Which Taiwanese party offers the best chance for peace? (Not the KMT)

Here's a random picture from Hyderabad because I have somewhere to be and haven't got time to be messing around with photos

Lord forgive me, but I'm gonna pull a Tom Friedman and start with a taxi anecdote. 

If I have work at 9am, I usually take a taxi because I simply cannot with the morning rush hour. Sometimes, we talk politics, and I've heard all sorts of opinions, from the standard-issue to the positively bizarre. This morning, my driver was a middle-aged woman from Tainan with big hair and a bright green skirt who insisted that Taiwan was indeed independent, but there was no need to keep "saying we're independent" because it "upsets the mainland."  She insisted that she wants "peace" and that Taiwan is very small so “there's nothing we can do." 

Crucially, she seemed to think that people calling for Taiwan independence simply should not do so. Not because Taiwan isn't independent, but because it puts Taiwan in danger. 

We didn't exchange views on specific political parties, but her views are fairly consistent with the KMT's current campaign platform: that they're the party of no war, not declaring independence and improved dialogue with China. The only real difference between her views and the KMT platform is that the KMT fundamentally does not believe that Taiwan is independent of China. 

As she talked -- and mostly, I just let her talk -- it occurred to me that a lot of people are still judging presidential candidates based not on their actual platforms, but on some weird fantasy of what they believe those platforms to be.

For example, I've heard people still say they fear that DPP candidate Lai Ching-te will "go for independence" or that the DPP is dangerous because they will "declare independence" if they win again.

Others believe that the KMT only favor "improved dialogue" with China for the purposes of averting war; they'll insist that the party won't sell out Taiwan's sovereignty despite the fact that China's preconditions for dialogue -- that Taiwan recognize that there is "one China" and that this China includes Taiwan" -- do exactly that. 

The first is based on a semi-reasonable deduction from DPP party philosophy. They do, indeed, favor an independent Taiwan. The second is based on zero evidence. Such people are taking the KMT at their word that all they want is "dialogue", without considering their fundamental orientation to unification. 

But why take the KMT at their word, while insisting the DPP has some sort of ulterior motive or secret plan to pivot toward a formal declaration of independence when they've been quite clear that they don't intend to do so?

It not only feels a bit unfair to deduce that Lai is being dishonest about the DPP's intentions if they win the presidency again but to take Hou's word as bond, it also assumes that there is a bigger difference between what the two parties are saying than I suspect actually exists.

No, really. Hear me out.

And yes, I'm leaving out Ko Wen-je and Terry Gou because I don't want to talk about Ko, and Gou isn't worth my time. 

If we take Lai and Hou's platforms as they are presented, here is what they say they want: 

The DPP has consistently said it does, in fact, want dialogue with China, and they do not intend to declare independence. 

The KMT also says it wants dialogue with China, and does not intend to declare independence. 

I have no reason to doubt either party is lying, so whether you vote for Lai or Hou, you're getting a party that welcomes discussions with China, and won't declare independence. (I happen to know for a fact that while the DPP does, of course, envision a future of globally-recognized sovereignty as an entity independent of the PRC, there is no current intention to 'declare independence'. There's no ruse, no secret agenda). 

That, in my opinion, is where the similarities end. The DPP's reasoning is that they'd be happy to speak with envoys from another country, as long as Taiwan isn't forced to abrogate its sovereignty to do so. There's no need to declare independence, as Taiwan is already independent. No other country feels the need to put out such a statement. Why should Taiwan?

The KMT is staking their presidential bid on that dialogue with China. The key difference, of course, is that they're perfectly willing to denigrate Taiwan's sovereignty in order to do so. They'll agree to just about anything -- that there is one China as per the (fabricated) 1992 Consensus, that Taiwan's a part of it, whatever the CCP want them to say about "brothers" (兄弟) or "one family" (一家人).

Their reasoning is less overt; they won't come out and say that they consider Taiwan a part of China, but their stances don't make any sense unless you take it as a given. If any party has a secret or poorly-clarified agenda, it's the KMT. They know perfectly well that their pro-unification orientation is not popular with the public. 

In other words, when greens point out that the KMT is willing to sell out Taiwan, they're not wrong. When blues say the DPP are secretly gunning for formal independence even if it means war, they're full of crap. 

Yes, I'm biased. But come on...I'm also not wrong.

Perhaps my dislike for the KMT is causing me to notice it more, but it feels like, as usual, there's a double standard at play with the two parties. The KMT can screw up royally but "well, you know, they've always been that way." They don't even need to make meaningful changes! Their fundamental philosophy regarding Taiwan's status is laughably out of touch with the public but "but Taiwanese like to change out the ruling party" (true enough, I just wish one of the two biggest options wasn't so awful). The KMT can slaughter the defense budget, but the DPP gets blamed for Taiwan's lack of military preparedness.

The KMT can all but say they'd sell out Taiwan, but people will still believe they only want "dialogue". The KMT can have a barely-concealed desire to make Taiwan as 'Chinese' as possible, but somehow people think the DPP are the ones who are hiding their true intentions. 

Frankly, I'm sick of it. 

Okay, you might say, but which party will actually prevent war?

Honestly? The KMT may be running on a "no war" platform, but it's most likely the DPP. 

What do you think is more likely to dissuade China from attacking? A party that will kowtow to the CCP's every demand but perhaps not agree to true unification with the PRC (because the public would never accept it)? Or the party that will do what they can for Taiwan's defensive capabilities and court support from other countries, making the country less of an appealing target? 

Let's say the KMT wins, Hou lets Xi give him a good old-fashioned rawdog, but crucially doesn't actually set a timetable for unification because he knows it would result in mass riots and essentially ruin the KMT's chances for future electoral wins, if not their very existence as a party. China realizes they're not going to actually get a peacefully-unified Taiwan out of the KMT, at least not anytime soon. 

In fact, I suspect China already knows this, unless they've believed their own lies that Taiwan's desire for sovereignty is some top-down DPP invention and not the general public consensus. 

Let's say that the KMT pivoting Taiwan toward China alienates those who might have previously supported its cause -- if you're going to vote in the party that wants unification, why should we support your fight for de jure independence? Domestically, Taiwan's defensive readiness is in shambles because the KMT doesn't actually think Taiwan should need to defend itself. 

What do you think China is going to do? Say "oh well, we tried, good luck in your future endeavors, Taiwan?" 

No, they're going to attack. Not because they have to, but because the KMT will have made it easy.

On the other hand, what do you think will happen when Lai steers the same course as Tsai: cultivating a sense of existing independence for Taiwan, growing global support, rendering the question of a declaration moot as there is no need to declare what is obviously true? 

China will refuse to meet with him for sure. It will look like a more dangerous path, and China will see to that with increase war games and military exercises, various economic coercions, perhaps some financial or cybersecurity sabotage, you know...blah blah blah, the usual. Insist that the 'troublesome' DPP is bringing it on Taiwan, when in fact China is deciding to engage in this. 

They won't do that to Hou. At first, Hou will seem like the candidate for peace, because the random sanctions, military drills and fighter jet excursions will stop. For a time, at least. 

But you know what else is more likely to happen? CCP top brass will look at the costs to a bloody war that Taiwan has purposely built up, from its own defenses to international support, and decide that continuing to rattle the saber is smarter, for the time being, than actually attacking. 

That's not ideal, but it's also not war exactly. 

So if you want peace, don't support the guy that will make it easy for China to start a war when it doesn't get what it wants. 

Because it won't get what it wants -- not ever, because the Taiwanese public is unlikely to pivot toward desiring unification or any kind of strong Chinese identity -- so Taiwan's only option is to make it a bad decision to grab.

Taiwan's Future Hinges on the Little Things

Here are some things I am not an expert in:

Military/defense
Tech
Arms sales
Intelligence
A lot of other things
Most things, actually

But an interesting theme - to me, the non-expert, at least - seems to run through several Taiwan-related news items that touch on these topics these days.

We have the always-great Tanner Greer, writing about how Taiwan can win a war with China. Sure, China's got a bigger army, a bigger budget, a bigger country, and is all around just bigger. But in order to actually win a war with Taiwan without getting trapped in a protracted battle (or before help for Taiwan can arrive), Greer argues that it would need to take Taiwan and strong-arm the population into docility within two short weeks.

That's a very small window of time, and it is not at all clear that China could accomplish it.

What stands in China's way?

The places where the PLA could land in Taiwan amount to a few beaches on the west coast. None of them are friendly to incoming assault.


There are only 13 beaches on Taiwan’s western coast that the PLA could possibly land at. Each of these has already been prepared for a potential conflict. Long underground tunnels—complete with hardened, subterranean supply depots—crisscross the landing sites. The berm of each beach has been covered with razor-leaf plants. Chemical treatment plants are common in many beach towns—meaning that invaders must prepare for the clouds of toxic gas any indiscriminate saturation bombing on their part will release. This is how things stand in times of peace.

As war approaches, each beach will be turned into a workshop of horrors. The path from these beaches to the capital has been painstakingly mapped; once a state of emergency has been declared, each step of the journey will be complicated or booby-trapped. PLA war manuals warn soldiers that skyscrapers and rock outcrops will have steel cords strung between them to entangle helicopters; tunnels, bridges, and overpasses will be rigged with munitions (to be destroyed only at the last possible moment); and building after building in Taiwan’s dense urban core will be transformed into small redoubts meant to drag Chinese units into drawn-out fights over each city street.


Each of these hurdles is a very small thing, but strung together, each one buys Taiwan a little more time, getting it a little bit closer to that two-week window in which the war stops being a certain victory for China and becomes a massive quagmire. It is to Taiwan's advantage, not China's for this to happen. If China overwhelms Taiwan and pushes on it a tense, authoritarian 'peace', the bombings will stop. But Taiwan will be finished. There will be no fighting back - only dying. If you thought the White Terror was bad, wait until you see what China is capable of. Oh wait, we already know.

Taiwan's weapons for fighting back are comparatively small, but they could have a huge effect on how such an invasion would go.

Here's another thing that's small - the latest arms package to Taiwan. But Michal Thim proves that it's not the size that counts, it's how you use it:


On the face of it, the content of the latest arms sale does not look particularly concerning to Beijing. The total size of the sale is much less than the US$1.4 billion approved last June....
However, the content of the sale is not the most crucial aspect, although its utility to Taiwan’s air force cannot be overstated. The fact that the sale is just about supply and logistics suggest a change in attitude on the US side.

First, the items were approved on a continuing basis and as needed and available. Second, the Trump administration has not only moved from large bundles every few years to sales on an annual basis, but it may also indicate a move away from bundling orders altogether.

In the past, and especially during Barack Obama’s two terms, the US government came across as too accommodating in trying to navigate relations with Taiwan in a way that would not upset Beijing, and Chinese leaders seized on every opportunity to capitalise.

The result was that arms sales to Taiwan were bundled into large packages and separated by long periods of no activity, though the ever-growing military capability of the PLA warranted a response via robust arms sales, as presumed by the Taiwan Relations Act of 1979. Something as routine as a supply of spare parts under the logistics agreement became subject to political considerations. Now, Washington may be returning to normal.


Small sales with big impacts. Arms sales on a continuing basis and not bundled into large packages, offered fairly rarely, which China throws a fit about each and every time, are in fact not as good a deal for Taiwan as sales on an as-needed, always-available basis. Nobody - not even China - can keep up the screamy outrage for that long. The more the US sells to Taiwan regularly, the less often China can "raise tensions" (then pretend those tensions rose by themselves, like magic) over it.

Well, actually China probably can do that. But nobody can keep the media's attention with its screamy outrage for that long, and that's really what matters here. If China cries alone in a forest and nobody is there to hear it, did it ever really cry at all?

Also, BOO to South China Morning Post for completely mangling a perfectly good shot at a dirty joke in their overly prolix subheader, and read the whole article to hear about how Europe is entering the Taiwan arms game. Also a small thing with a big impact: the more people we have ensuring that Taiwan can defend itself, the better. The sale may be small but the precedent it sets is huge. 

Here's an even smaller thing: Chinese companies have been hiding chips that enable them to hack into systems around the world into tech they manufacture: 


Nested on the servers’ motherboards, the testers found a tiny microchip, not much bigger than a grain of rice, that wasn’t part of the boards’ original design. Amazon reported the discovery to U.S. authorities, sending a shudder through the intelligence community. Elemental’s servers could be found in Department of Defense data centers, the CIA’s drone operations, and the onboard networks of Navy warships. And Elemental was just one of hundreds of Supermicro customers.

During the ensuing top-secret probe, which remains open more than three years later, investigators determined that the chips allowed the attackers to create a stealth doorway into any network that included the altered machines. Multiple people familiar with the matter say investigators found that the chips had been inserted at factories run by manufacturing subcontractors in China.


It doesn't take a tech expert to see that this is terrifying, and Jordan Robertson and Michael Riley lay out why:


In the three years since the briefing in McLean, no commercially viable way to detect attacks like the one on Supermicro’s motherboards has emerged—or has looked likely to emerge. Few companies have the resources of Apple and Amazon, and it took some luck even for them to spot the problem. “This stuff is at the cutting edge of the cutting edge, and there is no easy technological solution,” one of the people present in McLean says. “You have to invest in things that the world wants. You cannot invest in things that the world is not ready to accept yet.”


Tiny chips, massive problems. If this is what is being found in the US, imagine how much of Taiwanese telecommunications and other digital activities and information China has access to.

There are also small things like port terminals to consider. It seems odd that after a Chinese takeover, the Taiwanese government would allow terminals in Kaohsiung port previously controlled by a small shipping company (Orient Overseas) to be transferred to Chinese-owned Cosco. 

When Chinese state-owned shipping line Cosco Shipping Holdings unveiled a $6.3 billion deal to buy smaller competitor Orient Overseas (International) last year, Orient's ownership of port terminals in the U.S. and Taiwan appeared to pose a potential regulatory obstacle.

Port ownership by Chinese state companies has become an increasingly sensitive topic globally as Beijing's Belt and Road Initiative spurs concerns about whether their control could be leveraged for security purposes.

Given deepening confrontations between Beijing and both Washington and Taipei over a range of issues, it looked doubtful that Cosco would be allowed to take over the assets of Hong Kong-based Orient Overseas at Kaohsiung, Taiwan, and Long Beach, California, near Los Angeles.

On July 7, Cosco and Orient Overseas, better known under its operating brand OOCL, said that U.S. regulatory approval had been secured, with the condition that the Long Beach terminal be put into a trust and then sold. Cosco then announced the completion of its takeover on July 27, with no mention made of Kaohsiung.

While there have been no public statements, it is evident that OOCL retains control of its terminal at Kaohsiung, Taiwan's busiest port. OOCL's name remains on signage there and staff in Kaohsiung say nothing has changed.


What happens to those terminals when China grows more hostile toward Taiwan (as it likely will), or otherwise throws a conniption over Taiwan's simply trying to exist? How does it affect Taiwan's economy? 

I don't know, but that people who know these things say it matters means we ought to be paying attention. These terminals may barely register as small pearls in China's massive BRI pearl necklace encircling the world, but they could, in the coming years, matter quote a lot for Taiwan. 

People think big: they think about big bombs, big invasions, big armies.

But the war for Taiwan - and for liberal democratic values in the face of an increasingly expansionist China - isn't going to be won by earth-shaking missiles or massive regiments invading by sea.

It will be won by things as small as a gauntlet of booby traps starting in the Taiwan Strait and ending in Taiwanese cities, as small as whether Taiwan is able to maintain its defensive capabilities with rolling arms sales from the West, or whether we're all laid bare by hidden microchips as small as a number carved on a penny.

When it comes to ensuring a future for Taiwan, in some ways, think small.

Little end note: I just quoted a bunch of really smart men. Everything they say is worth listening to, but really, all men. You probably didn't notice, but I did. Where the ladies at?