GOOD MORNING FROM LONDON
People often clutch at apparent simplicities + for some, Russia’s move into Ukraine is part of a worldwide China/Russia Pact to enable China to seize Taiwan by force. Whilst the attention of the world is focused on issues in Eastern Europe, China with Russian support will “sneak up” on Taiwan + take the island by force.
China’s Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, commented on the issue on 7 March in his annual briefing with the foreign media in Beijing. The Taiwan issue, he said, is fundamentally different from the Ukraine situation as it is a “private domestic affair” rather than between two countries. Wang said people were wrong to respect the sovereignty of Ukraine and at the same time to repeatedly attack China’s sovereignty over Taiwan.
When the USSR fell apart, Ukraine, until then a province of the USSR, acquired its independence from the new Russia and became a sovereign state. Taiwan is quite different. It has always been part of China and it became home to the fleeing remnants of the Kuomintang Army after their defeat in the Third Civil War in China in 1949.
The reunification of China and Taiwan is a matter of time. It will happen. It is unlikely to happen by force notwithstanding the ambiguity of US support for Taiwan. The decision of President Biden to implement former President Trump’s withdrawal policy from Afghanistan has led many Taiwanese to question the reliability of US words of support for Taiwan. The Taiwanese are beginning to realise that “They Are On Their Own” notwithstanding US geopolitical games with the Quad and Five Eyes. Taiwan has noted that the US and NATO have remained on the margins as Russia and Ukraine clash in Europe.
The present is history. Events are taking place today that will have a long term significance for the balance of power for the rest of the 21st Century
NEXT CHINA POST ON 9 MARCH 2022
EPISODE 2 OF MEDIATION TOWN PLANNING – ALSO 9 MARCH
