Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

Evidence shows that the US government failed to live up to repeated public statements that it would remain neutral in the Jan. 14 presidential election.

First, in September last year, right after Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) met with US National Security Council and State Department officials, including US Deputy Secretary of State Thomas Nides and US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia Kurt Cambell, in Washington, the Financial Times reported an unidentified senior official as saying that Tsai had left US President Barack Obama’s administration with “distinct concerns” about her ability to maintain stability in the Taiwan Strait. The US Department of State immediately made known publicly that this was not the administration’s view.

The dust is settling over the Jan. 14 elections and many a commentator has weighed in with the conclusion that this was a vote for “stability,” in particular across the Taiwan Strait.

I would disagree, for a number of reasons, which will be elaborated on below. However, first, I would like to mention that I speak from the perspective of a long-time Taiwan observer, who started to follow and analyze the country’s political developments in the late 1970s, and who experienced Taiwan’s momentous transition to democracy in the late 1980s and early 1990s.