Pacific insecurity
China is pushing Donald Trump for concessions on Taiwan
Some in Taipei and Washington fear he may give ground
Illustration: Jared BartmanA year or so after communist China established diplomatic ties with America in 1979, Chinese officials started asking for a new agreement.
They wanted then-President Ronald Reagan to commit to ending arms sales to Taiwan, the self-governed island that China claims.
His secretary of state, Alexander Haig, backed the idea, arguing that China would soon be the world’s “most important country”.
Reagan sacked Haig but agreed to a fudge.
A new communiqué with China in 1982 promised “gradually to reduce” arms sales to Taiwan, provided Chinese intentions were peaceful.
He then sent secret assurances to Taiwan, reaffirming American support.
In the years since, peace in the western Pacific has often depended on such ambiguities in the liturgy of relations between China, America and Taiwan.
Chinese officials have made many more attempts to dilute America’s commitment to help Taiwan defend itself.
And successive American presidents have rebuffed them.
But as Donald Trump prepares to visit Beijing, China is making a new push to win concessions on Taiwan.
And fears are growing in Taipei and Washington that Mr Trump might at some point give ground as part of a broader deal with Xi Jinping, China’s president.
At the same time, the war in the Middle East is eroding America’s capacity both to arm Taiwan and to intervene successfully in a conflict with China over the island.
American military assets transferred from Asia to the Gulf include an aircraft-carrier strike group, a Marine expeditionary unit, missile-defence equipment and other munitions.
The knock-on effects on maintenance and readiness may last for years.
Moreover, America and its Middle Eastern allies have depleted their stockpiles of weapons, especially Patriot interceptor missiles.
Taiwan, which has bought many of the same American arms, was facing a $32bn delivery backlog before the war.
Clearing that may now take even longer.
American and Taiwanese officials insist that relations remain strong and arms deliveries on track.
They also play down the risk of a Chinese attack in 2027, the deadline that American spies say Mr Xi has set for his armed forces to be able to execute an invasion of Taiwan.
Although China continues to probe Taiwan’s defences almost daily, the threat of an actual attack may have diminished in the near term because of a recent purge by Mr Xi of his military high command.
He may have been deterred, too, by Mr Trump’s recent displays of AI-enhanced American firepower.
Still, anxiety about the future is starting to hit Taiwanese politics in ways that could fundamentally alter the power dynamics of the region.
Cheng Li-wun, the new leader of the Kuomintang, Taiwan’s biggest opposition party, is seeking closer ties to China ahead of local elections in November and a presidential poll in 2028.
In April she became the first KMT leader in a decade to meet Mr Xi.
The KMT and its allies, which control Taiwan’s parliament, are also blocking a $40bn rise in defence spending, mainly for American arms.
Further delay could bump Taiwan to the back of the queue for some critical weapons.
That all makes this a precarious moment for the island that produces some 90% of the world’s most advanced semiconductors.
When the two leaders last met, in South Korea in October, they barely discussed Taiwan.
But in December China grew upset when Mr Trump approved an arms package for the island worth a record $11bn.
Since then, Chinese officials have made clear that they want the issue at the top of the agenda in Beijing. In a phone call with Mr Trump in January, Mr Xi said Taiwan was “the most important issue” and that America should handle arms sales to the island “with extreme caution”.
A farewell to arms?
Mr Trump then took the unusual step of stating publicly that he had discussed future arms sales to Taiwan directly with Mr Xi.
Shortly afterwards it emerged that the White House was delaying a fresh arms package for Taiwan worth about $13bn.
America has temporarily delayed such arms sales before summits in the past.
But Mr Trump’s remarks suggested that he was actually negotiating with Mr Xi over future arms sales.
That would be a violation of Reagan’s commitments back in 1982.
Chinese representatives have also been lobbying for Mr Trump to change America’s official public rhetoric on Taiwan.
One proposal is for him to say that America “opposes” Taiwanese independence.
Its current position is that it “does not support” the island’s independence, implying that America would not object if it happened organically.
(Ms Cheng, the KMT leader, has suggested she would not object to such a change.)
Recently, Chinese officials and proxies have proposed that Mr Trump say he supports or does not oppose “peaceful re-unification” with China.
America’s current policy is that it supports a peaceful resolution, without mentioning a specific outcome such as unification.
Da Wei, who studies China’s relations with America at Beijing’s Tsinghua University, says he thinks Mr Trump “got the message” about arms sales during the recent leaders’ phone call.
He expects him to approve smaller packages in future and to wait several months before the next one.
Otherwise, Mr Xi could cancel a planned visit to America this year, he warns.
And he believes there is a realistic chance of Mr Trump saying he does not oppose “peaceful re-unification”.
Although only a small change from China’s perspective, that could lead to more significant ones on Taiwan’s status and future, he says.
That is what worries Taiwan’s government.
Such wrangling over a few words may seem precious.
But the careful use, and the tweaking, of diplomatic language around Taiwan has long been a sensitive point on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.
The island’s current president, Lai Ching-te, asserts that Taiwan is already an independent sovereign nation and its future can be decided only by its own people.
His government has stepped up efforts to lobby Mr Trump through its supporters in the American government and Congress.
But it fears that such influence is dwindling and that Mr Trump cares little for the island.
In its view, any rhetorical concession would imply that Taiwan is up for negotiation, further undermining public morale there, while helping Mr Xi’s strategy of bringing the KMT back to power.
And any delay or scaling back of American arms sales after the summit would embolden China and set back Taiwan’s efforts to modernise its armed forces.
No one involved expects a sea change from this round of talks.
Chinese officials have dropped earlier efforts to negotiate a fourth bilateral communiqué.
Instead, they appear to be trying to get Mr Trump to make concessions on Taiwan without a written agreement.
And if China doesn’t achieve that this time, it is likely to keep making Taiwan the dominant issue ahead of the three other planned meetings between Mr Trump and Mr Xi in 2026.
For America, strategic ambiguity over Taiwan has long deterred China.
Feckless ambiguity does not hold the same promise.
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