War, analysts were sometimes concerned that the Kremlin might misread a rogue statement of bellicosity in Washington DC as an indication of White House intentions. If a maverick Senator stood up and insisted on rollback in a fire-breathing rant, did that mean US forces were about to intrude beyond the Iron Curtain? Would Russian forces be put on high alert? Or worse? But as both political systems got to know each other, and weathered the occasional crisis without going to war, the hope was that leaderships on both sides of the divide could separate the authentic signal from the noise, to borrow an argument from Thomas Schelling.In the Cold War, analysts were sometimes concerned that the Kremlin might misread a rogue statement of bellicosity in Washington DC as an indication of White House intentions. If a maverick Senator stood up and insisted on rollback in a fire-breathing rant, did that mean US forces were about to intrude beyond the Iron Curtain? Would Russian forces be put on high alert? Or worse? But as both political systems got to know each other, and weathered the occasional crisis without going to war, the hope was that leaderships on both sides of the divide could separate the authentic signal from the noise, to borrow an argument from Thomas Schelling.

Detecting America’s authentic signal on Taiwan’s defence must be one of Beijing’s most urgent foreign policy preoccupations. Strategic learning has also done some work in the China–US relationship. Chinese President Xi Jinping and his colleagues will know about the separation of powers that complicates and balances US politics. They would be likely to place Senator Rand Paul (or someone of his ilk) in the noise basket. Quite what they make of the recent provocation by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a more serious and credible Congressional actor, is another matter. But even there, Beijing still has the option of looking to the Biden administration for the authentic message. Quite what they make of the recent provocation by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a more serious and credible Congressional actor, is another matter. But even there, Beijing still has the option of looking to the Biden administration for the authentic message.

But China’s problem is that the White House does not speak with one voice on Taiwan. And it would be too flattering to put that dissonance down to a deliberate attempt to foster uncertainty.

On four occasions now, the President has indicated that the United States would enter a war to defend Taiwan against aggression. And each time, after the fact, his officials have had to insist that Washington’s policy has not changed. Every time that happens, a little of whatever remains of strategic ambiguity gets chipped away.

Repetition counts. It is clear Biden wants China to know that, at least in the most serious of circumstances, the United States would come to Taipei’s military assistance. And in a recent CBS interview, he was asked about the most serious circumstance of all (at least as far as Taiwan is concerned):

Scott Pelley: So unlike Ukraine, to be clear, sir, US Forces, US men and women would defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion?

President Joe Biden: Yes.

That’s not the exchange that has garnered all the attention. Instead the headlines are based on Biden’s response to an earlier question:

Scott Pelley: But would US Forces defend the island?

President Joe Biden: Yes, if in fact there was an unprecedented attack.

There might soon be a place for “unprecedented” in Beijing’s official glossary of untranslatable American terms alongside such wonders as “responsible stakeholder”. An invasion of Taiwan by the People’s Liberation Army certainly would be an “unprecedented attack”. But in comparison to China’s bombing of offshore islands in the 1950s Taiwan Strait crises, and to Beijing’s more recent military intimidation of Taipei (including after Pelosi’s visit), so too would many of the military options that China has not yet used against Taiwan.

On the plus side, that means some strategic ambiguity remains. Because a full-scale invasion is at the extreme end of China’s options, it is useful for Washington to have Beijing wondering how the United States would respond should the PLA be tasked to use only some force on Taipei. But Beijing would want to know that the ambiguity is deliberate. Until or unless the “unprecedented attack” becomes an established formulation, there may be some doubt about the signal the President was actually intending to send.

Another “un” word would have changed the meaning. Imagine the following:

Interviewer: But would US Forces defend the island?

President: Yes, if in fact there was an unprovoked attack.

That choice matches the formulation that Biden and the White House has employed about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It’s had a workout on that war more than once. In no more carefully prepared text than this year’s State of the Union address, Biden declared that “Putin’s latest attack on Ukraine was premeditated and unprovoked”.

Taiwan is not Ukraine, and China is not Russia. But if the White House is actually thinking in terms of deterring an “unprovoked” attack by the PLA on Taiwan, that would elevate the extremity of the situation where a US response is more definite. In those rare extremities, rather than a crisis where it has taken two to tango, Taiwan’s leaders would have done nothing to incur Beijing’s wrath.

A purely one-sided escalation, where Beijing invades Taiwan because it is a fine day for military operations, is scarcely credible. That doesn’t change the overall trajectory: entry by the United States into a Taiwan Strait contingency seems increasingly likely. But I’d want the “unprecedented attack” argument to be repeated – and explained – before coming to any hard and fast conclusions.

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Gaffe or not, Biden's Taiwan defense remarks stir confusion


by Jesse Johnson
staff writer

Sep 20, 2022

Whether they were intentional or not, U.S. President Joe Biden’s recent remarks over the defense of Taiwan are raising questions about Washington’s approach to the democratic island — creating uncertainty and confusion over U.S. policy just as China ramps up its military pressure on Taipei.

For the fourth time since taking office, Biden this week appeared to upend the U.S. policy of “strategic ambiguity” — under which the U.S. expresses a strong interest in Taiwan’s security while avoiding an outright promise to defend it — delivering his most explicit comments to date that Washington would defend the self-ruled island from Chinese attack and hinting that it could support Taipei’s right to self-determination.

Although the White House has been quick to say that Biden’s remarks do not represent a shift in U.S. policy, some experts say this assertion is no longer credible.

“The president is making policy, whether intentionally or not,” Zack Cooper, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute think tank, wrote in an analysis Monday.

According to Cooper, while the Biden team may contend that there is no change to policy and the president’s remarks are merely “aiming to maintain the status quo” on Taiwan, “the strategy for achieving this objective has changed.”

“Biden is choosing to be less ambiguous about U.S. intentions in case of an unprovoked attack on Taiwan,” Cooper wrote. “Biden’s advisors should acknowledge this inescapable reality.”

‘Dual deterrence’

Asked in an interview that aired Sunday if U.S. forces would defend Taiwan, Biden said, “Yes, if in fact there was an unprecedented attack.” Queried to clarify if he meant that, unlike in Ukraine — where Washington has sent billions of dollars in weapons and aid — U.S. troops would defend Taiwan in the event of an invasion, the president offered an unequivocal “Yes.”

It was the fourth time Biden, 79, had delivered similar comments, including after a May summit in Tokyo with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. Each time, White House officials have denied any change in U.S. policy when pressed if this was, as some observers have put it, the end of strategic ambiguity and the beginning of strategic clarity.

The reactions out of Beijing to U.S. President Joe Biden’s latest remarks on the defense of Taiwan have been relatively boilerplate. | AFP-JIJIThe reactions out of Beijing to U.S. President Joe Biden’s latest remarks on the defense of Taiwan have been relatively boilerplate. | AFP-JIJI

On Monday, White House Indo-Pacific coordinator Kurt Campbell emphasized that while the president’s remarks “speak for themselves,” U.S. policy “has been consistent and is unchanged, and will continue.”

Washington has maintained a “One China” policy since 1979, in which it officially recognizes Beijing rather than Taipei but takes the stance that Taiwan’s status is unsettled. Meanwhile, the Taiwan Relations Act requires the U.S. to provide the island with the means to defend itself.

Beijing views Taiwan as a renegade province that must be brought back into the fold, by force if necessary. It is seen as China’s most important “core issue,” and the ruling Communist Party has said there is “no room for compromise or concession.”

Some observers say the president may have also undercut the U.S. principle of “dual deterrence” — discouraging Beijing from attacking Taiwan unprovoked while simultaneously deterring Taipei from taking actions that may provoke China — which lies at the heart of strategic ambiguity.

In Sunday’s interview, Biden stressed that while he was not encouraging Taiwanese independence, any decision on the matter was theirs to make. “Taiwan makes their own judgments about their independence,” he said. “We’re not encouraging their being independent. That’s their decision.”

Jessica Chen Weiss, a professor at Cornell University focusing on Chinese politics and foreign relations, called Biden’s remarks “dangerous, even if not an official change in policy.”

“Not supporting Taiwan independence is longstanding U.S. policy. But this new combo (a pledge to send troops + decisions about independence are Taiwan’s) suggests an unconditional commitment, one that will strengthen perceptions that the U.S. is issuing Taiwan a blank check,” Chen Weiss, a former Biden administration State Department official, wrote on Twitter.

China's Liaoning aircraft carrier takes part in a military drill in the western Pacific Ocean in 2018. | REUTERS China’s Liaoning aircraft carrier takes part in a military drill in the western Pacific Ocean in 2018. | REUTERS

M. Taylor Fravel, a China expert and director of the Security Studies Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said that while Biden’s repeated comments on the issue were unlikely to represent a shift in approach, they had certainly muddied the waters.

“Despite their reoccurrence, I don’t view these statements as reflecting a change in strategy,” Fravel said. “These statements occur in extemporaneous TV interviews and not in formal statements, speeches or meetings where interactions are heavily scripted.

“That said, especially with White House denials that U.S. policy has changed, the president’s statements create greater uncertainty or confusion over what U.S. policy actually is.”

Calibrated approach

But while Biden’s pledge to militarily defend Taiwan has appeared to be an evolution of his administration’s growing willingness to respond to the possibility of Chinese aggression, some experts say the U.S. policy has long taken a calibrated approach.

“Right now, the biggest threat to peace in the Taiwan Strait is the PRC’s military activity and threats,” Shelley Rigger, a leading Taiwan expert at Davidson College, said, using the acronym for China’s formal name, the People’s Republic of China. “It makes sense that the U.S. would focus on deterring Beijing from going farther. Just as, in the past, when Taiwanese leaders were making pro-independence noises, the U.S. focused on deterring Taiwan.”

Concerns in Washington have surged about Beijing’s intentions after it conducted large-scale military exercises around Taiwan over a period of several days — including ongoing crossings of the so-called median line of the Taiwan Strait — following a visit to the island by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

“Discouraging unilateral attempts to change the status quo promotes stability,” said Ian Chong, a professor of political science at the National University of Singapore. “This means that the (United States’) policy will be dynamic and subject to calibration based on evolving circumstances.”

A screen in Beijing shows a CCTV news broadcast featuring a map of locations around Taiwan where the Chinese People's Liberation Army was to conduct military exercises and training activities including live-fire drills. | REUTERS A screen in Beijing shows a CCTV news broadcast featuring a map of locations around Taiwan where the Chinese People’s Liberation Army was to conduct military exercises and training activities including live-fire drills. | REUTERS

Chong said that he believed Washington would like to retain the option for dual deterrence, but that China’s dissatisfaction with the status quo could prompt it to consider unilateral moves to change the facts on the ground.

“Hence more of the (U.S.) focus will fall to trying to discourage destabilizing behavior by Beijing,” he said.

As for Biden’s remarks on Taiwan independence, Rigger said the president’s comment about not encouraging such a move “will be welcome in Beijing as a sign that their concerns are getting through to the Biden administration.”

‘Clear challenge’

For its part, the reactions out of Beijing to Biden’s latest remarks have been relatively boilerplate.

Although a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman was quoted Monday as slamming the U.S. for sending an “erroneous signal to the ‘Taiwan independence’ separatist forces” and said Beijing would “reserve the option to take all necessary measures” in response, her remarks were scrubbed from both the Chinese and English readouts of the day’s news conference on the ministry’s website.

Still, state-run media hinted at at least some displeasure in Beijing over what it said were hints of a shift toward “strategic clarity.”

“It is becoming clear that the U.S. is gradually bidding farewell to a policy of ‘strategic ambiguity’ over the Taiwan question which it has stuck to for decades,” the China Daily newspaper said in an editorial published late Monday. “This is a dangerous development.”

According to MIT’s Fravel, Biden’s repeated assertions, the administration’s walk-backs and the growing acrimony in Sino-U.S. relations could combine to form a combustible mix — for both sides.

“Each time the president makes such a statement that the White House then denies reflects a change in U.S. policy, the credibility of U.S. policy is slightly weakened, especially in light of growing U.S. support for Taiwan over the past several years,” Fravel said.

“In an already tense situation between the United States and China over Taiwan, China’s leaders may view the president’s remarks as foreshadowing the direction in which U.S. policy will change, which they would view as a clear challenge.”

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Taiwan act puts Washington's 'One China' policy at risk

'Beijing and Washington are in a security dilemma, a vicious cycle': analyst

Tensions between China and the U.S. over Taiwan show no signs of abating. (Source photos by AP) 

MARRIAN ZHOU, Nikkei staff writer
September 20, 2022

NEW YORK -- U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan at the beginning of August prompted China to encircle the island with unprecedentedly large military drills. This did not deter further groups of American lawmakers from traveling there -- highlighting a new nadir in China-U.S. ties.

A U.S. Senate committee on Wednesday approved the Taiwan Policy Act of 2022 -- legislation to boost military support for Taiwan, including a proposal for the first major restructuring of Washington's approach toward Taiwan since 1979.

"What you hear from [diplomats], generally speaking, [is] frustration that the 'One China' policy is no longer understood," Robert Daly, director of the Kissinger Institute on China and the U.S. and a former diplomat at the U.S. embassy in Beijing, told Nikkei Asia.

Washington's "One China" policy, adopted in 1979, acknowledges Beijing's position but does not explicitly recognize Chinese sovereignty over Taiwan. Beijing has its own "One China" principle that regards Taiwan as an inalienable part of China that is to be reunified one day, despite Communist China never having held control of the island.

While the U.S. has a policy of strategic ambiguity over whether it would defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion, President Joe Biden has in recent months repeatedly said that Washington would send forces. Asked about this issue in a CBS 60 Minutes interview on Sunday, he said: "Yes, if in fact, there was an unprecedented attack."

The new act currently includes the phrase that "Taiwan is designated as a major non-NATO ally." If passed, "that's the end of the 'One China' policy," Daly said.

"We're heading pretty fast toward uncharted waters ... and all the policy has is a rowboat. These forces are bearing us toward conflict in a way that we're not sure we can control," Daly went on. "It's not clear that China and the U.S. can find a new foundation under which to have normal diplomatic relations."

Taiwan's foreign ministry said in a Sept. 15 statement that it will continue to pay attention to the progress of the Taiwan Policy Act.

Beijing and Washington have been adding heat to their diplomatic feud since Pelosi's Taiwan trip in August. Daly said that as the Chinese Communist Party heads into its highly anticipated 20th national congress next month, Beijing "has used the visit very successfully" and "feels the wind behind its back" to drum up domestic support for Chinese President Xi Jinping.

"If all of the parties believe they're reacting to escalatory steps from the other side, tensions likely will remain elevated," said Ryan Hass, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a former diplomat in the American embassy in Beijing. "At the same time, there's no enthusiasm for conflict in the U.S., China or Taiwan. There will be no winners if war ever breaks out."

With both the U.S. and China having economic and other problems, "neither leader wants conflict, but at the same time, neither feels they can afford to look weak," said Daniel Russel, vice president for International Security and Diplomacy at the Asia Society Policy Institute.

"None of the mechanisms for crisis prevention or for crisis management are operational, the dialogues and the mechanisms that have in the past restrained escalation and fostered some sort of resolution of an incident, aren't working right now," Russel told Nikkei Asia, citing the large military presence in the Taiwan Strait.

"There's a lot of tension, and accidents have happened in the past and certainly can happen," he added. "The problem is that right now, an accident quickly becomes a crisis and a crisis could lead to conflict."

 

A projectile is launched from an unspecified location in China during long-range live-fire drills by the People's Liberation Army on Aug. 4.   © Xinhua/AP

With no sign of an olive branch from either side, de-escalation could be difficult.

"Beijing and Washington are in a security dilemma," Russel said. "It's a vicious cycle. Each side thinks that it is the victim, that the action by the other is provocative, and therefore it needs to take defensive steps in response. But those defensive steps themselves are seen by the other side as being provocations and requiring more action by them."

Many experts say both sides should take a deep breath.

Daly said Washington and Beijing first need to be honest about "how dire the state of U.S.-China relations has become" and recognize the need to put mechanisms in place that are "conducive to peace and allow the two sides to converse.

"If you acknowledge how dangerous things have become, then it's clear the goal of U.S.-China relations should be to prevent conflict right now. Both sides act as though the goal of the relationship is to get the other side to wake up and admit that it's been wrong. That's not going to work."

Daly added that fixing U.S.-China relations will take decades of work, but the real discussion cannot begin in the current state of escalation, and America's allies would likely not follow suit with the direction in which Washington and Beijing are heading.

There is "a lot of anger and a lot of fear" in Washington, he said. The U.S. embassy in Beijing also faces many challenges, such as understaffing because of China's zero-COVID policy and very limited contact and access on the ground.

Many lawmakers in the U.S. have insufficient knowledge of the Asia-Pacific region, especially on Taiwan, some experts say.

"You need a lot of historical memory to understand its complexity and the current group of, mostly people in Congress, do not have that memory," said Minxin Pei, director of the Keck Center for International and Strategic Studies at Claremont McKenna College. "Every congressman and senator in D.C. should take a two-day course on Taiwan, so they know the history, the density and the complexity of the issue."

He added that officials in the military and the executive branch tend to understand the dangers better because they constantly deal with security issues, but lawmakers in Congress are too preoccupied with getting reelected to consider such problems very thoroughly.

Pei said policymakers nowadays tend to see the matter "in black and white terms," but much of the stability in the past has been achieved because of the gray area, where people wanted to maintain "a much more pragmatic approach."

The scholar added that the China-Taiwan issue has become a larger China-U.S. issue.

"The last thing we need to do is finger-pointing," Pei said. "I think the first step involves back-channel diplomatic conversations between the U.S. and China saying that we can either land the situation in the current direction and head for a military conflict, or we can do X, Y, Z, so we don't go there."

-- Additional reporting by Thompson Chau

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