Beyond Weapons: Time For A New U.S. Strategy On Taiwan

June 05, 2022
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This article first appeared in 19FortyFive on June 5th, 2022. Click here to read the original article.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is the most recent, but far from only, incident highlighting Taiwan’s vulnerability to Chinese attack. Western assistance to Ukraine, particularly sharing intelligence, has contributed significantly to its defense, but the underlying failure of deterrence was tragic. Prior to Moscow’s attack, Washington and its allies lacked credibility, unity, and adequate appreciation for larger geostrategic issues. The consequences are evident daily.

China and Taiwan are watching closely, and debate has accelerated over the military capabilities Taipei needs to maximize deterrence and defense against Beijing. Unfortunately, as with Ukraine, this debate lacks a broader politico-military foundation, which threatens Taiwan whatever its military arsenal. Biden administration myopia is missing critical opportunities to strengthen not just Taiwan, but the entire Indo-Pacific’s resistance to Chinese belligerence.

For the United States, implementing more effective deterrence for Taiwan is not simply a tactical case study. “Defending” Taiwan (or whether it has the right weaponry) is far too narrow a politico-military framework. Taiwan is not some isolated problem, but a strategically critical component of an Indo-Pacific, indeed global, counter-China strategy. Nonetheless, too many still view Taipei as an irritant to Beijing, an unnecessary burden we are protecting.

This misperception persists despite fundamental changes in Taiwan. It is no longer just the “losing side” in China’s Communist-Nationalist civil war, but a functionally independent country that intends to remain so. Its successful, growing economy is critical to America and the world, and its robust democracy has no appetite for anschluss with China. These are not just fun facts, but are integral to Taipei’s strategic position and its relationship with Washington.

Given its dramatic social, political and economic changes since 1949, Taiwan has little doubt the “one China” concept, like “strategic ambiguity,” is past retirement age. Thirty years of surveys have asked residents how they identify themselves. Those identifying as “Taiwanese” rose from 18% to 62%; “Chinese” fell from 26% to 3%; “both Taiwanese and Chinese” fell from 46% to 32%; and non-responses fell from 11% to 3%. Taiwan’s people have rejected the Shanghai Communique language of “all Chinese on either side of the Taiwan Strait” as archaic. Perhaps more than any other reason, this is why “Taiwan” is Asia’s synonym for “Ukraine.”

President Biden has said three times that America would defend Taiwan if it were attacked, and three times his staff has tried to pretend he didn’t. Such confusion has not been limited to Taiwan. So, if Biden intended to reinforce “strategic ambiguity,” he and his administration have done a masterful job. In April, 2021, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines testified that:

“[if] we were to see a U.S. shift from strategic ambiguity…,to clarify our willingness to intervene in a Taiwan contingency, the Chinese would find this deeply destabilizing….It would solidify Chinese perceptions that the U.S. is bent on constraining China’s rise, including through military force, and would probably cause Beijing to aggressively undermine U.S. interests worldwide. That is our assessment.”

If Biden disagrees with Haines’s assessment, which counsels against a “shift from strategic ambiguity,” he needs to say so. Rather than press-question answers followed by cleanup patrols, Biden must speak comprehensively, bury “strategic ambiguity” unambiguously, and establish plainly that Washington sees Taipei as an ally. Being explicit would benefit both countries, and everyone in the Indo-Pacific who assess China’s menace similarly.

Enlarging Taipei’s military cooperation throughout the Indo-Pacific is today potentially the most effective way to break Beijing’s heavy-handed efforts to quarantine Taiwan politically. Deciding what military assets America should provide Taiwan is crucial, but the bigger picture is to interweave Taiwan into the emerging alliances and coalitions forming to deal with the Chinese threat. That would be real “integrated defense.” Taiwan’s critical geographic position in the “first island chain” between China and the broader Pacific alone explains why. Beyond the East China Sea, Taiwan has inherited territorial claims in the South China Sea; its air and naval assets could play vital roles, alongside other navies, ensuring freedom of navigation and refuting Beijing’s unfounded sovereignty claims across that critical space.

Many such duties for Taiwan come readily to mind. The recent Tokyo meeting of Quad heads of state (India, Japan, Australia, and the United States) launched the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness (IPMDA), an excellent initiative in which Taiwan could play a vital part. Intended to “build a faster, wider, and more accurate maritime picture of near-real-time activities in partners’ waters”, the IPMDA contemplates “immediate consultations” with others, which should obviously include Taiwan.

The AUKUS (Australia, UK, US) initiative to produce nuclear-powers submarines for Australia provides another template for mutual cooperation on sophisticated, interoperable defense capabilities in which Taiwan could be seamlessly integrated into larger Indo-Pacific coalitions. There is no imminent need, or potential, to have one comprehensive alliance structure like NATO, which itself grew and evolved over decades. But Taiwan should be a part in whatever steps are being taken in the Indo-Pacific.

It was, therefore, a significant disappointment, and a significant error, not to include Taipei in the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF), unveiled the same day as IPMDA. Taiwan (under the outdated name “Chinese Taipei”) is, after all a WTO member; it is manifestly insufficient to say the U.S. will continue enhancing bilateral economic relations with Taiwan as if that is a substitute for participation in initiatives like IPEF. If other IPEF members feared Beijing’s reaction to including

Taiwan, it shows they still gravely underestimate China’s threat, and will fear other necessary and appropriate steps in the near future. Such timidity augurs poorly for IPEF’s prospects.

Taiwan’s broader, entirely appropriate regional roles cannot be fulfilled merely with “defensive” weapons against potential Chinese amphibious assaults, whether in traditional or asymmetric capabilities, which Biden’s advisors are pressing. Their focus is too narrow. It undercuts effective U.S. regional strategy, including their own initiatives like IPMDA and IPEF. Properly providing for an expanded, coalition-based military role for Taiwan requires assigning responsibilities to coalition-of-the-willing members and equipping them accordingly. We will then have a realistic context to assess specific weapons systems that will assist not just Taiwan, but the larger regional program to counter Beijing’s belligerence.

Biden’s unforced error at the United Nations

April 25, 2022
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This article appeared in The Hill on April 25th 2022. Click here to view the original article.

The Biden administration is committing an unforced error at the United Nations (UN) that risks reviving the long-simmering issue of the veto power wielded by the Security Council’s five permanent members. Russia’s Feb. 25 veto of a draft resolution deploring its invasion of Ukraine prompted a renewed effort to delegitimize the “Perm Five” veto, a controversial issue since the UN’s founding in 1945. 

Astonishment at Moscow’s veto and its result emerged in headlines such as: “Russia’s veto makes a mockery of the United Nations Security Council.” To which, the proper response is: mockery of the Security Council? Where have these people been the last 77 years? Have they forgotten the Council’s near-total Cold War paralysis and irrelevancy, the UN’s longest running failure? 

During the Charter’s drafting, many Americans and others objected to granting Security Council vetoes to World War II’s major victors. Eleanor Roosevelt, for example, said, “a good many people think that… the veto power should be done away with in order to insure a wider expression of the majority point of view. For the time being, however, that idea has been set aside.” Not until 1970 did Washington cast its first veto. 

The current effort to constrain the veto is led by Liechtenstein (yes, you read that correctly), with more than 50 co-sponsors on a measure requiring the General Assembly, within 10 days of a veto, “to hold a debate on the situation as to which the veto was cast.” 

Surprisingly, the Biden administration, alone among the Perm Five, has joined this misbegotten effort, on which the Assembly will vote April 26. With due respect to the good people of Liechtenstein, their government needs better international priorities.   

Unwise and unnecessary, the proposed resolution, following Mrs. Roosevelt’s logic, reflects the long-standing urge to weaken and ultimately eliminate the veto. Its proponents apparently either don’t understand or don’t care that, for the United States, an undiminished, unimpaired veto power is an absolute prerequisite to continued participation in the UN itself.  

Consider carefully the Biden administration’s own dangerous arguments. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield criticized Russia for its “shameful pattern of abusing its veto privilege.” 

But there never would have been a “Security Council” without the veto, which Joseph Stalin demanded and Franklin Roosevelt accepted. They would be amazed and amused (Mrs. Roosevelt notwithstanding) to hear it called a “privilege.” The Charter’s Article 27 expressly authorizes the veto, to which every original signatory and every subsequent member agreed. In the UN context, the veto is not a privilege, it is a right.  Arguing that it is merely a privilege implies it can be taken away or should be relinquished. If that’s President Biden’s view, he should initiate a broad debate on the issue in Congress, which would be especially informative during this midterm election year. 

Clearly, there is no acceptable excuse for Russia’s conduct in Ukraine, but “shameful” is in the beholder’s eye. As Elliott Abrams has stressed, the overwhelming majority of America’s recent vetoes have been to protect Israel. 

U.S. vetoes were often alone, with France and the United Kingdom deeming America’s position inappropriate or even a little shameful. Certainly, Russia and China weren’t happy. Nonetheless. two of my happiest days as UN ambassador were when I cast Security Council vetoes against unjust anti-Israel resolutions. Limitations on the veto power will never be imposed only on countries casting “shameful” vetoes, but on all permanent members. That is flatly unacceptable to the United States.  

Moreover, Liechtenstein’s resolution is utterly unnecessary to achieve the supposed “transparency” its proponents seek. Its immediate real-world impact will be trivial, hardly worth the effort being expended to obtain its passage, unless its cosponsors’ ulterior motives are part of a larger delegitimization effort. No one can say for certain how much this resolution will undermine the veto long-term, but for the U.S. to co-sponsor it suggests either blindness or Biden administration complicity with the delegitimization objective. 

It’s not as though vetoes are cast in secrecy. Every veto in UN history, like all formal Council actions, has been made in open, formal Council sessions, open to print and electronic press and the public. Almost all Council members make statements explaining their votes, particularly vetoes, for anyone interested. The Charter (in Article 31) specifically provides that any UN member “may participate… in the discussion of any question brought before the Security Council whenever the latter considers that the interests of that Member are specially affected.”  

I cannot recall any instance where the Council has denied a member’s request to speak. The Charter also provides (in Article 24) that the Council “shall submit annual and, when necessary, special reports to the General Assembly for its consideration.”  What more is needed? 

If anything, the Security Council is now so transparent that its frequently feckless actions are already in plain view. The Biden administration may stand behind Liechtenstein’s proposal, but other nations should understand that this is merely a fit of absence of mind, not a permanent change in American support for the veto power.   

John Bolton was national security adviser to President Trump from 2018 to 2019, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from 2005 to 2006 and held senior State Department posts in 2001-2005 and 1985-1989. His most recent book is “The Room Where It Happened” (2020). He is the founder of John Bolton Super PAC, a political action committee supporting candidates who believe in a strong U.S. foreign policy.