Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

On May 14, an 18-year-old white American man gunned down people in a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, killing 10, eight of whom were black.

The perpetrator, a white supremacist, selected an area he knew black people gathered in.

The following day, David Wenwei Chou (周文偉), a 68-year-old Taiwanese-born Chinese-American pro-unification nationalist extremist entered a luncheon for Irvine Taiwanese Presbyterian Church in southern California, sealing the entrance with superglue and chains to make sure the Taiwanese congregation would have no means of escape, and began shooting, intent on killing the people trapped inside.

Will the US come to the defense of Taiwan if and when China makes its move? Like most friends of Taiwan, I’ve been saying “yes” for a couple decades. But the truth is that none of us, in or out of government, really know. This is precisely why we all need to show humility in our advice on how Taiwan should prepare itself for such an eventuality.

After all, it’s their country, and they have no choice but to live with the consequences.

A couple weeks ago the New York Times published an article that put this reality in stark relief. As detailed there, the Biden administration is seriously committed to constraining the choices Taiwan can make in its choice of weapons purchases. This is not completely new. The US and Taiwan have consulted on Taiwan’s capabilities for decades. It does not always get what it wants.