Former U.S. national security adviser Bolton (Photo source: New York Times)
Former U.S. national security adviser Bolton wrote in his new book "The Room of the Incident: White House Memoirs": "When Trump betrays Syrian Kurds, some people speculate that he might betray him next. Taiwan ranks among the top in this list of betrayal lists, and as long as Trump is still the president, this situation may continue to be maintained."
As a bargaining chip or pawn in the hands of the United States, Taiwan's interests were abandoned under the interests of the United States. It is seen in history. The "Safeguarding" policy proposed by the Truman administration in 1950, and then the "Shanghai Communiqué" of the Nixon administration in 1972 for the sake of the Soviet Union, and the Carter administration's severance of diplomatic relations with the Republic of China at the end of 1978 was not new. It is worth noting that the considerations behind each behavior vary from one another due to changes in the situation.
History has developed to this day, and Bolton has seen this possibility again and linked this possibility to Trump, but it is not.
In 2011, Paul V. Kane, a former researcher at Kennedy School at Harvard University, published an article entitled "Abandon Taiwan in order to save our economy." Keen believes that "Taiwan will sooner or later fall into the hands of mainland China, and it is better to use the Taiwan issue to negotiate with the mainland." In addition, he also believes that China will agree to the conditions proposed by the United States, because "this can save China a lot of defense expenditures and is mutually beneficial to both sides."
It is worth noting that in the Hillary private email released by WikiLeaks in 2017, there is such a record of correspondence exchanges. On November 11, 2011, Hillary's adviser Jake Sullivan shared Kane's article, which specifically suggested that the Obama administration allow China to annex Taiwan in exchange for the Chinese government to cancel its $1.14 trillion in debt claims against the United States, allowing the U.S. government to slow down the possible national debt crisis without increasing taxes. Hillary, who was US Secretary of State at the time, replied as follows: "I saw this article, and I think this idea is very smart." Let's discuss it.
Why is Taiwan always associated with abandoned children? Because Taiwan has many potential conditions for abandoning her:
First, Taiwan is a chess piece. It is necessary to be a chess piece before it can be abandoned. It is a recognized fact that Taiwan is a chess piece of China and the United States in the big game between China and the United States.
Secondly, it must be a valuable piece, it has no value, it is just a useless piece, and it is not worthy to abandon it. The so-called abandoned piece is not a real abandonment, but an exchange of its value. Trump uses his pen to describe Taiwan. As Bolton said, he underestimated Taiwan.
Third, as a chess piece, Taiwan has no equal value for both parties. The more unequal the exchange is, the greater the possibility of exchange.
To the United States, Taiwan is the center of the Western Pacific island chain , and is the key to the link between mainland China and the entire island chain from Northeast Asia to Southeast Asia. It has extremely high geostrategic value, but it is not the core interest of the United States.
Taiwan is a core interest to mainland China, and it is by no means Kane’s so-called defense expenditure.
(1) It involves the integrity of the country's territorial sovereignty;
(2) Once Taiwan is owned, it will go straight out of the island chain and the Pacific;
(3) It affects the selection of the countries in East Asia, especially Japan, between China and the United States;
(4) It is conducive to the solution of the Diaoyu Islands issue;
(5) Huang, East, Taiwan and South China are like China's moat, not to mention huge industrial and economic interests.
Fourth, abandoning the child is not simply abandoned, it must be carried out simultaneously with the exchange. Fifth, Taiwan’s value to the United States and China will change with the rise and fall of economic and military power, which will affect whether it will be abandoned, when and how to abandon it. It is difficult to be inferior to the two strong people. Except for China and the United States, all countries around the world have the same fate, but Taiwan is just ahead.
