Analysis: Threatening Taiwan -- Part 2

HONG KONG, July 25 (UPI) -- In the area of advanced multirole fighters alone, the People's Republic of China imported 100 Su-30MKK/MK2s over the past eight years, whereas Taiwan did not purchase any new combat aircraft. Nor did it procure any surface warships or submarines, except for one retired Keelung Class DDG from the United States. Taiwan virtually wasted the whole of eight years in its military development.

Under this circumstance, quite a number of U.S. and Japanese military strategists find it hard to understand the statement by Taiwan's new president, Ma Ying-jeou, that there would be "no arms race" with China.

With respect to the current reality in the Taiwan Strait, the key problem lies not in whether Taiwan engages in an arms race, but that China's military buildup has developed to such an extent that China's neighbors -- including Japan, Russia and India -- have become increasingly worried.

Even if Taiwan abides by its earlier promise and increases its military spending to 3 percent of its total gross domestic product in the next four years, the most optimistic estimate is that Taiwan's total military spending each year will not be able to surpass $15 billion.

The military advantage that China already has achieved appears irreversible. Another factor that has to be taken into consideration is Taiwan's immense national debt. The outstanding debt of the central and local governments combined has grown to a stunning $134 billion, and inflation is also worsening on the island.

Politically, the Kuomintang's "one China consensus" will take cross-strait relations back to the age of a relationship between "two special states," similar to the status around 1992. In that event, two-way cooperation and exchanges will be boosted, talks between the two semiofficial bodies -- the Taipei-based Strait Exchange Foundation and the Beijing-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait -- very likely will be resuscitated, which is what the United States appears to have been encouraging the two sides to do.

Yet at the bottom of their hearts, U.S. and Japanese strategists are more concerned than eight years ago over any hasty rapprochement between the two sides in establishing a security mechanism for the Taiwan Strait.

Japanese strategists tend to believe the "three links" -- trade, transport and postal services -- between Taiwan and China will make Taiwan "Chinized" at a very fast pace. Some Japanese strategists are also worried that once China and Taiwan sign a peace agreement, the balance of power in East Asia will completely tilt in favor of China.

On the other hand, the Americans are more concerned that a number of high-level Kuomintang officials already have visited China and established close private ties with China's top leaders. Will these ties mean a much closer integration between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait? Evidently, what the United States and Japan really want is the long-term maintenance of the current "no war and no peace" status, rather than any breakthrough in the status quo.

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(Andrei Chang is editor in chief of Kanwa Defense Review Monthly, registered in Toronto.)