The inauguration of the new Taiwanese president on May 20 reinforced the divisions. China’s military invasion of the island of Taiwan has never seemed closer.
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We must listen to the words of the new Taiwanese president, Sunday June 16, to the students of the Military Academy who were celebrating the centenary of their school. William Lai, inaugurated on May 20, was very direct: “China’s rise is our biggest challenge“Beijing seeks to annex us, our “elimination“, he said, has become his national cause. Your mission, he told the future officers, will be to protect Taiwan.”with courage“.
Coming like his predecessors from the Progressive Democratic Party, William Lai, also called Lai Ching-te, opposes the one-China policy. On several occasions he proposed talks which were rejected.
The Chinese regime, which considers the island to be part of its territory, considers it a dangerous separatist and the scenario of an invasion becomes more threatening every day. First there was Chinese President Xi Jinping’s end-of-year speech declaring that Taiwan would be “surely reunited” with China.
In fact, intimidation maneuvers are increasing. Beijing put a lot of pressure on it at the end of May by mobilizing military ships and planes loaded with live ammunition in the Taiwan Strait. At the beginning of June, at the Shangri-La Dialogue, the Chinese Minister of Defense, Dong Jun, stood out with a fiery speech explaining that the army was ready to put an end to “with strength and determination” for the independence of Taiwan.
Taiwan, for its part, is preparing for an asymmetric war, as the Minister of Defense reiterated Monday morning. Since Taiwan does not have the means to cope with either the power or the number of the Chinese army, its policy consists of equipping itself with a defensive deterrent capacity, making its forces mobile and more difficult to attack, by example, by mounting missiles on vehicles and drones. The minister rejects the theory according to which Taiwan could collapse at the very first assault launched by Beijing.
The United States practices“strategic ambiguity” and even if they recognize Beijing as a legitimate power to the detriment of Taipei, President Joe Biden recently suggested that his country would defend Taiwan in the event of military aggression. Large contracts have just been signed between the two countries for the supply of spare parts for F-16 combat aircraft.
As in 2023, China was singled out this year by the G7 countries meeting in Italy. On Friday, June 14, the assembly issued a statement denouncing Beijing’s incursions in the South China Sea and the risk of escalation in the Indo-Pacific. With a deterrent effect that remains to be demonstrated. Monday June 17 in the morning, a new incident was reported, a Chinese ship collided with a Philippine boat near the Spratly Islands, an area claimed by Beijing in defiance of international justice.