Category: Relations -Sino-Taiwanese

Diplomatic Recognition: A Comparative Record

Last week, Costa Rica switched its diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China, leaving Taiwan with only 24 diplomatic allies.  As a result, Chinese Nationalist Party presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou took the current government to task:

"We had as many as 30 allies when the KMT was in power … It was clear that we made some progress diplomatically when we had a consensus with China … Chen’s foreign policy has lead Taiwan to a dead end," Ma said during a visit to Taipei Port in Bali Township (八里).

Chen’s foreign policy has led Taiwan to a dead end?  An invitation if ever there was to take a closer look at where KMT foreign policy has led the beautiful isle:

During the time the KMT ruled Taiwan, how many net diplomatic allies did it lose?  80?  100?  130?  On top of that, how many new U.N. member states were given the opportunity of recognizing Taiwan, and chose China instead?  I can think of at least 15 – the old Soviet Union used to consist of 15 republics – and NONE of them recognized Taiwan when they gained their freedom.  Come to think of it, neither did any of the newly-freed Eastern-bloc countries, either.  All those potential allies up for grabs on the KMT’s watch – and the KMT let them slip right through their fingers.

So, back to the question:  how many diplomatic allies, real and potential, did the KMT lose for Taiwan?  I’ll guess 100 (and be grateful to anyone who can provide a more accurate number).  That means that over 50 years, the KMT lost 2 diplomatic allies per year, on average.  Does this record compare favorably to that of the Taiwanese nationalists?

I’m afraid it doesn’t.  Under a Taiwanese nationalist president, Taiwan suffered a net loss of 6 diplomatic allies within a period of 7 years.  Unless I’m mistaken, that works out to an average loss of 0.86 diplomatic allies per year.  Nothing to brag about, to be sure, but it sure beats the KMT’s loss of 2 per year.*  Which is to say nothing of the KMT’s loss of Taiwan’s security council seat, and their idiotic refusal to accept the consolation prize of a general assembly seat instead.

* In reply, supporters of the Chinese Nationalist Party might offer two defenses.  The first, Ma Ying-jeou has already mentioned:

"It was clear that we made some progress diplomatically when we had a consensus with China."

OK, I’ll bite.  Just how many new diplomatic allies did Taiwan pick up after it reached the mythical "One China, two interpretations" consensus in 1992?  I wasn’t here, so I don’t know.  Was it two?  Three?  Four?  Undoubtedly, Ma would insist this was a result of goodwill from Beijing.  But could he be suffering from a bad case of post hoc ergo propter hoc?  In other words, might there be some OTHER possible explanation for the increase, besides some sort of imagined "goodwill" on the part of revanchist communists?

Well, let’s see…1992…That would be, what, THREE years after the Tienanmen Massacre?  That was a time at which horrified American and European investors had ceased, or significantly slowed, their investment into the Middle Kingdom.

Wealthy Taiwanese industrialists had fewer scruples, however.  They saw untapped opportunities in China that Americans and Europeans weren’t taking advantage of, and they jumped in.  Fortunately for the Butchers of Beijing, the slack in foreign investment was picked up by the Taiwanese, who pumped money into China big time.

Under this unique set of circumstances, what would China have had to gain by wholesale thievery of Taiwan’s diplomatic allies?  Only an angry government in Taipei, which might have gotten serious about staunching the flow of capital to China, that’s what.  Better to let Taiwan have its two, three, four, new allies.  A few diplomatic gains for Taiwan weren’t going to change the big picture anyways, and would have ensured those NT dollars kept a-comin’.  It might even have convinced a few fools in Taipei to think some sort of detente had been achieved.  Later, when American and European investors returned to the market, the relative importance of the Taiwanese contribution diminished.  China could then afford to put the screws to Taiwan, secure in the knowledge that a cessation of Taiwanese investment would have limited impact, with Americans and Europeans on the scene willing to pick up the slack.

Now for that second objection.  A supporter of the Chinese Nationalist Party might dismiss all of this, pointing out that THEY weren’t responsible for the loss of Taiwan’s allies.  The People’s Republic of China was to blame.  The communists were the ones who twisted arms, or bought governments off.  Against them, tiny Taiwan just couldn’t compete in the diplomatic game.

Funny how that’s an excuse Chinese nationalists aren’t gracious enough to grant in turn to others.  From Taiwan’s China Post:

The ROC government need not fault Costa Rica for leaving it. Nor should the DPP administration accuse Beijing of trying to deprive Taiwan of international space. The DPP should instead look at its own attitude and behavior.  [emphasis added]

There we have it.  When Chinese nationalists lose allies to the PRC, it’s the PRC’s fault.  And when Taiwanese nationalists lose allies to the PRC?  Well, in THAT case, the PRC is entirely blameless.  The fault can ONLY lie with Taiwanese nationalists, naturally.

If I didn’t know better, I might think someone was arguing in bad faith!

But…let’s pursue this all the way to the end:

The DPP itself has not been very peaceful. Its chairman, Yu Shyi-kun, has publicly advocated a possible retaliatory missile attack on Shanghai…

Jeez.  RETALIATORY strikes hardly rate up there with the KMT’s old "Retake the motherland" tomfoolery on the ol’ warmonger-ometer, but we’re not supposed to notice that.   We’re only supposed to feel disgust that the victim of Chinese aggression would ever dare defend itself.

Let me paraphrase Charles Krauthammer here:  When under attack, no nation is obligated to collect permission slips to strike back.  But the Chinese nationalists at the China Post think otherwise.  Clearly, in the event of a Chinese attack, Taiwanese ought to bend over and ask, "Please sir, can I have some more?"

(Come to think of it, that’s EXACTLY the way the Taiwan News felt America should have handled Afghanistan after the attack on 9-11.  But it’s late now, and that’s a whole ‘nother topic.)

David Frum On Taiwan & Other Links

Apparently David Frum of the American Enterprise Institute was in Taiwan recently, and he wrote a few pieces about La Isla Formosa.  Haven’t had much time to follow the ‘net over the past few weeks (belated congratulations on blog post #2000, Michael!), so apologies to anyone who has already posted these links.

Frum gives a good summary of China’s behavior towards Taiwan here.

Even better is his second piece (though it’s a bit deceptively-titled).  He certainly grasps that left-right labels aren’t really applicable to Taiwanese politics:

The "left-wing" DPP has proposed to purchase American warships, surveillance craft and interceptor missiles. It presses the U.S. to engage in joint training exercises with Taiwanese forces, to allow U.S. naval vessels to call at Taiwan ports and to change current policy so as to allow serving generals and admirals to visit Taiwan.

The "right-wing" KMT prefers detente. It has used its majority in Taiwan’s parliament to stall the DPP’s arms purchases. It advocates closer contacts with China even if China refuses to recognize Taiwan. Some of its members voice rising doubts about the relevance of the U.S.-Taiwan alliance. Leading KMT members have travelled to Beijing to hold party-to-part talks with leading
Chinese Communists.

(My favorite moment a few years back was when "left-wing" Vice-President Annette Lu channeled Ronald Reagan, calling China "an empire of evil".  A statement which the "right-wing" KMT hastened to denounce as "China-bashing".)

He closes this one with a concern many of us here have had for a long time:

One hears persistent rumors in Taiwan that the Chinese Communists pressure Taiwan businessmen with interests on the mainland to make campaign donations to their ancient enemies in the KMT. China ranks among the most corrupt countries on Earth. Young democracies are vulnerable to external corruption.

I travelled to Taiwan worried that the Chinese might try to invade the island. I returned worrying that China will try to buy it.

Over at his blog with the National Review, he gives a book review of Minxin Pei’s China’s Trapped Transition:  The Limits of Developmental Autocracy.  One highlight:

* The Chinese Communist party’s grip on power is tightening, not loosening. While 60% of entrepreneurs who launched businesses in the 1980s were workers, peasants, or other ordinary people, by 2002, two-thirds of China’s business owners were former government officials, party cadres, or executives of state-owned enterprises. This is not a case of successful businessmen opportunistically joining the ruling party. Rather, it seems that the ruling party is opportunistically seizing successful businesses.

[…]

Pei argues that these disturbing trends represent something more than growing pains. He argues that they inhere in the path the Chinese Communist Party chose for the country it rules.

The great problem facing any state is how to control the actions of its agents. In a democracy, we rely on a free press to alert us to abuses by the government and competitive elections to correct them. Mao Tse-Tung’s version of communism relied on capricious and all-enveloping terror. But when the Chinese reformers semi-opened their economy, while sedulously denying political freedom, they loosened their control of their agents – while creating lucrative new incentives for their agents to siphon wealth away for themselves.

A vicious cycle has been unleashed. The richer China grows, the more reluctant the ruling elite becomes to surrender power, because power has become so much more valuable. But the refusal to loosen the grip on power undermines China’s wealth, by creating unchecked incentives to the state’s agents to prey upon wealth creation.  [emphasis added]

Elsewhere, George Will points out that James Mann has something similar to say in The China Fantasy:  How Our Leaders Explain Away Chinese Repression:

[Mann’s] most disturbing thesis is that "the newly enriched, Starbucks-sipping, apartment-buying, car-driving denizens" of the large cities that American visitors to China see will be not the vanguard of democracy but the opposition to it. There may be 300 million such denizens, but there are 1 billion mostly rural and very poor Chinese. Will the minority prospering economically under a Leninist regime think majority rule is in their interest?

Maybe this is piling on, but Guy Sorman says much the same:

Still, hasn’t [economic] growth [in China] created an independent middle class that will push for, and eventually obtain, greater political freedom? Many in the West think so, looking to the South Korean example, but [dissident economist] Mao Yushi isn’t convinced. What exists in China, he argues, is a class of “parvenus,” newcomers whose purchasing power depends on their proximity to the Party rather than their education or entrepreneurial achievements. Except for a handful of genuine businessmen, the parvenus work in the military, public administration, or state enterprises, or for firms ostensibly private but, in fact, owned by the Party. The Party picks up the tab for almost all their imported luxury cars, two-thirds of their mobile phones, and three-quarters of their restaurant bills, as well as their call girls, their “study” trips abroad, and their lavish spending at Las Vegas casinos. And it can withdraw these advantages at any time.

In March, the Chinese government announced, to much fanfare in the Western press, that it would begin to introduce individual property rights. We should understand that this “reform” will benefit only the parvenus, not the peasants, whose tilled land will still belong to the state. But the parvenus will now be able to transmit to their children what they have acquired thanks to their Party connections—one more reason that they will be unlikely to push for the democratization of the regime that secures their status.

Speaking of democratization, Sorman gives us an idea of just how much democracy Taiwan can expect to retain should the KMT’s dream of reunification ever be implemented:

…like everybody else, the Chinese love to watch TV, despite pervasive censorship and the propaganda broadcast on it in China. One of their favorite shows is a local version of the U.S. hit American Idol called Super Girl, broadcast by a Hunan satellite channel and produced by a private firm. In 2005, the winner of this amateur singing contest was Miss Li, a lanky 20-year-old with a punk hairdo, sporting jeans and a black T-shirt—a fashion inspired by South Korean pop bands. Miss Li won democratically with nearly 4 million votes, text-messaged by viewers using their cell phones from home. Over 400 million Chinese viewers—more than the combined populations of the United States and England—watched the finale.

An unexceptional story—except that it happened in China, and the Communist Party, taken by surprise, condemned Miss Li for not singing in Chinese but in English and Spanish and for wearing clothes that didn’t conform to the anodyne official dress code laid down by the national television station. A columnist in China Daily, the Party’s mouthpiece, interpreted her victory as a popular uprising against the established order, concluding that “Miss Li has been elected but the people have made a bad choice. This is what happens when people are unprepared for democracy.”  [emphasis added]

Taiwanese Generals Setting Up House In Communist China?

"Chiang Kai-shek would definitely have these people executed if he were alive."

-DPP legislator

From Friday’s Taipei Times:

Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers yesterday accused a number of
retired generals of having relocated to China or purchased real estate there
while accepting life-time monthly paychecks from the Ministry of National
Defense (MND).

The legislators named names – names of citizens who’ve presumably retired from public life – so they’d better have the goods, or there’s going to be a set of monster libel suits.  As well there should be.  A lot of irresponsible accusations get made here, and they’re not always confined to one side of the aisle.

That said though, the charges do have a ring of truth about them.  I’ve no doubt that some former Taiwanese officers (not necessarily the ones in question) WOULD voluntarily move to the glorious Fatherland they’d always dreamt of retaking.

Trojan Horse TV

Since I don’t understand Mandarin, I cannot intelligently comment upon Taiwan’s TVBS news station, and it’s supposed bias against Taiwanese nationalist parties.

(If anyone knows of a good blog post or newspaper column on the subject, I’ll happily link to it.)

From what I understand, TVBS has been highly critical of the current Taiwanese president.  And that, of course, is the media’s job.  The fly in the ointment is that the majority of TVBS shares are held by Hong Kong concerns, so some fear that TVBS is being used as a propaganda arm of the Communist Party of China.

Taiwan’s China Post is rather dismissive of that possibility:

While it is true that the TVBS network is majority owned
by persons and entities from Hong
Kong,
we simply do not accept the proposition that such ownership is somehow
seditious.

While TVBS’ owners have worked through a legal loophole
to retain ownership of the network, the fact remains that the loophole is
perfectly legal.

Just because it’s legal doesn’t mean it’s right.  It may be apropos to recall here that during World War II, Axis Powers were not permitted to own media within the U.S.  Perhaps there was a time, when a loophole in the law might have allowed Vichy France or Franco’s Spain to own American newspapers or radio.

But if such a loophole DID exist, I imagine it was closed quite quickly.

Inalienable Rights

A new Taiwanese constitution was tabled for consideration recently, and Taiwan’s China Post has trouble with the preamble:

…the professors wrote into their draft constitution Taiwan and
China are two different countries and the people in the former have the final
say in their country’s future. Any change to the political relationship between
the Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China must be decided by
negotiations between the two sides and subject to approval of the people of
Taiwan, they added.

Do they have to state in the constitution the universally acknowledged
inalienable right of the people to determine the future of their country?

How can a paper call something a "universally acknowledged right" if it doesn’t recognize that right itself?  The China Post has specifically rejected calls for referendums should a future Taiwanese president sign a sovereignty-related treaty with Communist China.  In one of his columns not long ago, Dr. Joe Hung derided as "naive" those who would call for a referendum in such a case, quoting the current constitution, which says that that power belongs ONLY to Taiwan’s political class, and NOT the people.

What the paper really objects to then, is taking the power of surrender away from a future KMT capitulationist.

On The Sunny Side Of The Street

I’m not going to heap scorn upon this China Post editorial.  Because there are days when I, too, think things might work out for the best in the Middle Kingdom:

Today’s communist leaders in China are pragmatists, who believes in Deng Xiaoping’s "cat theory" of getting results rather than Mao Zedong’s egalitarianism of glorifying poverty on an equal footing. The merit of the law should be judged by the answer to a single question: Do the people want it?

But the mainland people may want more-free elections, free press and independent courts, for example. Clearly, the National People’s Congress is in no hurry to work on these political reforms, which are lagging far behind. These are the reforms that can best safeguard against the abuse of power by corrupt officials. So, after property reform, political reform must be on the agenda.

Already, grassroots pressure for such reform is mounting. The rising middle class and increasingly well-educated people will demand political reforms that are now put on the back burner. If the past is an indication, we have reasons to be optimistic that such reforms will be carried out in another decade or two, if not sooner.

China’s communists may be more pragmatic than they once were, but is that pragmatism directed at doing what’s good for their country, or merely doing whatever allows them to hold their positions of power and privilege?  A selfless utilitarian might, out of a sense of pragmatism, be willing to allow himself to be voted out of office in order to better serve the needs of society.  But communist oligarchs obsessed with clinging to power may be much less inclined to do so.

Furthermore, while I agree that the well-educated will demand political reforms, it is not at all inevitable that they will succeed in getting these demands met.  Tienanmen Square happened once, and it can happen again.  And again and again.  Heinlein once depicted a society whose subjects were completely co-opted by a fascist state; they were perfectly free to make all the money they wanted, and as long they tended to their own gardens, the State was content to leave them alone.  The Federation was unapologetically brutal to those who dared meddle in politics, however.

"Starship Troopers" may have been fiction, but a few societies HAVE paralleled it in real-life.  Could China take that path as well?  I wonder…

There ARE indeed hopeful developments in China, but there are others the sober observer cannot ignore.  The creation of the "Great Firewall", continuing persecution against certain religious minorities, a blithely amoral foreign policy – these are all things that suggest China might be moving in a darker direction.

To this list, I might add China’s treatment of the free and democratic state of Taiwan.  A few years ago, a Taiwanese industrialist doing business there was threatened, with tax audits and overzealous safety inspections, into signing a document declaring his "opposition" to Taiwanese independence.  It was only last year that Chinese arm-twisting caused an airplane carrying Taiwan’s president to be forbidden from flying over Mexican airspace.  And let it not be forgotten that China currently aims a thousand missiles at Taiwan, in an effort to terrorize the population into submission. 

Taiwan is the canary in the coal mine, and how China treats it should be of interest to everyone.  Today, it’s Taiwanese industrialists who are being bullied into taking political stances; tomorrow, it may be businessmen from YOUR country.  Today, China prevents Taiwan’s president from freely traveling; tomorrow, it may prevent the president of some other democratic country it’s displeased with from doing so.

And the missiles?  Well, TODAY they, and other weapons, are targeted upon Taiwan.  And tomorrow?  Well, by now I hope you’ve gotten the picture.

What The Smart People Think

Heh, heh.

I don’t usually bother discussing polls taken in Taiwan, but this statistic was interesting:

…85 percent of [Taiwanese] 20 to 30 year-olds and 80 percent with a university degree or higher education favor independence.  [emphasis added]

Gotta remember that number next time Taiwan’s China Post prints an editorial claiming the "rational and educated" within Taiwan prefer the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and its policies of surrender.

Pro-Beijing Media Bias In Taiwan’s China Post

Yeah, I know.  Surprise, surprise.

Headline in the China Post:  50,000 people vie for tour guide license to host mainland visitors

Sounds like China Fever.  All those folks wanna get in on all those tourist dollars.  Nothing wrong with that.

But wait, the China Post forgot to inform us there’s something else explaining the increased number of people taking the tour guide tests.  A Taipei Times story discusses expectations of future Chinese tourists, but mentions something else, too:

Relaxed qualification requirements for tour guide licenses led to a record 50,000-plus applicants sitting this year’s tour guide exam, held nationwide at 13 venues on Saturday and yesterday.

[…]

Unlike previous years, where applicants needed a college diploma or to have graduated from high-school with at least one year of experience in the travel industry, this year the candidates could apply for the test so long as they had a high school diploma.

Ah-ha.  Econ 201 time.  If the price of a commodity goes down, the quantity demanded goes up if all other things are equal.  In this case, the price of a tour guide license went down (in the sense that it became easier to apply for the license).  So yes, one would expect the number of applicants to increase.

We see now that there are really two factors here driving the increased number of applicants: relaxed license requirements AND expectations of job growth in the tourist industry.  The Taipei Times simply gave the reader a more balanced picture of the facts here.

And There’d Be Even MORE Tourists If It Were Dedicated To Mao Tse-tung

Tough to defend the existence of Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall on moral grounds, so the latest argument is a naked appeal to economic self-interest.  From Sunday’s editorial in the China Post:

Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall has become a tourist attraction that’s extremely popular with tourists, especially visitors from mainland China.  It contributes immensely to the development of Taiwan’s tourist industry.

The abolition of this historic site would deprive the island of a major tourist attraction and do tremendous harm to the lives of countless businesspeople who rely on this tourist center to make a living.

Making pilgrimages to monuments to authoritarianism is about the LAST thing that subjects of a communist state ought to be doing.  If Chinese tourists come to Taiwan, let them visit monuments showing Taiwan’s commitment to democracy instead.

Lenin’s Tomb is a pretty big tourist attraction too, but that’s entirely beside the point.  Bury the sonofabitch already.