The fate of Taiwan is the largest issue in dispute between the United States and the People’s Republic of China. Yet, like the proverbial elephant in the room, the future of the 23 million island residents was ignored by President Barack Obama and Premier Hu Jintao during Hu’s visit to Washington.
Had either world leader bothered to look out the White House windows during the Chinese leader’s state visit they would have seen on street outside noisy protesters defending human rights, Tibet, Chinese Uyghurs, and Taiwan.
Although the Tibet demonstrators clearly were more vocal, better organized, and passionate, those braving the winter cold to advocate for Taiwan came from a coalition of 17 Taiwanese-American groups.
China has threatened Taiwan with invasion for the last six decades since the United States allowed forces of Chiang Kai-shek’s Kuomintang regime to settle on the island. In a bid to prop up the failing government of dictator Chiang against the communists who defeated the Chinese Nationalists in 1949, the United States delayed resolution of Taiwan’s status.
Taiwan, then commonly called Formosa, was Japanese territory at the end of World War II and the United States was named “principal occupying Power” over the island in the San Francisco Peace Treaty that ended World War II with Japan. However, the United States has delegated its responsibility over the island to the exiled Republic of China.
Chiang and his son Chiang Ching-kuo imposed four decades of harsh martial law on the people of Formosa while the United States looked the other way as the Cold War raged on. But the thawing of the Cold War did not lead to self-determination for Taiwan as the United States maintained a “strategic ambiguity” on the island status to ward off Chinese advances.
In 2009, the District of Columbia U.S. Court of Appeals urged President Obama to resolve Taiwan’s “political purgatory” but the White House has ignored the court request leaving the island at risk of Chinese invasion and caught in an escalating arms race across the Taiwan Strait.
While individuals and groups prepare petitions, pass resolutions, and stage protests, nothing they do seems to clarify the unresolved international status that leaves Taiwan barred from the United Nations and kept out of membership in orgainizations like the World Health Organization.
Although Taiwan enjoys considerable Congressional support it remains unclear the extent of support from the Obama administration which has sent mixed signals on Taiwan.
Source: Michael Richardson - Boston Progressive Examiner
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