All eyes on Taiwan: What will China do?

Taiwan’s response to the latest round of China’s rather aggressive retaliation to the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi’s Taiwan visit has been measured and calculated yet firm. Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-wen remarked, “We will work to maintain the peaceful and stable status quo in the Taiwan Strait. We are calm and will not act in haste. We are rational and will not act to provoke. But we will absolutely not back down.” Taiwan is showing resolve and is being transparent with swift dissemination of information but China is upping the ante in the Taiwan Strait.

China’s overreaction, symptomatic of its insecurities vis-à-vis Taiwan, is very much in continuation with its conventional response whenever there is a high-profile foreign visitor to Taiwan. China wants Taiwan to get sunk into oblivion, and deprive it of any international legitimacy.

Unfortunately for China, the COVID-19 pandemic gave Taiwan a rare opportunity to reach out to the global community and expand its international space amid China’s attempts to shrink former’s international space and poach diplomatic allies. This was a direct outcome of Tsai government’s refusal to accept the 1992 consensus to govern the cross-Strait ties that led China to suspend the cross-Strait dialogue.

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While accusing Taiwan and the United States of altering the status quo through Pelosi’s visit, China conveniently forgets that in reality, it is China that has unilaterally violated the status quo in recent years. Its repeated encroachments into Taiwan’s Air Defence Identification Zone (ADIZ) and attempts to persuade countries to not acknowledge and engage Taiwan are violations too.

So far as its strategic options are concerned, in spite of its heightened rhetoric and intimidation, it is a prevalent view in Taiwan that China is less likely to opt for a full-fledged military response.

What makes China’s choices difficult is the fact that this is a crucial time for China and it cannot afford to appear weak, both in front of the international community and the domestic audience. On August 2, marching of the tanks on a beach in Xiamen that is China’s closest point to Taiwan’s outlying island, Kinmen, when people were enjoying at the beach was to showcase the domestic audience that China views Pelosi’s visit as a violation of its sovereignty and if the need arises, will respond with military actions.

We are in a long haul here, and China’s intimidation might continue for months or even years. However, this is not something that Taiwan has not seen before. Taiwan has been living under the China threat for decades but the world is taking cognizance of it now.

Arguably, China’s retaliation against Taiwan is likely to be fivefold: spreading disinformation, launching cyberattacks, intensifying economic coercion, seeking reassurances and trying to shape the narrative in its favour, and further intensification in the naval and air incursions.

A long-term response includes economic coercion. China has already banned 100 Taiwanese food snacks manufacturers, imports of citrus fruits, and varieties of fish. China’s economic sanctions are only going to intensify as it is trying to hit Taiwan where it hurts the most given the cross-Strait economic interdependence.

China is also using this episode to seek reassurances from several countries on their adherences to the One-China Policy. Two of the first countries to come in support of China were Russia and North Korea. Additionally, the Chinese diplomats are hoping to shape the narrative of the people in the host countries through social media interactions and writing op-eds in the traditional media.

One of the most alarming responses is the further increase in military activities around Taiwan. With this, China aims to achieve three objectives: it wants to generate panic among people and intimidate Taiwan; it allows China to check Taiwan’s preparedness, the United States’ resolve to defend Taiwan, and even Japan’s response in an event of future cross-Strait conflict; and deter countries to expand interactions with Taiwan leading to Taiwan’s isolation.

These moves seem to be punitive measures, and are to deter the United States and Taiwan from improving semi-political exchanges and other countries to freely engage Taiwan. For now, China’s response seems to be a mix of military intimidation, verbal brinkmanship, and cutting off dialogues on key issues with the United States with a possibility of downgrading diplomatic contacts.

China’s actions will have long-term implications. While this increases anxiety and tensions in the Taiwan Strait, such miscalculations have the potential to create further problems for China. This is leading to further deterioration of relations with the United States, Japan, and other G7 countries with a possibility of the United States and Japan also getting involved in any future contingency.

It will dent China’s image and establish it as an aggressor. China has active territorial disputes with countries such as India, Japan, Southeast Asian nations. If China decides to escalate, it will harbour anxiety among countries that they might be next, and only bolster the resolve of countries to further strengthen a collective response to maintain the peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific.

Sana Hashmi is Post-Doctoral Fellow, Taiwan-Asia Exchange Foundation. She tweets @sanahashmi1.

(Disclaimer: The views of the writer do not represent the views of WION or ZMCL. Nor does WION or ZMCL endorse the views of the writer.)