A Chinese invasion of Taiwan is unlikely. This is a conclusion many would arrive at when they factor in the logistics cost, the bloodshed and the international reaction that China would have to face for even attempting to breach the Taiwanese fortress. After all, the USA has vowed to defend Taiwan, sold billions of dollars worth of military equipment, and is in fact bound by its own law to ensure that the island nation successfully resists a Chinese incursion. What can go wrong? Well, a lot. Recent ‘fails’ of the West show just how quickly and severely things can go wrong for nations that count on Western assistance— the latest victim being Ukraine.
Ukraine— The latest casualty
Ukraine fell prey to the illusion of Western backing. This will go down in history as a classic example of the West’s inability to unite and inflict costs on a powerful aggressor, in this case, Russia. It all goes hunky-dory as long as a politically heightened fear of war keeps the ball rolling for Nato’s unity and expansion and therefore, the western military-industrial complex. Beyond that, a war with a great power like Russia is out of the question, and any harsh economic sanctions that come with a price to the West, are untenable. That is why as Putin invaded Ukraine, European companies doubled down on their imports of Russian gas which ironically passes through Ukraine in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline. This is why Italy lobbied to keep its luxury exports out of the sanctions list on Russia, and Belgium saved its diamond industry from the cruel effect of the war. To put it another way— words, not deeds, is the way to go for Western governments until it’s too late to act.
Germany denied weapons to Ukraine, and instead sent 5000 helmets to cheer them up— cheer whom, Russia or Ukraine, that’s your guess. It was also in two minds about removing Russia from the SWIFT global payments system. After nearly three days of the Russian military’s quick advance into Ukraine and a lot of criticism, Germany has decided to send 1000 anti-tank weapons and 500 Stinger class missiles to the besieged country which has been pleading for over a month. It’s still to be seen if Germany can dump Russian gas and shed its reliance on Moscow.
Western action is condensing in the form of some selective economic sanctions. Among them, the European Union’s proclaimed sanctions on Russia’s central bank could deliver a strong blow to the Russian economy. Meanwhile, only a “certain number” of Russian banks will be blocked out of SWIFT. Besides, the devil is always in the details which will be apparent soon enough.
Nevertheless, these actions are far from scaring Russia off. Ukraine has splintered from the north, south and east. The capital is under siege. Ukrainian forces are demoralised. Ukrainian civilians, men and women, are willingly or unwillingly taking up arms, and preparing Molotov cocktails at the call of their President. And by the looks of it, the last of Putin’s aggression has not been seen yet. He is looking for a fight and has priced in even the loss of Russian troops and weaponry. Economic sanctions may not dent that raging ambition, not in the short term, and it is in the short term itself that Ukraine could lose out a significant portion of its territory. So the West’s financial actions are not an immediate remedy to the situation. In fact, they will only push Russia further into the lap of another mindless aggressor, China— an eventuality the West has not prepared for.
India’s China problem
India is faced with a constant threat of war with China. With a war-like military buildup at the de-facto Line of Actual Control (LAC), China occupies the Indian territory ‘Aksai Chin’. To the east of India, China eyes the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh and its shenanigans— threatening and kidnapping civilians, and brawls with the Indian Army keep springing up from time to time. India’s China problem has existed for decades, yet the West kept mum. Instead, it made China richer with its loose WTO standards for Beijing, and the complete absence of crippling economic consequences every time China mass-persecuted a minority, made expansionist moves in the Himalayas, the South China Sea and elsewhere, or when it debt- trapped weak economies to enter into a base race among other objectives.
When in 2020, the Indian Army and the Chinese PLA exchanged blows leading to significant casualties for the first time since 1975, the West’s reaction was checked. The hawkish Trump administration’s livid reaction was an oasis of hope but Europe, Canada, and others turned a blind eye to the escalation.
India’s relations with the West are blooming. Under the Trump administration, the US saw India take a sharp, unprecedented turn favoring ties with Washington DC, much to the chagrin of China. The Biden Administration, however, sourced things as he inherited Trump’s legacy only to dismantle it globally. On China, the US pulled back on all fronts and the severity of its language on China’s aggression towards India also faded. India may have many things to say about that but one assessment is certain— India is on its own in the time of war with China, just how it always stood alone against Pakistan-sponsored terror, despite flourishing economic and diplomatic ties with the West.
The Afghanistan Fever Dream
Before Ukraine, one needed to go no further than Afghanistan to see how ridiculously clumsy the West can be with a country whose existence depends on them. Sheer incompetence, terrible foresight and moral depravity— all culminated into the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban and its backers in Pakistan. The visuals of Afghans falling off air-borne flights fleeing out of Kabul allegorises the West’s tendency to abandon its allies and partners.
The withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan came abruptly and without a strategy. The civilian government was left to face a nasty fate at the hands of vengeful terrorists that wreaked havoc all the way and quickly took Kabul. Afghan allies of the US, political proponents of democracy were left to face the Taliban, defenseless. USA’s allies who helped it strengthen the civilian regime in Kabul when it wanted them to, were left scrambling to evacuate their own, racing towards an airport, the only functioning airport, that was surrounded on all sides by terrorists. Loss of billions in investments in infrastructure projects was left undiscussed. Suddenly, the US made it clear, it did not owe anyone anything.
What if this keeps repeating? Is the West indeed reliable? Can the West even save itself? And where does this leave Taiwan?
Taiwan— Yet another prop?
Taiwan, a beacon of democracy just 160 kilometers from the coast of China, is at the risk of being engulfed in red by the Chinese Communist Party. Russia’s freak invasion of Ukraine can energize Xi Jinping to pull off something similar. Add to that the failures of the West, and China might just find the right cue to launch an attack. The trigger could also be internal party unrest. Nevertheless, Xi Jinping plans to stay on till 2036 and capturing Taiwan is definitely on the menu.
In fact, right after Russia’s military operation in Ukraine began, nine Chinese fighter aircraft violated Taiwanese airspace. For Taiwan, this has become a routine. For the last few years, China has amped up calls for invasion, waged an elaborate psychological war on the Taiwanese people, and attempted to exhaust and unnerve Taiwanese defense forces with regular airspace intrusions.
Taiwan has hit back, leveraged its semiconductor prowess, spread its message across the world and diplomatic relations with major world powers. Although left with just 15 countries that officially recognize its sovereignty, the USA, and several European nations have propped Taiwan up against China. The stated reasons could be many— democratic brotherhood or freedom from Communism, but most importantly, it is to push China on the back foot and extract economic concessions from it when absolutely needed. Past that, Taiwan might just be on its own.
Granted the USA’s Taiwan Relations Act would allow it to make available whatever defense equipment and services that Taiwan would require, but determining what Taiwan requires or what it should get depends on the US Congress and the President, who is currently Joe Biden, a President that has no history or perceivable interest of hawking over China as he does with Russia. In essence, the US might defend Taiwan or it could very well decide to ‘clumsily’ drop Taiwan into China’s hands depending on the situation. Ring a bell?
In fact, the Biden Administration has been vacillating on its position with regards to Taiwan. In October 2021, Biden stated that the US would defend Taiwan, but US officials quickly clarified that there was ‘no change’ in the policy. In the Democracy Summit, Taiwan did get an invite from the US, but its foreign minister was blacked out in her virtual address where she showed Taiwan as a nation separate from the People’s Republic of China on the map. Such fiascos will only translate as a sign of weakness and indecisiveness to Xi Jinping.
In case Taiwan faces an invasion, many say that since the USA and the European Union are China’s largest trading partners, together, they can obliterate China’s will to fight and bring Taiwan to justice. But again, the USA and the European Union are China’s largest trading partners and they may not be ready to shun the ‘world’s factory’ and bear the immediate economic discomfort caused by such a move. The second circumstance is more likely as the Trump-era political campaign to re-orient the supply chains evaporated under the Biden Administration.
Undoing the legacy of Donald Trump’s hawkish and confrontationist policy on China, under Biden, the US simmered down and eventually, the focus fell entirely on Russia— leaving Quad members India, Japan and Australia in the lurch, ASEAN in a ‘told you so’ position and Taiwan completely exposed to the hazards of the ill-timed abomination that the Biden Administration sells as ‘strategic ambiguity’. For Japan, India and Australia, it is time to take the lead. For Taiwan, it is a time to lay low and radically recalibrate the risk of relying entirely on the US or the democratic West.
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