New Chinese White Paper points to military conquest of Taiwan
Please use Share Button below to share with friends and colleagues
Adrian Geiges reports in Die Welt1 on a new Chinese White Paper on Taiwan which was released on August 10, 2022.2
Xi Jinping’s goal is to go down in history as the Chinese leader who reunited Taiwan with mainland China. A new “White Paper” spells that out in alarming detail.
Geiges reports,
Revised Google translation
(Xi’s) government has just published a new White Paper that clearly sharpens the rhetoric.
It is overwritten: “The Taiwan question and China’s unification in the New Era.” Beijing’s propaganda describes the time since Xi Jinping came to power as a “New Era”, characterized by increased repression internally and external aggression.
According to the paper, this also has direct consequences for Taiwan: “Under the strong leadership of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party with Xi Jinping as the core, the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese government have taken new and innovative measures with regard to Taiwan.” As a result, “the wheel of history continues to roll towards national reunification, and no individual or force will stop it.”
The change in the text from previous versions of the White Paper is particulatly significant:
The previous White Papers of the Chinese Government on Taiwan, published in 1993 and 2000, still stated that Beijing would permanently station “no troops and no administrative staff” in Taiwan. This sentence has now been deleted.
Xi Jinping thus breaks with the policy of the great reformer Deng Xiaoping. He had a brilliant idea, first for Hong Kong and Macau, then also for Taiwan: one country, two systems. The territories should nominally belong to China, but govern themselves internally and retain their previous system.
It is probably no coincidence that this update and revised language of the White Paper was issued a week after Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan on August 2, and on the eve of the 20th Chinese Communist Party Congress, where it will likely be endorsed as the official policy of the Party.
While the visit of Nancy Pelosi3 to Taiwan probably did not affect the drafting of the paper, it may well have affected the timing of its release. Other factors that probably contributed to its release include the disastrous meeting of Antony Blinken with foreign minister Wang Yi in Anchorage in March 2021, President Biden’s refusal to accede to Xi’s direct and personal request made in a telephone call that the Pelosi visit be canceled, the failure of the Biden administration to loudly celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Shanghai Communjqué, and the general hostility between the two countries which Biden has done little to moderate.
The question is and will remain for Xi and China: What does China have to gain from a cooperative relationship with the United States?
The question for Americans is whether if Joe Biden had acceded to Xi’s request to cancel Pelosi’s visit, at least by postponing it until after the Chinese Party Congress, release of the new White Paper and its endorsement by the Party Congress might have been avoided.
More broadly, the question for Americans is whether or not the U.S. should try to establish more cooperative relations with China, in order to counter Russia and to inhibit the formation of tighter military ties between the Russia and China.In doing so, the U.S. should of course hold fast to its principles.
But it can try to soften the tone of overt hostility, and try offering more carrots and lfewer sticks.
Biden’s failure to delay Pelosi’s visit (e.g., with a personal telephone call and strong request that it be postponed in view of overarching national security interests) constituted a disastrous foreign policy failure 4, one of the greatest of his administration. It ranks right up there with the Afghanistan withdrawal decision, and the public decision to take force off the table in responding to any potential Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The U.S. and its allies have been put on notice: Xi Jinping intends to incorporate Taiwan into the People’s Republic of China, by negotiation if possible but by force if necessary.
Xi Jinsping is 69 years old. That gives him 10 years, perhaps 15, to carry out his plan and achieve his goal.
This means that so long as Xi Jinping remains in power and there is no dramatic improvement in U.S.-Chinese relations, there is a high risk that China may invade Taiwan sometime in the next 10-15 years.
Moreover, there appears to ne no reason to assume that such military action will take place later rather than earlier in this time period.
Geiges reports,
One should also ask why he is having a new White Paper on Taiwan published right now, the first in 22 years. It cannot be due to Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, the spokeswoman for the US House of Representatives – no policy papers are written in China at such short notice. Xi will use the most convenient time to attack. And this could also be now, as long as the West is busy with the Ukraine war and has not yet built up a strong production of semiconductors.
On the relation between Pelosi’s visit and release of the White Paper, Geiges is confusing the time needed for the preparation of the report with the decision to release it. The latter very probably was affected by Pelosi’s visit, and by Biden’s failure to respond to Xi’s personal request to call it off.
In terms of the threat against Taiwan, the outcome of the war in Ukraine could have a large impact on Xi’s calculations.
What you want to accomplish, though, is not always what you are able to accomplish.
Still, it is worth bearing in mind that, as has been the case with Putin, there is no guarantee that Xi’s decision will be “rational” in the sense that it will appear to Western observers to be “rational” in terms of the variables they deem to be important.
Xi, like Putin, may be acting from other motivations.
1) Adrian Geiges, “Warum Xi Jinping gerade jetzt einen Angriffskrieg auf Taiwan ankündigt,” Die Welt, den 28. August 2022;
2) Adrian Geiges, “Why Xi Jinping is announcing a war of aggression on Taiwan right now, Die Welt, August 28, 2022;
Adrian Geiges studied Chinese in Beijing and reported from there as China correspondent of the “Star”, and also lived in Shanghai and Hong Kong for several years. Together with WELT editor Stefan Aust, he is the author of the book Xi Jinping – the most powerful man in the world, the first comprehensive biography of the Chinese head of state and party.
See,
(1) The State Council, The People’s Republic of China, “China releases white paper on Taiwan question, reunification in new era, Xinhua, August 10, 2022 (Updated 14:24);
(2) Alex Millson, “China’s First White Paper on Taiwan Since Xi Came to Power — In Full,” Bloomberg, August 10, 2022 (03:25 AM EDT);
See “China and Taiwan: Before poking the Cyclops in the eye, think about the Party Congress and Ukraine, Trenchant Observations, August 18, 2022.
See,
(1) “Pelosi's visit to Taiwan and Biden's catastrophic foreign policy failures,” Trenchant Observations, August 6, 2022;
OR Biden should have picked up the phone and called Xi to say, "Relax" this we are not changing our policy".
But the truth may be more difficult to discern. China has always played the long game as we have been more reactive.........are the roles changing?
No doubt Taiwan will be taken by China. But when?
The US is moving forward to convince Taiwan manufacturers to move to USA soil sooner not later. Still, this maneuver may excellerate China's take over ambitions.
In the big picture, this development would be happening no matter who is president in the US.
Seems to me that Biden is doing as much as he can without any Republican support in this regard.