FRANK CHING
Managing Taiwan to improve Sino-American ties

2009/11/05

UNITED States President Barack Obama begins an Asian trip next week that will take him to Japan, Singapore, China and South Korea. This is a welcome sign of a renewed American emphasis on Asia.

Clearly, the China portion of the trip is extremely important, as cooperation between Washington and Beijing is increasingly essential to the resolution of major issues, ranging from climate change and Iran's nuclear ambitions to the global financial crisis and a nuclear-free Korean Peninsula.

The Obama administration has tried to ensure a favourable environment for the talks in China. The president departed from tradition by not meeting the Dalai Lama when the Tibetan leader was in Washington last month. He has also refrained from announcing an arms sales package for Taiwan.

But it is unclear if such measures will ensure a successful outcome in Beijing, especially in terms of improving military-to-military relations, which reportedly will be an important focus of the discussions.

After all, it will not be possible for the US to keep pleasing Beijing. For example, after it was disclosed that Obama plans to meet the Dalai Lama after his China trip, the People's Daily ran an online commentary headlined, "Meeting with the Dalai Lama should be deterred, not just deferred".

As for relations between the American and Chinese militaries, US Secretary of Defence Robert Gates called for lasting dialogue rather than "on again, off again" talks while welcoming Xu Caihou, vice-chairman of China's Central Military Commission.

The reason for the intermittent nature of the relationship is that every time the United States announces a big arms sales package for Taiwan, China suspends the military dialogue. This happened last October when the Bush administration announced a US$6.5 billion (RM22 billion) package to Taiwan, and it has taken a year for the two sides to get back to where they are today.

In a speech at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, Xu called on the US to abide by agreements it has signed with China, citing a 1982 accord in which the US said that it "intends to reduce gradually its arms sales to Taiwan, leading over a period of time to a final resolution".

For over 30 years, the US has tried to get China to promise not to use force against Taiwan, while China has tried to get the US to stop selling arms to the island. So far, neither side has convinced the other.

The US has cited the Taiwan Relations Act, passed by Congress in 1979, which commits Washington to "make available to Taiwan such defence articles and defence services in such quantity as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defence capability".

Beijing has pointed out that this is a domestic law that should not supersede an international agreement between the two countries. However, in the US, domestic law has a higher legal status than accords signed by the executive but not ratified by Congress.

As China rises economically, politically and militarily, it is becoming increasingly important to the US. That relationship has been described by Obama as the relationship that "will shape the 21st century".

That means China is in a position to make Washington pay an increasingly steep political price each time it makes an arms sale to Taiwan.

This is an issue where China rather than the US can take the initiative. If Beijing creates an environment in the Taiwan Strait in which the US feels that Taiwan is not under threat, and in which Taiwan itself feels no need to acquire American weapons, the problem will solve itself.

Actually, in the 18 months since Ma Ying-jeou became president, tensions in the Taiwan Strait have gone down substantially.

Taiwan and the mainland have signed a plethora of agreements on such issues as air and shipping links and tourism.

The signing of an economic cooperation framework agreement, expected early next year, will be another step forward.

But the bottom line is whether there is a military threat to Taiwan. And, so far, the answer is yes. Instead of reducing the number of missiles targeting Taiwan along the Chinese coast, Beijing has actually substantially added to the number.

China may think that it needs to keep the stick while offering carrots to Taiwan. But actually, the stick at this juncture is counterproductive. If China simply removed the stick, it would find Taiwan much easier to deal with. And its key problem with the US will also wane.

frank.ching@gmail.com