Taiwan's defining moment: Election to determine future of relations with China
Against backdrop of Ukraine and Hong Kong, voters must choose confrontation or compromise with Beijing
KAOHSIUNG/TAIPEI -- Taiwan's presidential election next month will be a pivotal moment in the island's history: Its outcome could solidify the territory's always-precarious sovereignty, plunge it into conflict with China, or set it on a trajectory toward incorporation into its larger neighbor.
The front-runner in the three-horse race is Lai Ching-te of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party. The 64-year-old son of a coal miner is a fierce defender of Taiwan's sovereignty, welcoming the continued support of the U.S. and like-minded partners. He has made Hsiao Bi-khim, who until November was Taiwan's de facto ambassador to the U.S., his running mate on the DPP ticket.
Their main opponents are Hou Yu-ih and Jaw Shaw-kong, candidates for president and vice president, respectively, from the largest opposition party, Kuomintang (KMT). Hou is a policeman-turned-mayor, while Jaw is a conservative media commentator. They, too, vow to protect Taiwan, but through negotiation, consensus and compromise with China.
Former Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je, of the upstart populist Taiwan People's Party (TPP), and his running mate, Wu Hsin-ying, a young female lawmaker from the Shin Kong Group business dynasty, make up the third leg of the electoral triad, after an effort to team up with the KMT fell apart last month.
Whoever wins -- recent polls show a close race between the DPP and KMT, with the TPP not far behind -- the Jan. 13 vote is likely to be Asia's most consequential election of 2024. It has been characterized by all sides as a moment of truth.
"The 2024 election is a choice on the path this country will take," said Miao Po-ya, an activist running for a parliamentary seat in Taipei. Hailing from the DPP-backed Social Democratic Party, she added that the presidential race will determine Taiwan's foreign policy, national security and defense, and its relations with China.
Communist China has never ruled the island democracy of 23.5 million people, which Beijing sees as its territory. But China's regular threats that subsuming Taiwan by force is an option have taken on special urgency in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which has forced Taiwan's electorate to imagine previously unthinkable conflicts. January's election is overshadowed by the prospect of war, which each of the contenders has said they alone can prevent.
President Tsai Ing-wen, who expanded Taiwan's international presence and defense capabilities despite China's attempts to isolate her government, is constitutionally barred from a third term. This has opened a leadership vacuum that the DPP, TPP and the KMT aim to fill.
The election will decide "how determined we are to defend ourselves and Taiwan's free and democratic way of life," said Miao.
Miao is the face of modern Taiwan. She was born in 1987, the year the Republic of China -- as Taiwan is officially known -- lifted martial law. Elected as a city councilor in 2018, she is one of the island's first openly lesbian elected politicians.
She said that China's crackdown in Hong Kong, where Beijing has rescinded guarantees of the city's freedom and autonomy made before the 1997 handover from the U.K., has reverberated in Taiwan. Myanmar's uprising against the latest military coup, not to mention Russia's invasion of Ukraine and more recently the fighting in the Middle East have all demonstrated that conflicts along long dormant geopolitical fault lines can erupt at any moment.
"Seeing what other countries and territories are going through reminds the Taiwanese of the importance of building our own capabilities to defend ourselves. Only with strength can we maintain peace. Temporary compromise or capitulation or submission will only bring greater misfortune," Miao said.
High stakes
The January election will be a test of this thesis, a barometer of the electorate's appetite to stand up for Taiwan's sovereignty and future in the face of steadily increasing pressure from Beijing and the threat of war.
"Taiwanese are not afraid to defend our own democracy just because China's armed police are committing violence in Hong Kong," Miao said, referring to the security law promulgated by Beijing in Hong Kong in 2020 that erased what was left of the city's freedom. "On the contrary, Taiwanese people were reminded that democracy requires strength to defend. Otherwise, we will be left defenseless and at the mercy of others."
The opposition KMT's main narrative, meanwhile, is that war can only be prevented by accepting that Taiwan is not a separate entity from China and reducing tensions with Beijing, including by promoting closer economic links. "Next year's elections are a choice between war and peace," Jaw told crowds at a rally in November.
China, meanwhile, is doing its best to drive home the war versus peace narrative: In the past year, China's warplanes and ships have stepped up intrusions into Taiwanese waters and airspace. In September, 103 Chinese aircraft flew near Taiwan -- a new record -- of which 40 had crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait or entered Taiwan's air defense identification zone, according to Taiwan's defense ministry.
Ko of the TPP also weighed in on the war and peace debate. In recent years, Ko has moved away from his early DPP-leaning politics and has branded himself as a "third force," accusing the ruling DPP of being too "pro-war."
Tsai has begun to hit back at this narrative, accusing the opposition of "alarmist talk" at a DPP campaign rally on Dec 3. "I want to ask you all here, does anyone want war? Nobody does," she said. "Look at Hong Kong and think of Taiwan. We don't want Hong Kong-style peace. We want dignified peace."
Tsai's government is fending off not only Chinese military incursions, but also what they say are heavy-handed election meddling and disinformation.
According to Wellington Koo, Taiwan's National Security Council secretary-general, a notable example came when the Taiwanese United Daily News (UDN), a pro-KMT media outlet, published claims that the U.S. had asked Taiwan to develop weaponized biological agents, citing what he described as a forged government document.
Both the U.S. and Taiwan denied the allegations. UDN said in a statement that the paper had fulfilled its verification obligations before publishing the story, but the statement did not address the charge of whether the documents were forged.
"There'll be more and more fake news [throughout Taiwan's media] in the run-up to the elections," Koo told Nikkei in a recent interview.
UDN's claims were amplified in Chinese state media. "As a democratic country, we respect freedom of speech while seeking to counter the spread of disinformation and misinformation. This consumes considerable resources," Koo said.
The Chinese state, party and affiliated entities represent the strongest force stoking or amplifying anti-US content, said Chihhao Yu, co-director of the Taiwan Information Environment Research Center (IORG), citing an analysis of two years of Mandarin news reports from mainstream media in Taiwan, state media in China and social media posts from over 1 million Facebook pages.
Michael Cunningham of the Heritage Foundation's Asian Studies Center said that China's aggressive actions against Taiwan are raising alarm bells in the region. "The Philippines, Japan and other countries in the region are alarmed by China's aggressive tactics with regards to Taiwan and in the South China Sea," he said.
"While Asian governments have lived through previous periods of tension, the stakes are now higher because of China's greater military strength."
U.S.-China battleground
January's election takes place as tension between Washington and Beijing continues to dominate the region, and the outcome of the vote is being watched in the U.S. as carefully as it is in China.
Taiwan's sovereignty and future have long been the most contentious issue between Beijing and Washington, and China's lashing out in the event of a Lai victory could worsen superpower tensions.
In a November meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Joe Biden, the Chinese strongman urged the U.S. to stop arming Taiwan and "support China's peaceful reunification," a Chinese political term referring to absorbing Taiwan into China. Experts warn the phrase indicates an escalation by Beijing. In his post-summit news conference, Biden said he had explicitly warned Xi against interfering in Taiwan's upcoming presidential election.
While many Taiwanese are grateful to the U.S. for countervailing support vis-a-vis China, some worry that Washington is pursuing its own interests rather than those of Taiwan.
Sanctions against China's chip industry imposed last year, for example, have hit Taiwanese chipmakers and supply chain companies, who have lost many customers in China. Some commentators accuse the U.S. of "weaponizing" Taiwan in its effort to contain Beijing's expansionism and question whether Washington is seriously committed to defending the island if it is attacked. The U.S. has no mutual defense treaty with Taiwan, but President Biden has said on a number of occasions that America will defend Taiwan if attacked, and the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act requires the U.S. "to provide Taiwan with arms of a defensive character."
"Taiwan has always felt a "security dilemma," especially among voters who support the KMT camp," said Pan Chao-min, a professor at Tunghai University.
"Since the U.S. withdrew its troops from Afghanistan, many people in Taiwan have felt that American support for its allies is not unlimited. ... Even if a battle is won against a Chinese invasion, it would be a pyrrhic victory, and Taiwan would end up as scorched earth," Pan told Nikkei Asia.
Visits by American politicians, including last year's trip by then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, have ratcheted up tensions with China. Pro-U.S. commentators say the trips are necessary demonstrations of U.S. political support, while critics say they are efforts to grandstand and exploit Taiwan for Washington's own interests.
Most Taiwanese, though, welcome U.S. interest, however self-serving. A recent poll by the Taiwan Public Opinion Foundation found that among Taiwanese adults, 61% agreed with the statement that "Even if the U.S. contains China out of its own interest, it is necessary for Taiwan." Only 22% thought U.S. containment of China was not in Taiwan's interest.
The defense flashpoint
Whoever succeeds Tsai will have to navigate the increasingly fierce U.S.-China rivalry, as well as a hostile China that is doubling down on economic and political coercion against Taiwan.
All parties in the election favor strong defense, according to Jing Bo-jiun, senior research fellow in Taiwan studies at University of Oxford. "All three candidates have acknowledged the potential conflict risks for Taiwan and publicly voiced support for raising the defense budget, seeking to convince voters that they are best placed to ensure peace and stability," Jing told Nikkei Asia.
Within this unified exterior, however, the competing parties offer subtly different visions of how Taiwan's future is to be secured, said Lev Nachman, a political scientist in Taipei and author of "Taiwan: A Contested Democracy Under Threat."
"The two parties [DPP and KMT] are trying to sell to voters that their approach to maintaining the status quo is the safer bet for Taiwan," he said.
KMT politicians, for example, have cast doubt on Tsai's plan to strengthen national security, which involves extending conscription, adopting asymmetric warfare doctrine, developing Taiwan's own submarine fleet and diversifying the economy away from China. Their own plan is, in many ways, the opposite. It aims to avert conflict by reducing tension with China.
Vice presidential candidate Jaw of the KMT, for example, has pledged to shorten the length of national service (currently a year), and to investigate the former admiral in charge of Taiwan's submarine program, citing high costs. The KMT also blocked the DPP government's attempt to import American submarines in the 2000s.
KMT presidential hopeful Hou, meanwhile, backs restarting talks with China on a highly controversial trade deal which would liberalize service trade between the two economies, which the then-KMT administration was forced to abandon in the face of massive protests known as the Sunflower Movement in 2014.
This, the KMT says, is the best hope for Taiwan's continued existence. "Do you think that we can contain China by ourselves?" said KMT Vice Chair Lien Sheng-wen, in an interview with Nikkei Asia. He used the classic Chinese idiom "a mantis trying to stop a chariot," meaning Taiwan should not overestimate its power and attempt the impossible task of trying to overwhelm China. A Hou presidency, Lien said, would reduce tensions with China and reinitiate "constructive dialogue" between the two governments, while continuing to beef up Taiwan's defense capacity.
China is a lot closer to Taiwan than the U.S., geographically, so "that leaves us no option but to engage" with Beijing, Lien said.
Lien, 53, is among the most prominent KMT figures, and is son of former Premier and Vice President Lien Chan. The elder Lien, as KMT chair, traveled to China in 2005 to meet with Chinese Communist Party leader Hu Jintao, in the first top meeting since the end of the 1949 Chinese civil war between the two former enemies. The KMT fled to Taiwan that year to escape Mao Zedong's communist revolution.
The fundamental divisions among the presidential contenders extend from the nuts and bolts of defense policy all the way to an abstract formulation of China-Taiwan relations, known as the "1992 Consensus." This refers to an alleged understanding between Beijing and the then-KMT government in Taipei that China and Taiwan belong to one and the same country, even as they disagreed about whether that country was the Republic of China or the People's Republic of China.
The KMT backs the 1992 Consensus and its "One China" notion. The DPP, meanwhile, rejects it, though Lai has said he does not seek formal independence for Taiwan -- a red line for Beijing. Ko, for his part, has been ambiguous but has said that a political union is impossible.
Huang Kwei-bo, a former KMT deputy secretary-general and a professor of diplomacy at Taiwan's National Chengchi University, told Nikkei Asia accepting the "1992 Consensus" is the key to defusing tension with Beijing. "Since the 1992 Consensus is the only framework that both Beijing and Taipei once recognized, adopting it will temporarily reduce the political conflicts between the two governments."
However, others worry endorsing the 1992 consensus, with its One China formulation, risks undermining Taiwan's status as a separate political entity and opens the door to talks about political and economic union with China.
While it was humiliated in the last two presidential votes, the KMT remains a powerful force, winning the vast majority of local councils and mayoralties across Taiwan in the 2022 local polls. In November, the party turned 129 years old.
A KMT administration next year will seek to "rebuild a mutual trust" with China and resolve livelihood issues such as tourism and the environment, Lien said. "So they [China] know that we're not trying to cause them any trouble, and they should not cause us trouble. We will leave each other alone [and] go back to what we call 'the status quo.'"
Lien said it is also important to beef up the island's defenses because there are "unstable elements" and "hardcore hawks in China" who want to bring Taiwan under control "tomorrow."
Talk of closer economic links inevitably raise concerns about China's economic coercion.
"It's very dangerous to base your economy or bargaining chips on China's goodwill," said Chen Chi-mai, mayor of the southern city Kaohsiung and a senior DPP politician. He cited the examples of Taiwanese grouper fish and pineapples, imports of which Beijing banned as part of a wider program of economic coercion.
"Our farmers and fishermen, at least those in Kaohsiung, know very well that China is not a very reliable trading partner," Chen told Nikkei Asia. He added that the next president will need to continue working with different partners on security and economic matters, such as pushing for membership in the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), which Tsai's government has applied to join.
An uncertain future
Despite the KMT's success in local elections last year, veteran analysts and Washington insiders say the KMT has failed to articulate exactly how they would keep the peace.
"The [opposition] campaigns largely focus on being against DPP policies ... rather than articulating a coherent vision for coexistence with communist China. That's the implication behind the war versus peace argument," said Ivan Kanapathy, former U.S. military attache in Taipei and former director for China, Taiwan, and Mongolia on the U.S. National Security Council staff from 2018-2021.
"The notion that a future Taiwanese administration can work constructively with both Washington and Beijing is not credible, given the centrality of the Taiwan issue in U.S.-China competition," he told Nikkei Asia.
Michael Reilly, formerly Britain's de facto ambassador to Taiwan, said Chinese pressure on the Taiwan government, regardless of who's in charge in Taipei, will push the Taiwanese toward a political settlement on Beijing's terms.
Eventually, even an opposition government will have to confront Beijing's desire to move toward talks about a political union, which many Taiwanese are likely to oppose. A recent poll by the World United Formosans for Independence suggests the majority of the public does not want to change the current Taiwan-Beijing dynamic: 44.3% said they want to "forever maintain the status quo," while 35.8% supported "maintaining the status quo while working toward independence."
"Short-term tensions in the event of an opposition victory would almost certainly ease. But China will be very wary of agreeing to any 'concessions' to Taiwan that could become permanent," Reilly said.