This is the third of a three part series by Danny Lam on the way ahead for the “One China Policy.

2017-01-15 By Danny Lam

When Chiang Kai Shek’s Republic of China (ROC) retreated to Taiwan in 1949, few Kuomintang (KMT) officials could have foresaw the extended stay in Taiwan, whose people they regarded as traitors and Japanese collaborators — Taiwanese having lived mostly peacefully under Japanese rule for close to a half century.

Taiwan as a former Japanese colony retained features to this day that are distinctly Japanese in origin, including the system of real property: measured and administered in Japanese derived units.   Many administrative systems at the local level are traceably Japanese.   Taiwan under Japanese rule was by no means an entirely negative experience, with many public works projects completed by the colonial administration and by Chinese standards, good public administration.

Opposition to the Japanese by Taiwanese nationalists was far less than that faced by the KMT.   Nationalist had no formal presence on Taiwan prior to the Japanese surrender of 1945.   When the KMT remnants flooded the island in 1949, came as ruthless occupiers.

Not surprisingly, the incoming ROC-KMT was regarded as oppressors by Taiwanese: replacing one set of oppressors (however benign), with another group of defeated KMT officials, soldiers, etc.

President Tsai Ing-wen, Taiwan’s first woman President.

Thus, it is not surprising that when the KMT successor generation under President Chiang Ching-kuo relaxed controls and democratized, that the opposition coalesced around the pro-Taiwan Independence Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) despite the KMT’s iron grip on the instruments of power.

Taiwanese have now seen several changes and iterations of government through free elections, with the Presidency and Legislative Branches of government regularly changing hands between the KMT and DPP.

And surprise, things have largely stayed the same.

The ROC remains the formal name and organization for Taiwan, and there has been no serious effort at formal secession to become the Republic of Taiwan.

Meanwhile, the world has changed.

While the ROC is no longer explicitly competing with the PRC for formal international recognition as the government of “all China” as they did under Chiang Kai Shek, the institutional mechanisms and structures supporting that competition remains fully operative.

Taiwan invests hundreds of millions to maintain formal diplomatic recognition with a handful of states notable for their irrelevance.   Relations with a majority of the world’s most influential states are conducted “unofficially” as “economic or cultural” ties, and Taiwan is locked out of a majority of international organizations.   Efforts to alter the international status quo by the KMT and DPP, by governments from Presidents Lee Tenghui, Chen Shui-bian, Ma Ying-jeou have been proven to be ineffective.

At the heart of the failure by successive Taiwan regimes to change the international status of Taiwan is the persistence of the ROC / Chiang Kai Shek foreign policy goal of seeking formal recognition of ROC as it primary goal to the exclusive of all others. From George Kung-chao Yeh to the present day, Foreign Ministers of Taiwan have placed a premium on symbolic acts by foreign nations such as permitting the display of the ROC flag at the expense of substance.

The epitome of this colossal foreign policy blunder was the effort under President Lee Tenghui to join the UN and get a visa for a “private” visit to the United States, which rather than increasing the “space” for ROC, reduced it even as President Lee’s goal was achieved.

When President Lee visited Cornell University, he went out of his way to violate the negotiated understanding with the U.S. to limit the political fallout from the visit, resulting in sterner and strident protests by the PRC for violation of the “one China” policy than necessary. The Lee visit damaged relations with the U.S. for decades, resulting in the downgrading of relations with ROC that persist to this day including lowering Taiwan’s access to sophisticated weapons systems.

President Tsai can reflect on the policies under her predecessors and change course beyond the symbolic act of not acknowledging the 1992 consensus.

Without a “clean out” of the foreign policy deadwood and reformulation of ROC on Taiwan’s foreign policy with new ideas, there is limited scope for the U.S. and Allies to improve Taiwan’s standing even as the threat from the PRC have become the major issue of our time.

The time has come for Taiwan under President Tsai to fundamentally rethink their place in the world and how to break the pattern of the past — that if unchecked — will more likely than not, lead to Taiwan’s absorption by the PRC in due course.

Formal declarations or moves toward independence as the Republic of Taiwan is an unworkable outcome that will result in a regime that will not have any improvement in international standing, and, risk a war with the PRC that Taiwan can lose.   Similarly, improved status for the ROC with its present foreign policy is unlikely to happen.

There is an alternative.

The ROC on Taiwan can unilaterally create a new domestic political system that meets the goal of ending the ruinous war for formal recognition of ROC with the PRC, and yet, at the same time, improves the ability of other states to improve their working relationship with Taiwan without any formal recognition of the ROC that they pledged not to under the “one China” policy with the PRC.

President Tsai’s ROC can unilaterally rewrite their constitution to replace the present Provincial Government of Taiwan with a new Province of Taiwan government that will be delegated all the powers of the ROC.

That is to say, all powers including taxation, administration, foreign affairs, justice, and defense except it is only limited to territories defined as within the Province of Taiwan.

Once that is done, the ROC can then vote themselves out of existence (or to become a vestigial organ like the appendix) with a constitutional amendment that ROC President (like the Governor General of the Crown) will only act on the advice and consent of the newly established Province of Taiwan, and have the power to override the legislative, judiciary and control branches of the government.

All but the President of the Executive branch of the ROC will be placed in suspended animation with officials and legislators except the ROC President tendering their resignation and not replaced.

The ROC President is appointed by the Province of Taiwan and serves at the pleasure of the Province.

In effect, ROC will no longer exist for practical purposes and serves very much like a symbolic head of state.

This strategy will enable the ROC to exit from explosive issues like its 9 dash line claims in the South China Sea, and a host of issues related to ROC claims.

It will enable “diplomatic” relations to be conducted directly by the Province of Taiwan via their Provincial Representative Offices abroad.

The issue of ROC being a competing “China” to the PRC is entirely sidestepped and the U.S. and Allies will have a fig leaf to plausibly argue that extensive relations with the Province of Taiwan in no way challenge the “one China” policy.

There is a viable way ahead to allow Taiwan to expand its global role without the debilitating dominance of the PRC manipulation of a “one China policy.”

Editor’s Note: If you wish to comment on this article, please go to the following:

Changing the Terms of Reference for Taiwan: Expanding the Strategic Options

2017-01-19 According to the 2016 version of the Annual Report to Congress of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, the time is now to deal with the actions and policies of the current dictatorial regime in Beijing.

The new Trump Administration has an opportunity to shift U.S. policies and strategies to deal with the very clear patterns of negative and aggressive behavior with regard to the so-called People’s Republic of China.

A new domestic agenda pursued by Trump could provide the basis for a policy reset.

As Richard McCormack noted in his publication Manufacturing News and published in late 2015:

In a position paper on reforming the U.S.-China trade relationship, Trump notes that President Bill Clinton in 2000 promised that China’s inclusion in the World Trade Organization would be a big win for the American economy.

“None of what President Clinton promised came true,” Trump notes.

Since China joined the WTO, 50,000American factories have closed and millions of jobs have disappeared.

“It was not a good deal for America then and it’s a bad deal now,” writes Trump. “It is a typical example of how politicians in Washington have failed our country.”

Trump would take a much more aggressive approach in government negotiations with China.

“We have been too afraid to protect and advance American interests and to challenge China to live up to its obligations,” he writes.

“We need smart negotiators who will serve the interests of American workers, not Wall Street insiders that want to move U.S. manufacturing and investment offshore.”

Free trade is not the same as fair trade, says Trump, reflecting a phrase that Ronald Reagan used in the 1980s when he confronted Japan and Germany over their predatory trade policies. Reagan’s stance on trade helped create a generation of “Reagan Democrats” throughout the American heartland.

“When Donald J. Trump is president ,China will be on notice that America is back in the global leadership business and that their days of currency manipulation and cheating are over,” states the Trump position paper.

Trump taps into the anti-Washington sentiment when he says, “We need a president who will not succumb to the financial blackmail of a Communist dictatorship.”

He blasts Obama and his Treasury Department for “repeatedly refus[ing] to brand China a currency manipulator.

If elected, “on day one of the Trump administration, the U.S. Treasury Department will designate China as a currency manipulator. This will begin a process that imposes appropriate countervailing duties on artificially cheap Chinese products, defends U.S. manufacturers and workers and revitalizes job growth in America.”

He adds that he will “stand up to China’s blackmail and reject corporate America’s manipulation of our politicians.” He would then “force” China to uphold intellectual property laws“ and stop their unfair and unlawful practice of forcing U.S. companies to share proprietary technology with Chinese competitors as a condition of entry to China’s market.”

He would “reclaim millions of American jobs and [revive] American manufacturing by putting an end to China’s illegal export subsidies and lax labor and environmental standards.”

He notes that Chinese export subsidies take the form of free rent, utilities and raw materials, cheap loans from China’s state-run banks, and tax rebates and cash bonuses to stimulate exports. “From textile and steel mills in the Carolinas to the Gulf Coast’s shrimp and fish industries industries to the Midwest manufacturing belt and California’s agribusiness, China’s disregard for WTO rules hurt every corner of America,” Trump writes.

“The U.S. Trade Representative recently filed yet another complaint with the WTO accusing China of cheating on our trade agreements by subsidizing its exports. The Trump administration will not wait for an international body to tell us what we already know.”

To strengthen the U.S. negotiating position with China, Trump would lower the U.S. corporate tax rate as a means to keep American companies from moving abroad. He would “attack our debt and deficit so China cannot use financial blackmail against us.”

A President Trump Would Play Hardball With China

That is the domestic side of it.

In our Special Report, we focus on the foreign policy side of a major redirection of U.S. policy towards China.

The strategic challenge posed by the increasingly assertive leadership of the People’s Republic of China needs to be met.

The new American Administration has a strategic opportunity to reshape its policies towards the PRC, rather than simply engaging in a “tit-for-tat” exchange, which the PRC is well postured to augment its global positions.

One of the opportunities opened up by a Trump presidency is a serious repositioning of Taiwan within U.S. policy.

It is time to exit the Madame Tussaud museum of policy initiatives and shape a Taiwan policy for the 21^st century, which is part of a broader deterrent strategy.

Both the technology available to the United States and the policy shifts of core allies in the Pacific are enabling the forging of a deterrence in depth strategy.

As Japan has focused on its extended defense, Australia upon the integration of its forces with a capability also for the extended defense of Australia and with U.S. forces focus on shaping a force to operate over the extended ranges of the Pacific, now is the time for a serious rebooting of the role of Taiwan in extended Pacific defense and security.

Please enter your name and email below and you will then be able to download the report directly.