The Never Ending China-Taiwan Issue | Explained

China is showing its biggest every power performance which is very close to a small scale warfare. Till date China has launched projectiles and long range military ammunition firing. This comes after US House of Representative Speaker, Nancy Pelosi lands in the island of Taiwan.

China sees Taiwan as a part and separated part of main land China. If we take a look in the history of China, Beijing was always attacked from the island of Taiwan. In the WW2 too Japan first captured Taiwan and it became an unsinkable aircraft carrier, from where most of the attacks was from the island. Hence, for China it is also a strategic land from the point of security. Therefore, in this blog we will try to understand the cause and sensitiveness of China when it comes to Taiwan.

Lets start with Taiwan inter political structure, Taiwan has already declared as an independent country, with its own declared constitution and democratically elected leaders. So, lets understand first the location of Taiwan and the distance between China and Taiwan. In the image given below we can see the location of Taiwan and the size of the island. It is merely 100 miles.

Root Cause Lies in the History

Lets take a deep dive in the era of era of Mao Zedong, when civil war broke in the land of China, where two main groups were there CCP (Chinese Communist Party) and KMT (Kuomintang) led government. 

 

In the war the CCP had the upper hand which is generally referred to as Chinese Communist Revolution. The communist gained the control of mainland china and established PRC (People's Republic Of China) in 1949 forcing the leadership of Republic of China to move to the island of Taiwan. 

 

Since then, in the era of 1950s, both countries started having conflict in terms of military and economy both claiming to the legitimate govt. of China. 

 

But after Second Taiwan Strait Crisis both tacitly ceased fired in 1979 but no treaties had been signed, resulting in the current situation of Taiwan.

Why China still considers Taiwan to be part of main land China ?

Chinese are so desperate for Taiwan that they would even start the war against American military itself. What is so special about China that even studying we cannot see it?

 

Let's understand it. 

 

We understood till now that the leaders of mainland China claims the right of the island of Taiwan but the real question is, why someone wants to invade when you claim something, what is there to be so violent of? 

 

Initially, Putin also essentially laid claim to Ukraine. After weeks of warnings the Russian invasion of Ukraine has begun. 

 

But this is about more than tanks and troops and artillery.

If we see from a shallow perspective, we can see this is about struggle for power? 

 

This is the reason, why the world considers the Chinese invasion of Taiwan very seriously. 

 

But this is not it. 

 

China is so serious about this that in 2005 they came out with something called the anti-secession law and in this law there are three sentences that make it very clear that china wants Taiwan by hook or crook and these are the three sentences:- 

1. Taiwan is a part of china and the state shall never allow the Taiwan independent secessionist forces to make Taiwan secede from china under any name or by any means. 
2. Solving the Taiwan question and achieving national reunification is china's internal affair which subjects to no interference by any outside forces. 
3. If Taiwan declares independence china shall employ non-peaceful means and other necessary measures to protect china sovereignty and territorial integrity.
   

Now the question over here is this law was made in 2005 right? 

 

It's been 16 years now. So why is this a concern for the world now? 

 

 Well that is because China’s military strength has grown exponentially in the past 30 years. 

 

And Secondly, China has already started flying its planes near Taiwan.

Actually by this picture, it will be easy to understand visual of how china has constantly been crossing the lines. 

 

If you see this this is the median line of Taiwan as in it is supposed to be Taiwan's territory and military planes are not supposed to enter this space without their permission but you see these red lines this is the Chinese military frequently crossing this line not once not twice but hundreds of times in the past few years, and this frequency has only been increasing with time.

Why China Is Not Invading?

But now the question over here is Taiwan is such a small country right and if you compare both their armies: China has 10 times more ground force, 8 times more naval destroyers, and 30 times more submarines, then why didn't China attack Taiwan till now?

Well that is because Taiwan has been backed by none other than the United States Of America itself. When President Biden was asked if he would come to rescue Taiwan if china attacked, Biden openly said "yes" and stated that America has a commitment to do that. This kind of upset china, So if china attacks Taiwan, According to President Biden the US will intervene which means what we could be looking at a military war between two of the most powerful nations in the world and more importantly two nuclear superpowers will be head-to-head which could perhaps escalate to World War 3 itself.

Three Reasons Why US is protecting Taiwan.

This is the backing that Taiwan has now. This begs the question what is so special about this little island called Taiwan that the United States of America itself is willing to take such a big risk to go head-on with China. 

1. The South-China Sea

The first reason for this is something called the South China sea dispute and this is one of the most critical reasons why China would invade Taiwan. South China sea is this region in the world map where you have Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines Taiwan, and Vietnam. And this is by far one of the most important regions in the world. Therefore because 30 of the entire world's shipping passes through this region and it amounts to 3.37 trillion dollars in trade, every single year.

And as far as the strategy resources are concerned according to council on foreign relations the sea is estimated to have 11 billion barrels of untapped oil and 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and the most vital benefit of all is that the country controlling this maritime route will have natural military advantage over the rest of the world including the United States and China. This is why both China and US is so keen on taking control of this region that they have placed military ships conducted military drills and even built artificial islands. 

 

Yes you read that right china has literally built artificial islands to claim the south China sea. And in our context if China attacks Taiwan if it wins, it will have an insane upper hand over the second most important region in the world and this region gives them more control over a plethora of resources, a strategic military advantage, and most importantly dominance over this three trillion dollar trade route.

 2. Defence Pact

Secondly, for the US it is a question of reputation and safety. Reputation because if the US does not defend Taiwan then the rest of the countries that the united states has signed a defense pact (like Japan and other countries) including the NATO allies will be extremely offended. 

3. Semiconductor
Thirdly we have the critical aspect of the semiconductor crisis and a giant Taiwanese company called TSMC. 

 

For those who don't know semiconductors. These are by far one of the most important components in the world this is because they are used in almost every single gadget that you use starting from your mobile phone to your oven to your lights to even your automobiles.

The fact is that if you look at the market of semiconductor contractors all across the world you will see that while china stands at six percent, south Korean manufacturers stand at 17 percent, the rest of the world stands at 13 percent, and Taiwan alone has a market share of 63 percent. 

 

And in that also TSMC alone commands a market share of 54 percent it's the world's largest country that counts major technology firms such as Apple, Qualcomm and Nvidia and all the major car makers around the world including Volkswagen, Ford Motors and Toyota motors are super dependent on Taiwan for its semiconductors.

Furthermore replicating the manufacturing of semiconductors is an extremely costly, tedious and time-consuming process that involves thousands of complicated procedures. The world is dangerously dependent on Taiwan for semiconductors why because this is what happened in 2020, Massive worldwide chip shortage. Earnings being caught by up to 2 billion, we don't have these chips, we're in trouble, there's a lot of reasons why this is happening right now we still expect that through 2023 that we're still going to be facing tough supply shortage.

This is the reason why the United States is extremely concerned about Taiwan and takes its commitment to protect it very very seriously. Like I said not because human beings are in trouble but because there is a rival superpower that might rise to power. This is the reason why the entire world is extremely worried about the China Taiwan conflict and even the slightest miscalculation can escalate this to World War III itself.

Conclusion

Furthermore because the world is already suffering due to the Russia Ukraine War, if this war happens now it would be a nightmare for the world economy itself and this brings me to the most important part and that is how will this China Taiwan scenario affect India and what helps you dig deeper into this conflict.

The first thing we need to understand is that India is an ally of both US and Taiwan and regardless of whether China attacks Taiwan or takes it peacefully it could be a disaster both for India and the world itself disaster. For India because just like the Chinese vendors started abusing their monopoly position to increase the price of solar components, they are more likely to do the same with the semiconductors and that could hit us very hard.

Secondly, if a war breaks out the US is more likely to pressurize India because we are the closest allies and we might be forced to go to war. This is because during such critical times the United States often puts forth a condition saying that if you don't support us you are by default against us and that could put us in a catch situation.

So, we hope War does not break out.

Thank You.