WEBVTT - How Taiwan Became the World's Most Perilous Geopolitical Chokepoint 0:00:02.720 --> 0:00:16.360 Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio News. 0:00:17.960 --> 0:00:20.640 Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odd Thoughts Podcast. 0:00:20.720 --> 0:00:22.040 I'm Tracy Alloway. 0:00:21.840 --> 0:00:23.080 And I'm Joe Wisenthal. 0:00:23.400 --> 0:00:23.680 Joe. 0:00:23.960 --> 0:00:27.159 Up until recently, very recently, I would say there are 0:00:27.680 --> 0:00:31.479 or were two hypothetical blockades that kind of loomed large 0:00:31.640 --> 0:00:35.360 in the minds of geopolitical strategists everywhere. And the first was, 0:00:35.479 --> 0:00:38.840 of course, Iran blockading the Strait of War moves. That's 0:00:38.880 --> 0:00:42.560 clearly not a hypothetical on anymore. It's actually happened. It's reality, 0:00:42.680 --> 0:00:44.800 and we've been doing a lot of episodes about it. 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:48.680 And so the big hypothetical blockade that we're left with 0:00:49.320 --> 0:00:53.360 to ponder is China potentially doing something with Taiwan. 0:00:53.640 --> 0:00:55.880 Definitely, and you know, the only thing I would actually 0:00:55.960 --> 0:00:58.880 flip them in the sense that I would say the 0:00:59.040 --> 0:01:02.600 vast majority of discourse has been about the letter China 0:01:02.760 --> 0:01:04.360 potentially blockading. 0:01:03.880 --> 0:01:05.200 Taiwan in some way. 0:01:06.240 --> 0:01:08.360 That was the thing that everyone has been talking about 0:01:08.360 --> 0:01:11.800 for years and years with growing intensity. And then, of course, 0:01:11.840 --> 0:01:15.840 as you mentioned now, the Hormuz situation, which sort of, 0:01:16.040 --> 0:01:17.880 I don't know, hit people by their blind spot because 0:01:17.880 --> 0:01:19.760 they didn't think it could ever really happen, or whatever 0:01:19.800 --> 0:01:24.600 really happened has happened. But when this resolves, If this resolves, 0:01:24.680 --> 0:01:28.400 et cetera, I believe the question of Taiwan will very 0:01:28.480 --> 0:01:29.560 quickly return to the fore. 0:01:29.720 --> 0:01:33.319 Oh absolutely, So, as you mentioned, it obviously hasn't happened yet, 0:01:33.360 --> 0:01:35.400 but people have been writing and thinking about it for 0:01:35.480 --> 0:01:37.959 years and years and years, and as you know, I 0:01:38.080 --> 0:01:41.039 consider myself an expert on this topic, having once written 0:01:41.040 --> 0:01:44.319 a paper in college saying that China was going to 0:01:44.319 --> 0:01:47.559 invade Taiwan before the two thousand and eight Beijing Olympics, 0:01:47.600 --> 0:01:50.080 and that obviously didn't happen. 0:01:50.320 --> 0:01:52.880 Well, being wrong has never gotten in the way of 0:01:52.920 --> 0:01:55.880 any pundit's career, that's right, so that I wouldn't worry 0:01:55.920 --> 0:01:58.200 about that. That has never been an issue as long 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:03.720 it was as as well articulated and actually et cetera. 0:02:03.880 --> 0:02:04.760 That you're fine. 0:02:04.960 --> 0:02:08.200 It was written from a server closet while I was 0:02:08.280 --> 0:02:11.640 in Beijing, so it had that going for it. But anyway, 0:02:11.680 --> 0:02:13.640 my point is that this is something that's always sort 0:02:13.680 --> 0:02:16.720 of looming in the background, and you always see headlines 0:02:16.840 --> 0:02:20.560 kind of coming up that hint at China Taiwan tension. 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:23.440 So we actually had one this morning. We're recording on 0:02:23.480 --> 0:02:27.800 April twenty. First, the headline is Taiwan's president canceled his 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:31.400 visit to Swatini. Do you know where that is? It's 0:02:31.440 --> 0:02:34.440 a tiny, tiny place in Africa? 0:02:35.600 --> 0:02:36.360 Did they record? 0:02:36.360 --> 0:02:37.440 Did they like? You know? 0:02:37.520 --> 0:02:40.119 It is interesting because there's a few countries still help 0:02:40.280 --> 0:02:44.280 wholly out there that recognize that's right, Taipei is the 0:02:44.400 --> 0:02:48.519 unified capital of China. Most of like a lot most 0:02:48.520 --> 0:02:50.400 of switch. There's a few random ones out there that 0:02:50.480 --> 0:02:54.200 are still like they don't recognize the mainland, et cetera. 0:02:54.520 --> 0:02:56.840 So I'm always, you know, all little factoids here and there. 0:02:56.880 --> 0:03:01.040 I didn't know that, But so Taiwan's president offices citing 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:04.280 air root issues. I'm doing air quotes for those who 0:03:04.320 --> 0:03:08.640 can't see this video, and China pressure. So yeah, you 0:03:08.680 --> 0:03:10.840 do get those kind of headlines every once in a while. 0:03:10.840 --> 0:03:13.919 And then the one other thing I would say is like, okay, 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:16.920 the straight of horror moves the blockade. There clearly an 0:03:16.960 --> 0:03:19.680 oil story, and oil is something that powers the entire 0:03:19.720 --> 0:03:23.679 global economy. But as we've kind of learned over the 0:03:23.720 --> 0:03:26.160 past six or seven weeks, oil might not actually be 0:03:26.280 --> 0:03:29.639 the thing that like powers markets. Right if you think 0:03:29.639 --> 0:03:32.959 about the true, true, the thing that matters for markets, 0:03:33.040 --> 0:03:37.640 it might be something much closer to AI and semiconductor 0:03:37.840 --> 0:03:39.760 evaluation is. 0:03:39.720 --> 0:03:43.840 Cut right, Yes, totally. I mean, evidently the world could 0:03:43.920 --> 0:03:47.280 go a few weeks and not grind to a halt 0:03:47.560 --> 0:03:49.280 if the straight of horm moves is closed for a 0:03:49.280 --> 0:03:53.240 few weeks, I believe the reaction in markets would be 0:03:53.360 --> 0:03:56.040 and just all around the world, and really can everything 0:03:56.080 --> 0:03:59.480 would be orders of magnitude differently off someone's like no chips, 0:03:59.600 --> 0:04:02.480 no chips coming out. That would be such a bigger deal. 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:05.600 And of course you know the question of you know, 0:04:05.680 --> 0:04:09.960 Taiwan's role in the world, that would already have been 0:04:10.080 --> 0:04:13.240 a very big security question even prior to the now 0:04:13.600 --> 0:04:16.080 constant drum beat obsession with AI chips, et cetera. But 0:04:16.360 --> 0:04:19.680 it only magnifies why this is such a live issue. 0:04:19.760 --> 0:04:22.520 Right, So apparently we can kind of survive a few 0:04:22.560 --> 0:04:25.440 weeks without oil. Can we survive a few weeks without 0:04:25.680 --> 0:04:27.200 we can survive a few months. 0:04:27.600 --> 0:04:30.400 We can survive a few weeks without a fraction of 0:04:30.760 --> 0:04:34.919 a certain fraction the didy whereas if we you know, 0:04:35.080 --> 0:04:37.560 the chip flow were to be disrupted on that level 0:04:37.600 --> 0:04:40.400 would just be Yes, much bigger deal. 0:04:40.440 --> 0:04:42.120 All right, Well, we do, in fact have the perfect 0:04:42.120 --> 0:04:45.200 guests to talk about all of this, someone who has 0:04:45.240 --> 0:04:49.520 just written a book on exactly this topic called Defending Taiwan, 0:04:49.600 --> 0:04:51.960 a Strategy to Prevent War with China. We're going to 0:04:52.040 --> 0:04:54.919 be speaking with Ike Freiman. He is also a Hoover 0:04:55.000 --> 0:04:57.159 Fellow at Stanford. So, Ike, thank you so much for 0:04:57.160 --> 0:04:57.479 coming on. 0:04:57.520 --> 0:04:59.040 All thoughts, thanks for having me on. 0:04:59.240 --> 0:05:00.960 Here's my first ques. And you've spent a lot of 0:05:01.040 --> 0:05:03.599 time in China, including researching this book. Are you going 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:04.559 to be able to go back? 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:07.400 I think I could go back. The question is whether 0:05:07.440 --> 0:05:10.400 I could leave. I'm joking. I'm joking. They gave me 0:05:10.440 --> 0:05:12.800 a hard time at immigration on the way out last time. 0:05:12.880 --> 0:05:13.520 Oh interesting. 0:05:13.640 --> 0:05:16.960 And I can't do useful research there anymore. It's not 0:05:17.000 --> 0:05:19.720 like there's archives I can access, interviews. 0:05:19.200 --> 0:05:19.640 I can do. 0:05:20.000 --> 0:05:22.480 So the value of it for research is going down 0:05:22.560 --> 0:05:24.400 for me, but also the risk of my person and 0:05:24.440 --> 0:05:24.919 the risk. 0:05:24.760 --> 0:05:26.520 Of my devices is going up. 0:05:27.040 --> 0:05:29.040 I do try to engage as much as I can, 0:05:29.440 --> 0:05:32.640 but I think it's better to engage in the third countries. 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:36.400 What do you tell us the genesis of this book 0:05:36.480 --> 0:05:39.000 or the origin of it or how you got interested 0:05:39.279 --> 0:05:41.839 in this particular topic. 0:05:42.279 --> 0:05:45.839 Well, my background is as a China scholar looking at 0:05:46.040 --> 0:05:49.440 the China's global investment campaign. My first book was about 0:05:49.440 --> 0:05:52.120 the Belton Road and I looked at a bunch of 0:05:52.160 --> 0:05:54.599 Chinese language sources that show how it works under the 0:05:54.600 --> 0:05:58.480 hood as a campaign to mobilize the party state behind 0:05:58.560 --> 0:06:01.000 Seson Ping, and then I went on the trail of 0:06:01.040 --> 0:06:04.560 it to Sri Lanka, to Tanzania, Greece, Greenland. Actually I 0:06:04.560 --> 0:06:07.839 did my PhD about China in Greenland trying to understand 0:06:07.880 --> 0:06:09.040 how China leverages. 0:06:09.320 --> 0:06:11.840 You did our PhD about China and Greenland. Yeah, oh 0:06:11.920 --> 0:06:13.320 that is timely, and I keep going. 0:06:13.400 --> 0:06:14.320 That'll be another book. 0:06:14.400 --> 0:06:15.440 Yeah. 0:06:15.600 --> 0:06:19.160 But what I learned in the process of doing this 0:06:19.200 --> 0:06:23.360 book is that China has this formidable toolkit for blending 0:06:23.680 --> 0:06:29.520 economic power with its geopolitical objectives. And Taiwan was clearly 0:06:29.520 --> 0:06:33.240 emerging during COVID as the ai story was heating up 0:06:33.839 --> 0:06:37.400 as this monumental issue in the structure of the world economy, 0:06:37.720 --> 0:06:39.760 not just for the old reasons that we care about Taiwan, 0:06:39.800 --> 0:06:42.800 which is largely about geography. So it seemed to me 0:06:42.960 --> 0:06:46.240 reading about this, China had more ships, more planes, more missiles, 0:06:46.240 --> 0:06:48.919 more drones. What was I missing? Why is the United 0:06:48.960 --> 0:06:52.920 States not completely outmatched? So I started this project with 0:06:52.960 --> 0:06:56.000 a friend of mine named Harry Halem, who's a superstar 0:06:56.279 --> 0:06:59.200 naval historian, and I asked him, what's the book I 0:06:59.200 --> 0:07:01.480 should read to underst what a US China war over 0:07:01.520 --> 0:07:04.560 Taiwan would be, like, what it would take to win, 0:07:05.080 --> 0:07:06.719 and then what of those things the US can do 0:07:06.839 --> 0:07:09.520 or can't do? And he said, well, the book doesn't exist. 0:07:10.160 --> 0:07:12.320 I can give you hundreds of articles, hundreds of people 0:07:12.320 --> 0:07:13.960 to follow on Twitter, but no one thing to read. 0:07:14.480 --> 0:07:18.320 And so began this collaboration between two historians, one focused 0:07:18.320 --> 0:07:20.160 on the economics, one focused on the military, to. 0:07:20.080 --> 0:07:21.000 Put the pieces together. 0:07:21.680 --> 0:07:24.000 And as I did so, I began to discover there's 0:07:24.160 --> 0:07:26.760 huge gaps in our knowledge of this problem. This is 0:07:26.800 --> 0:07:33.000 the most complex, multidisciplinary, multifunctional foreign policy problem that American 0:07:33.000 --> 0:07:36.640 statecraft is ever faced. Because it's a military problem, it's 0:07:36.640 --> 0:07:40.520 also an industrial problem, it's a technology policy problem, it's 0:07:40.560 --> 0:07:44.040 a diplomatic problem, a real one, complex one for how 0:07:44.120 --> 0:07:45.680 we do with China, with Taiwan and with the rest 0:07:45.680 --> 0:07:48.520 of the world. And then finally it's an economic problem. 0:07:48.560 --> 0:07:51.920 It's a question of global economic order, because if Taiwan 0:07:52.040 --> 0:07:55.760 falls by force or coercion and China seizes the FABS, 0:07:55.920 --> 0:07:59.240 the semiconductor FABS, or the FABS are disabled or destroyed, 0:07:59.800 --> 0:08:03.200 that is a hard reset of the entire global economic 0:08:03.240 --> 0:08:05.360 system that we have had since nineteen eighty nine and 0:08:05.480 --> 0:08:08.040 arguably back to nineteen forty five. So what comes next? 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:11.200 And while we have a lot of good thinking about 0:08:11.280 --> 0:08:14.440 certain aspects of this scenario, like the wargaming of what 0:08:14.480 --> 0:08:17.160 an amphibious campaign would look like and how we stop it, 0:08:17.440 --> 0:08:19.720 there's other aspects, like the economic planning, that we just 0:08:19.800 --> 0:08:20.480 haven't done. 0:08:20.720 --> 0:08:22.080 So that was the idea for the book. 0:08:22.520 --> 0:08:25.040 Pull together the best of existing knowledge, fill in the 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:28.560 gaps where we can, based on interviews, based on historical work, 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:31.080 Chinese language materials, and try to be the person to 0:08:31.080 --> 0:08:32.000 put the pieces together. 0:08:32.679 --> 0:08:35.640 I want to back way up for a second and 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:38.920 ask a very obvious question, which is why does China 0:08:38.920 --> 0:08:41.320 actually care so much about Taiwan? And then is it 0:08:41.360 --> 0:08:44.120 even accurate to say, like why does China care about Taiwan? 0:08:44.160 --> 0:08:47.920 Should I be asking why does she himping care about Taiwan? 0:08:48.760 --> 0:08:50.800 Those are the two right questions to ask, and it's 0:08:50.800 --> 0:08:53.320 where we start with the book. The first thing to 0:08:53.400 --> 0:08:55.680 understand is that it's not about the chips. 0:08:56.120 --> 0:08:56.640 For China. 0:08:57.480 --> 0:08:59.840 The chips are a co benefit. But China cared about 0:08:59.840 --> 0:09:02.000 time I won long before they made hips, and they 0:09:02.040 --> 0:09:04.480 would care about them if they didn't make chips. Taiwan 0:09:04.600 --> 0:09:08.640 is the unfinished business of China's Civil War. In nineteen 0:09:08.679 --> 0:09:12.720 forty nine, as the gwoman Dang Chang Kai Shek's government 0:09:13.080 --> 0:09:16.240 was losing control of northern China, they began to evacuate 0:09:16.280 --> 0:09:19.199 their forces alongside all the treasures of the Imperial Palace, 0:09:19.520 --> 0:09:23.120 to Taipei, and they set up a government there, essentially 0:09:23.120 --> 0:09:26.800 took over the island by force, and became, over the 0:09:26.840 --> 0:09:30.000 course of the Korean War essentially a US ally. In 0:09:30.080 --> 0:09:33.360 nineteen fifty five, Eisenhower went to Taipei. They became a 0:09:33.400 --> 0:09:37.160 critical node in the US Alliance architecture. Mao obviously wanted 0:09:37.160 --> 0:09:38.880 to take this island. He wanted to wipe out the 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:42.080 remnants of his enemy, and for him, the fact that 0:09:42.120 --> 0:09:46.080 there was this other China right across the strait, which 0:09:46.120 --> 0:09:48.319 at the time enjoyed the Chinese seat in the UN 0:09:48.360 --> 0:09:50.640 Security Council, was recognized by most of the world as 0:09:50.679 --> 0:09:53.160 the one true China. This was a fundamental question of 0:09:53.160 --> 0:09:56.760 the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party, and so it 0:09:56.840 --> 0:10:01.600 became this tootemic propaganda point. We will liberate Taiwan from 0:10:01.600 --> 0:10:04.760 the imperialists, and in the process we will make China whole. 0:10:05.160 --> 0:10:09.040 We will fix this historical wrong that we were separated 0:10:09.120 --> 0:10:12.120 under this century of humiliation, and therefore for us to 0:10:12.160 --> 0:10:15.560 be fully rejuvenated as a civilization, Taiwan has to be 0:10:15.559 --> 0:10:18.240 brought to heal and the world must accept it's not 0:10:18.320 --> 0:10:21.800 just about control over Taiwan. It's about political legitimacy. The 0:10:21.920 --> 0:10:24.960 United Nations must accept. The United States must accept that 0:10:25.040 --> 0:10:27.320 Taiwan is part of China, and there's only one China 0:10:27.360 --> 0:10:29.360 in the world, and the Communist Party is the only 0:10:29.440 --> 0:10:32.319 legitimate government. So this is why it's sensitive. It's not 0:10:32.440 --> 0:10:36.760 just about the status of Taiwan. It's about what China means, 0:10:37.840 --> 0:10:40.160 and that has always been bound up in competition with 0:10:40.200 --> 0:10:41.040 the United States. 0:10:41.360 --> 0:10:45.240 Prior to the KMT having fled the mainland of the 0:10:45.280 --> 0:10:48.440 civil war and all that, what was understood to be 0:10:48.679 --> 0:10:52.680 the status of that geography called Taiwan, and to what 0:10:52.800 --> 0:10:56.079 degree going back even prior to the Civil War, etc. 0:10:57.600 --> 0:11:00.920 What was its relationship to mainland China. 0:11:01.040 --> 0:11:02.680 It depends how far back you want to go. Back 0:11:02.679 --> 0:11:05.120 in the seventeenth century, the Dutch had a presence there 0:11:05.920 --> 0:11:09.560 as the Ming Empire was falling apart. You had generals 0:11:09.600 --> 0:11:12.360 who came from the mainland. They're claimed by both sides now. 0:11:13.000 --> 0:11:15.240 A couple of them became gods actually, and there's temples 0:11:15.280 --> 0:11:19.160 to them in Taiwan. And essentially during the Qing Dynasty, 0:11:19.240 --> 0:11:23.880 China's final dynasty, they were a region of the province 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:28.559 across the strait on the mainland, but the Qing dynasty's. 0:11:27.960 --> 0:11:29.240 Writ didn't really run there. 0:11:29.320 --> 0:11:31.440 They were settled by people from the mainland, but it 0:11:31.480 --> 0:11:35.000 was swampy and pestilential, and there were indigenous people, and 0:11:35.000 --> 0:11:40.040 it wasn't really actively administered by the center. The Qing 0:11:40.480 --> 0:11:44.000 pretty quickly lost control over the fringes of their empire, 0:11:44.480 --> 0:11:47.679 and then the Japanese took it in the Sino Japanese 0:11:47.679 --> 0:11:50.280 War in eighteen ninety five, and the Japanese developed it. 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:52.839 The Japanese industrialized, they left a mark on it, and 0:11:52.920 --> 0:11:56.480 unlike other places that the Japanese colonized were like Korea, 0:11:56.880 --> 0:12:01.679 where their colonization was brutal in Taiwan, they left relatively 0:12:01.679 --> 0:12:05.160 good feelings. So all through the first half of the 0:12:05.280 --> 0:12:08.600 twentieth century, when the communists and the nationalists were fighting 0:12:08.640 --> 0:12:13.120 on the mainland, Taiwan was under Japanese control. And then 0:12:13.200 --> 0:12:16.840 the question is after Japan surrendered in nineteen forty five, 0:12:17.679 --> 0:12:21.040 who did they surrender it to? And was the status 0:12:21.040 --> 0:12:25.160 of Taiwan decided after Japan's surrender, And the US position is, 0:12:25.280 --> 0:12:29.920 legally it remains unresolved. It remains unresolved who Japan surrendered 0:12:29.920 --> 0:12:32.640 it to. So the US position is we don't actually 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:35.360 take a view on what the true status of Taiwan is. 0:12:35.960 --> 0:12:38.480 This is something for Taipei and Beijing to work out 0:12:38.480 --> 0:12:41.600 between themselves, and we are open to any outcome, but 0:12:42.400 --> 0:12:46.320 it has to be done peacefully, so no force and 0:12:46.400 --> 0:12:49.559 no coercion. And since Taiwan's become a democracy, it has 0:12:49.600 --> 0:12:52.360 to be democratically acceptable to the people of Taiwan. And 0:12:52.400 --> 0:12:55.600 that's a principled position which is really about the stability 0:12:55.600 --> 0:12:59.600 of the broader region because it recognizes that this region 0:12:59.640 --> 0:13:03.880 has held together through trade routes that go through international waters, 0:13:03.920 --> 0:13:07.760 international airspace. It's been stable since nineteen forty five. And 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:11.440 if the United States starts allowing borders to be changed 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:15.120 by force, trade routes to be changed by force, very quickly, 0:13:15.120 --> 0:13:16.640 the whole regional order in. 0:13:17.559 --> 0:13:19.160 This part of the world will collapse. 0:13:19.840 --> 0:13:22.560 And this is a grave economic danger for the United 0:13:22.559 --> 0:13:24.160 States as a geopolitical danger. 0:13:24.400 --> 0:13:25.360 So that's the view. 0:13:25.800 --> 0:13:28.120 And unfortunately, what China is doing is they're trying to 0:13:28.160 --> 0:13:32.240 revise that situation by pushing in the gray zone, pushing 0:13:32.320 --> 0:13:35.040 through coercion, and there's obviously always the risk they could 0:13:35.080 --> 0:13:35.679 escalate to war. 0:13:36.120 --> 0:13:38.200 I want to talk more about that, but just on 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:42.520 the topic of I guess US policy towards China, and 0:13:42.559 --> 0:13:45.320 you already touched on the one China policy. But what 0:13:45.440 --> 0:13:49.520 exactly is strategic ambiguity? Because whenever I hear that term, 0:13:49.559 --> 0:13:51.880 I always think it's like, that's what I would do 0:13:51.920 --> 0:13:53.360 if I was trying to get out of a social 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:56.440 commitment later that evening, or something like, oh maybe I'll 0:13:56.440 --> 0:13:59.280 come maybe you know, we'll see, we'll see what happens. 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:02.120 What is exactly does that mean? And isn't it weird 0:14:02.160 --> 0:14:05.720 that people recognize that as an actual policy strategic ambiguity? 0:14:05.760 --> 0:14:06.520 What does it mean? 0:14:07.000 --> 0:14:09.959 So the whole policy is sort of strange because it 0:14:10.040 --> 0:14:13.440 was never put forward by one person. It emerged through accretion. 0:14:14.280 --> 0:14:17.040 So it's like seeing one hundred bottles of beer on 0:14:17.040 --> 0:14:19.800 the wall, like you keep adding a new lyric every 0:14:19.840 --> 0:14:23.080 time there's a new administration. So what is the components 0:14:23.080 --> 0:14:25.840 of the One China policy. Well, there's three communicates, three 0:14:25.880 --> 0:14:28.720 agreements that the United States signed with China between the 0:14:28.720 --> 0:14:31.520 seventies and the eighties, and those are the political foundation 0:14:31.640 --> 0:14:36.640 of our relationship with the PRC. And the language is vague, 0:14:37.120 --> 0:14:39.960 and there's some key phrases that are translated differently in 0:14:39.960 --> 0:14:42.320 English and Chinese, so we get to claim that the 0:14:42.360 --> 0:14:44.200 other side said things that the other side says it 0:14:44.200 --> 0:14:47.600 doesn't say. There's a whole lot of that, But basically 0:14:48.000 --> 0:14:52.160 the United States position is we will have a relationship 0:14:52.680 --> 0:14:53.680 with the PRC. 0:14:53.800 --> 0:14:54.600 We will treat. 0:14:54.360 --> 0:14:58.720 Beijing as the sole legitimate government of China, but we 0:14:58.800 --> 0:15:03.080 will maintain for all practical purposes an informal relationship with 0:15:03.120 --> 0:15:07.119 Taiwan as if it were a country, just not technically 0:15:07.680 --> 0:15:12.520 not de jury. And this has been reaffirmed by Congress, 0:15:12.600 --> 0:15:15.040 which in nineteen seventy nine past the Taiwan Relations Act 0:15:15.200 --> 0:15:17.200 that makes very clear that it's the sense of Congress. 0:15:17.200 --> 0:15:18.440 So we should treat Taiwan as a. 0:15:18.360 --> 0:15:21.560 State in basically every respect except for some of these formal, 0:15:22.000 --> 0:15:25.400 very high end political and military interactions. And then in 0:15:25.440 --> 0:15:28.320 the Reagan administration we made some extra commitments to Taiwan 0:15:28.720 --> 0:15:32.120 called the Six Assurances, and they basically reduced to we 0:15:32.160 --> 0:15:34.560 will not force you to the negotiating table, we will 0:15:34.600 --> 0:15:37.080 not trade you away. In other words, you will never 0:15:37.160 --> 0:15:41.000 face pressure from us to take a bad deal. And 0:15:41.640 --> 0:15:44.280 what this policy adds up to has been called by 0:15:44.280 --> 0:15:49.560 political scientists dual deterrence. We want to deter Taiwan from 0:15:49.600 --> 0:15:54.240 declaring independence or doing something provocative that might trigger a crisis, 0:15:55.000 --> 0:15:58.640 and we want to persuade Beijing that if it intervenes, 0:15:58.680 --> 0:16:02.000 it might face the devastating real but that they don't 0:16:02.000 --> 0:16:04.560 have to worry because Taiwan has also deterred, so they 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:07.280 can take their time, and hopefully if we deter both 0:16:07.320 --> 0:16:10.680 sides from doing something extreme, we can encourage them to 0:16:10.760 --> 0:16:14.720 resolve their differences peacefully. So that strategic ambiguity is the 0:16:14.840 --> 0:16:18.680 not saying exactly what we would do or under what circumstances. 0:16:19.160 --> 0:16:22.720 The tricky thing is that was a great policy when 0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:27.600 we had overwhelming economic, technological, and military advantages. 0:16:28.720 --> 0:16:29.960 That is no longer the case. 0:16:30.560 --> 0:16:34.120 We probably could defeat China in a high end conventional war, 0:16:34.680 --> 0:16:37.680 and we can go into why if we put sanctions 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:40.520 on China, we could probably cause a greater GDP hit 0:16:40.560 --> 0:16:44.080 in China, And we can get into why. But the 0:16:44.200 --> 0:16:46.640 cost to us and the risk to us as Americans 0:16:46.840 --> 0:16:49.200 is just going up up up as the relative balance shifts, 0:16:49.480 --> 0:16:51.960 and so now it increasingly seems like it's a get 0:16:52.000 --> 0:16:53.960 out of jail free card, even if it isn't. 0:17:09.760 --> 0:17:14.440 Quick question, I know basically nothing about taiwanis domestic politics. 0:17:14.880 --> 0:17:15.639 Am I wrong? 0:17:15.760 --> 0:17:15.960 Though? 0:17:16.040 --> 0:17:18.639 I feel like I read somewhere it's like the KMT 0:17:19.040 --> 0:17:22.400 the success they and they were the revolutionaries, aren't they 0:17:22.440 --> 0:17:25.400 the more dubbish of the parties and relations with Beijing? 0:17:25.520 --> 0:17:27.600 And don't aren't they the party that seems to be 0:17:27.840 --> 0:17:30.320 a little bit softening of the stances of the future 0:17:30.640 --> 0:17:33.800 and maybe, you know, uniting the two sides a little bit? 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:37.040 Am I wrong about? That's? How is that possible? It's 0:17:37.680 --> 0:17:38.800 how nerdy do you want to get? 0:17:38.920 --> 0:17:39.000 So? 0:17:39.080 --> 0:17:41.560 Here's the thing I mentioned. 0:17:41.280 --> 0:17:45.560 That the dispute is largely about what China means. Now 0:17:45.600 --> 0:17:49.679 that question continues. The Gwomandong, the KMT, which is the 0:17:49.720 --> 0:17:54.199 successor of Chang Kai Shek's party, they believe that there 0:17:54.200 --> 0:17:56.919 are still the legitimate representatives. 0:17:56.119 --> 0:17:56.960 Of the true China. 0:17:57.040 --> 0:17:57.960 The entire thing. 0:17:58.160 --> 0:18:00.840 Well, they recognize that there is a free China and 0:18:00.880 --> 0:18:03.840 an un free China. And I think they've long since 0:18:03.880 --> 0:18:06.120 given up their aspirations of raising an army and going 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:08.119 back across the straight and taken over the mainland. But 0:18:08.160 --> 0:18:11.520 I think they have an aspiration that one day this 0:18:11.640 --> 0:18:15.359 divided China can be unified, either in some kind of 0:18:15.359 --> 0:18:18.440 confederation structure or who knows, maybe with the KMT on top. 0:18:19.080 --> 0:18:24.680 And they identify culturally, historically, civilizationally as Chinese. They say, 0:18:24.720 --> 0:18:27.320 we're Chinese, we just happen to live on Taiwan. But 0:18:27.320 --> 0:18:31.480 we're one civilization, one nation. And the KMT's point of 0:18:31.560 --> 0:18:36.200 view is that we one China, respective interpretations, and on 0:18:36.240 --> 0:18:39.880 that basis, Beijing is willing to talk to them because 0:18:40.160 --> 0:18:42.520 they disagree about one China means what one China means. 0:18:42.520 --> 0:18:44.640 But they both believe in principle that there is only 0:18:44.640 --> 0:18:46.440 one China and the world and Taiwan's part of it. 0:18:47.119 --> 0:18:50.280 But the current ruling party in Taiwan, the Democratic Progressive 0:18:50.280 --> 0:18:53.960 Party of the DPP. They have a different perspective. They say, 0:18:53.960 --> 0:18:56.560 we are a country called Taiwan. We're one of the 0:18:56.560 --> 0:18:59.879 most technologically advanced places in the world. We are thriving 0:18:59.880 --> 0:19:02.600 to democracy. The world needs our chips, you know. We 0:19:02.640 --> 0:19:05.600 are at the center of this security architecture. 0:19:05.760 --> 0:19:07.840 They themselves is a distinct nation. 0:19:08.080 --> 0:19:10.480 We are a distinct nation and we should be recognized 0:19:10.520 --> 0:19:14.520 by the world as such. And they're not suicidal, they're 0:19:14.560 --> 0:19:18.320 not crazy. They recognize that if they declare independence that 0:19:18.760 --> 0:19:20.480 this could bring the hammer down on them. 0:19:20.800 --> 0:19:21.439 But their points of. 0:19:21.480 --> 0:19:24.000 View is we will never declare independence because we already are. 0:19:25.960 --> 0:19:29.000 And Americans, I think will are about to have to 0:19:29.080 --> 0:19:31.600 learn this lesson because Taiwan is going into a presidential 0:19:31.640 --> 0:19:35.840 campaign and it is far from clear where the wind 0:19:35.880 --> 0:19:39.000 is blowing, and the United States will have to work 0:19:39.040 --> 0:19:41.920 with whoever wins, because that's what it means to have 0:19:42.000 --> 0:19:43.240 a partner that's a democracy. 0:19:43.760 --> 0:19:46.320 But these two parties have very different. 0:19:46.000 --> 0:19:48.280 Points of view, and one of the points I make 0:19:48.320 --> 0:19:50.920 in the book is we need to learn to handle 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:55.000 Taiwan's domestic politics. We are two democracies that respond to 0:19:55.119 --> 0:19:58.479 one another. For example, I think the KMT, if they 0:19:58.520 --> 0:20:00.760 come back to power, will be much less interested in 0:20:00.800 --> 0:20:05.440 helping America reshore chip production, and they're also probably much 0:20:05.480 --> 0:20:08.560 less interested in doing military cooperation with the United States 0:20:09.000 --> 0:20:12.359 if that's going to inflame China. I think, basically you 0:20:12.359 --> 0:20:15.040 can think about it this way. The DPP believes that 0:20:15.080 --> 0:20:17.560 the relationship with the United States is the most important thing, 0:20:18.200 --> 0:20:21.359 that we matter to them just as they matter to us, 0:20:21.760 --> 0:20:24.400 and that if Taiwan gets in trouble, America will come. 0:20:25.080 --> 0:20:28.520 And the KMT views are diverse, but they tend to 0:20:28.520 --> 0:20:31.800 have the view the cavalry might not be coming. The 0:20:31.840 --> 0:20:34.080 Americans might be using us as upon in a bigger 0:20:34.119 --> 0:20:37.639 geopolitical game, but can we really trust them? And we 0:20:37.640 --> 0:20:41.280 don't want to become Ukraine, So maybe the best approach 0:20:41.400 --> 0:20:44.640 is to negotiate. And these are two very different points 0:20:44.680 --> 0:20:48.359