TRAPPED? Taiwan depended on a powerful US, a weak China and a strong economy, but that is no longer possible, former Mainland Affairs Council chairman Su Chi said
Taipei Times
Date: Mar 19, 2018
By: Chen Wei-han / Staff reporter
Taiwan should not involve itself in the confrontation between the US and China, but
Foundation on Asia-Pacific Peace Studies chairman Hsu Hsin-liang, left, speaks at a forum on strategy in Taipei yesterday as Taiwan Research Fund founder Huang Huang-hsiung, former Mainland Affairs Council chairman Su Chi and Academia Sinica member Chu Yun-han, second left to right, listen. Photo: Chien Jung-fong, Taipei Times
should create another path to interact with the two powers to ensure its security, former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chairman Hsu Hsin-liang (許信良) told a forum in Taipei yesterday.
The US until this year approached its relationship with China as a constructive partnership, but the US Department of Defense in its annual defense strategy report published in January defined China as “a strategic competitor,” suggesting that the US-China partnership has turned confrontational, Hsu told the regional security forum organized by the Taiwan Research Foundation.
The confrontation would not come to a definite conclusion because neither the US nor China would escalate it to a military conflict, a trade war or Cold War-style diplomatic confrontation, Hsu said.
The US-China relationship would develop into a “protracted, on-and-off process of confrontation and compromise,” which would become the basis for a new world order, Hsu said. [FULL STORY]