China’s Orwellian white paper blacklists tiny Taiwan
UNITED NATIONS — Calling for a dramatic boost in defense spending and making a clear commitment to military force modernizations, the People’s Republic of China has announced a double digit rise in its military budget. The fifteen percent spending surge to $36 billion, according to most observers, still grossly underestimates Beijing’s actual military financing but raises serious strategic questions for Mainland China’s neighbors; Japan, Vietnam, the Philippines and most especially Taiwan.
Beijing’s defense “White Paper” outlines national security needs and requirements which are clearly part and parcel of the PRC’s dramatic economic growth and global standing. While speaking of modernizations especially for the navy and air forces, the paper soothingly adds, “China pursues a national defense policy which is purely defensive in nature,” and says reassuringly “China will not engage in any arms race or pose a military threat to any other country.”
So has the gentle panda assumed ascendancy over the Dragon? Hardly.
While stating “China’s overall security environment remains sound,” the document then goes on to warn that Taiwan remains a serious threat to regional stability, and thus in Beijing’s view poses a “complex and grim” situation for peaceful China. As the PRC claims Taiwan as a “renegade province” (even though the communist regime has happily never governed the island for a single day) it does not take too much imagination to see that Beijing has morphed its likely victim into the aggressor.
There have been two competing governments on Chinese territory for 57 years. At the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949, the communists captured the Mainland and the Nationalist forces retrenched to Taiwan. Thus there have been two de facto and mutually antagonistic states claiming title to Taiwan. Given that the Beijing communists have never renounced the use of military force to “reunite Taiwan with the Motherland” clearly Taipei’s government must not give the PRC any pretext to do so.
The White paper states ominously, “By pursuing a radical policy for ‘Taiwan independence,’ the Taiwan authorities aim at creating ‘de jure Taiwan independence’ through ‘constitutional reform,’ thus still posing a grave threat to China's sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as to peace and stability across the Taiwan Straits and in the Asia-Pacific region as a whole.” Ironically it’s the other way round—the People’s Republic poses the threat to democratic Taiwan.
So in the best Orwellian tradition, Beijing singles out tiny Taiwan as a threat! This should serve as a clear warning to Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party that any rhetorical or real change in the de facto status quo could court disaster.
In his New Year’s Address, Republic of China President Chen Shui-bian stated, “Only the people of Taiwan have the right to decide on the future of Taiwan," He added, "Taiwan's sovereignty belongs to 23 million people. It definitely does not belong to the People's Republic of China." While this is certainly true, Chen’s own DPP government, beset by scandal and economic doldrums, has still remained philosophically wedded to the idea of Taiwan “independence.”
In classic PRC rhetoric the White Paper proclaims “The People's Liberation Army (PLA) is dedicated to performing its historical missions for the new stage in the new century, namely, providing an important source of strength for consolidating the ruling position of the Communist Party of China (CPC), providing a solid security guarantee for sustaining the important period of strategic opportunity for national development, providing a strong strategic support for safeguarding national interests, and playing a major role in maintaining world peace and promoting common development.”
Such military roles are extended to wider naval protection of China’s sea lanes of communication, something which could conversely include the interdiction of Taiwan’s economic lifeline. Equally PRC naval expansion could counter claims by Vietnam, Taiwan and the Philippines over the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea. In the longer term PRC naval expansion could conflict with the U.S. naval role in the Pacific.
The paper also views the wider participation and deployment of Chinese forces in United Nations peacekeeping operations.
But most importantly, China’s Defense White Paper marks the obvious red lines which should be clearly seen on both sides of the Taiwan Straits — namely any change in the semantical status quo in how the Republic of China on Taiwan defines itself, could easily invite the wrath of the dragon and in turn trigger instability throughout East Asia.
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