Taipei, Jan. 13 (CNA) No party won a majority in Taiwan's Legislative Yuan for the first time since 2004, after Saturday's elections saw the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) win 51 seats, the Kuomintang (KMT) 52, and the Taiwan People's Party (TPP) eight.
What Ma Yingjiu was able to do 10 years ago is no longer as feasible today. The wealth disparity and military disparity between the two regions has grown much greater so Taiwan is now in a even worse position and unlikely to get what it had been offered then. Taiwan itself also has been undergoing 10 additional years of anti-Mainland propaganda, the DPP has been actively cutting off engagement between the people, as compared to 2014 when relations had been quite friendly with open policies to visit, tourism, and business etc.
While the KMT is at least prepared to acknowledge that permanent separation is unlikely, and while it is the most pro-“Chinese culture” party (as in, willing to admit they are Chinese but not that PRC is the representative of China), the KMT is not ready to officially active engage in reunification. They have their own deeply entrenched interests and benefits in keeping Taiwan separate, which they know they will lose if Taiwan becomes a part of China.
Finally, the KMT has crap reputation with the younger generation, as their authoritarian rule for decades had tortured a lot of Taiwanese citizens with horrible policies, and to this day they haven’t found the words nor policies to attract a younger crowd.
In the election that’s just happened, NO candidate dared even to mention the fact that separation is probably impossible, that Taiwan should probably have some contingency plans to prevent a conflict with China, or for negotiation in face of what is factually inevitable. The KMT didn’t even dare to mention that Taiwan had Chinese origin, or that they are Chinese under ROC. Everyone is all acting like ostriches–though the non-DPP supporting citizen knows better and hence the DPP only had 40% win out of the 70% turnout. But the political rhetoric was all unbearably hypocritical and not based on anything realistic.
Ultimately once you cut past all the theatre and posturing, the hard facts are that Taiwan is entirely dependent on China economically, and that there is no scenario where it can win against China militarily even with the best possible support that separatists can hope for. In the long run, reunification is the only possible outcome here.
I expect that a lot of the oligarchs in Taiwan understand this perfectly well, and they can see also how things are playing out in Ukraine. I suspect that when push comes to shove, a lot ofthem will find whatever terms China offers to be preferable to being used as a proxy.
That said, it’s pretty clear that China would prefer to maintain the status quo to taking military action because it plays in China’s favor. As time goes on, Chinese military is becoming increasingly more capable, China is insulating itself from the west economically, and securing resources that will be needed in case there’s a break down in relations with the west. At the same time, US influence is waning globally, and its military is finding itself increasingly overstretched. Time is on China’s side here.
The only scenario I can see where China takes military action would be if US tried putting missiles that can attack the mainland in Taiwan or some other equivalent type of provocation that crosses the red lines of China’s security. Given how unhinged US regime is, this is of course an entirely plausible scenario.
This is the big risk Taiwan is taking by playing the game it’s currently playing. US knows that their window for military option is closing, and if that means they could choose to push Taiwan into war.
What Ma Yingjiu was able to do 10 years ago is no longer as feasible today. The wealth disparity and military disparity between the two regions has grown much greater so Taiwan is now in a even worse position and unlikely to get what it had been offered then. Taiwan itself also has been undergoing 10 additional years of anti-Mainland propaganda, the DPP has been actively cutting off engagement between the people, as compared to 2014 when relations had been quite friendly with open policies to visit, tourism, and business etc.
While the KMT is at least prepared to acknowledge that permanent separation is unlikely, and while it is the most pro-“Chinese culture” party (as in, willing to admit they are Chinese but not that PRC is the representative of China), the KMT is not ready to officially active engage in reunification. They have their own deeply entrenched interests and benefits in keeping Taiwan separate, which they know they will lose if Taiwan becomes a part of China.
Finally, the KMT has crap reputation with the younger generation, as their authoritarian rule for decades had tortured a lot of Taiwanese citizens with horrible policies, and to this day they haven’t found the words nor policies to attract a younger crowd.
In the election that’s just happened, NO candidate dared even to mention the fact that separation is probably impossible, that Taiwan should probably have some contingency plans to prevent a conflict with China, or for negotiation in face of what is factually inevitable. The KMT didn’t even dare to mention that Taiwan had Chinese origin, or that they are Chinese under ROC. Everyone is all acting like ostriches–though the non-DPP supporting citizen knows better and hence the DPP only had 40% win out of the 70% turnout. But the political rhetoric was all unbearably hypocritical and not based on anything realistic.
Ultimately once you cut past all the theatre and posturing, the hard facts are that Taiwan is entirely dependent on China economically, and that there is no scenario where it can win against China militarily even with the best possible support that separatists can hope for. In the long run, reunification is the only possible outcome here.
I expect that a lot of the oligarchs in Taiwan understand this perfectly well, and they can see also how things are playing out in Ukraine. I suspect that when push comes to shove, a lot ofthem will find whatever terms China offers to be preferable to being used as a proxy.
That said, it’s pretty clear that China would prefer to maintain the status quo to taking military action because it plays in China’s favor. As time goes on, Chinese military is becoming increasingly more capable, China is insulating itself from the west economically, and securing resources that will be needed in case there’s a break down in relations with the west. At the same time, US influence is waning globally, and its military is finding itself increasingly overstretched. Time is on China’s side here.
The only scenario I can see where China takes military action would be if US tried putting missiles that can attack the mainland in Taiwan or some other equivalent type of provocation that crosses the red lines of China’s security. Given how unhinged US regime is, this is of course an entirely plausible scenario.
This is the big risk Taiwan is taking by playing the game it’s currently playing. US knows that their window for military option is closing, and if that means they could choose to push Taiwan into war.