Hot Spot: Taiwan

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC) are in dispute over the status of Taiwan and other islands currently under the governance of the ROC. Although the PRC has never ruled Taiwan or any of the current ROC territory, it insists that Taiwan, including its offshore islands, is an inseparable part of China, and will one day be reunified with the PRC.

Since the 1990s, political liberalisation and the increased representation of opposition parties in Taiwan's legislature have opened public debate on the island's national identity. Debate on Taiwan independence and relations with the PRC have remained key issues in Taiwan’s domestic politics. Public opinion polls consistently show a substantial majority of Taiwan people supports maintaining Taiwan's status quo for the foreseeable future.

The possibility of war in the Taiwan Straits, even though quite low in the short-term, requires the PRC, ROC, and U.S. to remain wary and vigilant. The goal of the three parties at the moment seems to be, for the most part, to maintain the status quo.

History

Taiwan, also known as Formosa, is an island in the Southeast Asia, separated from the China mainland by the Taiwan Strait. The island was first populated by the Austronesian people, and later saw influx of immigrants from Southeast China, in particular Fujian Province. Taiwan was colonised by the Dutch in the 17th century, and was under the Chinese governance by the Qing Empire between 1683 and 1895.

In 1895, Taiwan was ceded to Japan under the Treaty of Shimonoseki (Maguan) as a result of the First Sino-Japanese War. The island was under the Japanese governance for the next fifty years. After the surrender of Japan in 1945, Taiwan was returned to the Republic of China under the Kuomintang (KMT, or Nationalist Party) government led by Chiang Kai-shek. In the summer of 1947, the Chinese Civil War broke out and the Chinese Communist forces embarked large scale offensive operations against the KMT forces. Following the fall of Nanijng, the capital of the ROC, in March 1949, KMT resistance collapsed. In August, Chiang and his followers fled to Taiwan. On 1 October 1949, the Chinese Communists founded the People’s Republic of China.

Up until the 1970s, the ROC in Taiwan was regarded as the legitimate government of China by most Western countries, while the PRC was recognised by the Soviet Union and other Eastern Bloc countries. In 1971, the seat for “China” in the United Nations Security Council was assumed by the PRC, in pace of the ROC. In 1972, the United States established diplomatic ties with the PRC, and acknowledged without explicitly endorsing the One China Policy in the Shanghai Communique. In 1979, the U.S. government established formal relations with the PRC and broke its relations with the ROC.

Shortly after the U.S. broke its relations with the ROC, the Carter administration issued the Taiwan Relation Act, which authorises unofficial diplomatic relations with the ROC government by giving special powers to the American Institute in Taiwan to the level that it is the de facto embassy, and states that any international obligations previously made between the ROC and U.S. before 1979 are still valid unless otherwise terminated. The act provides for Taiwan to be treated under U.S. laws the same as "foreign countries, nations, states, governments, or similar entities". The Taiwan Relations Act does not require the U.S. to intervene militarily if the PRC attacks or invades Taiwan, and the U.S. has adopted a policy of "strategic ambiguity" in which the U.S. neither confirms nor denies that it would intervene in such a scenario.

First and Second Taiwan Strait Crisis

The First and Second Taiwan Strait Crisis were both continuations of the Chinese Civil War that lasted from 1947 to 1949 between the KMT and Chinese Communists. Following the overwhelming victory on the China mainland, the Chinese communists had been planning for an invasion on Taiwan, the last Chinese territory occupied by the KMT regime, since the late 1949. However, On 27 June 1950, two days after the outbreak of the Korean War, the U.S. President Harry Truman declared the "neutralisation of the Straits of Formosa" and sent the Seventh Fleet of the U.S. Navy into the Taiwan Strait to prevent any conflict between the PRC and ROC, effectively putting Taiwan under American protection. As a result, the PRC abandoned the plan to liberate Taiwan and shifted its focus onto Korea instead.

On 2 February 1953, the newly elected U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower lifted the Seventh Fleet's blockade of the Taiwan Strait in order to fulfil demands by anti-Communists to "unleash Chiang Kai-shek" on the mainland. The ROC fortified islands of Quemoy and Matsu, just 8 miles off the coast of the China mainland as bases for its re-conquest of China. The PRC also planned an attack on the KMT-occupied island of Yijiangshan and Dachen Islands off its southeast coast.

In August 1954, the ROC moved 58,000 troops to Quemoy and 15,000 troops to Matsu. On 11 August, the PRC premier Zhou En-lai declared that Taiwan must be liberated. On 17 August, the United States warned the PRC against action against Taiwan, but on 3 September the PLA began an artillery bombardment of Quemoy. On 12 September, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff recommended the use of nuclear weapons against the PRC. In November, PLA planes bombed the Tachen Islands. On 23 November, the PRC sentenced 13 US airmen shot down over China in the Korean War to long jail terms, prompting further consideration of nuclear strikes against the PRC. Despite domestic political pressure, President Eisenhower refused to bomb mainland China or use of American troops to resolve the crisis. At the urging of Senator Knowland, the U.S. government signed the Mutual Defence Treaty with the ROC on 2 December 1954.

On 18 January 1955, PLA troops under the support of air and naval forces seized Yijiangshan Island and completely wiped out the ROC defence there. The two sides continued fighting on Quemoy, Matsu, and along the mainland Chinese coast. On 7 February 1955, the U.S. government ordered the Seventh Fleet helped ROC troops and civilians on the Tachen Islands to retreat to Taiwan.

In the face of a possible nuclear strike by the United States, the PRC backed down and stated on 23 April 1955 at the Afro-Asian Conference that it was ready to negotiate on Taiwan. On 1 May 1955 shelling of Quemoy and Matsu ceased. On 1 August 1955, the PRC released the 11 captured US airmen previously sentenced to jail terms.

Hostility between the PRC and ROC remained after the first crisis. The Eisenhower Administration of the United States responded to ROC's request for aid according to its obligations under the 1954 US-ROC Mutual Defence Treaty by reinforcing U.S. naval units and ordering US naval vessels to help the ROC forces protect Quemoy and Matsu's supply lines. ROC Air Force F-86 Sabre fighters received special modification to carry the newly introduced AIM-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missile. In December 1957, the talks between the United States and the PRC over the Taiwan issue collapsed.

In July 1958, the Chinese leader Mao Ze-dong ordered a military operation against KMT-occupied islands of Quemoy and Matsu, where large numbers of ROC troops were stationed. The PLA deployed large numbers of ground and air forces to the southeast province of Fujian, directly facing Taiwan across the strait.

The Second Taiwan Strait Crisis started at 5:30pm on 23 August 1958, when PRC troops suddenly began an intense artillery bombardment of the Quemoy, and ROC forces in Quemoy returned fire. The artillery crossfire lasted for 44 days and took approximately 1,000 lives. The air forces of the two sides also engaged over the Taiwan Strait. On 22 September 1958, the Sidewinder missile was used for the first time when Sabres and MiGs clashed with several MiGs being downed by the F-86s. An even larger engagement occurred 2 days later, with both sides claiming to have scored many kills of enemy aircraft.

The conflict in the Taiwan Strait soon became a focus point of the world. The Soviet Union dispatched its foreign minister, Andrei Gromyko, to Beijing to discuss PRC's actions. Faced with pressures from the United States and Soviet Union, the PRC and the ROC called a ceasefire on 6 October 1958. Beijing issued a “Message to the Compatriots in Taiwan”, calling for a peaceful solution to the Taiwan issue and all Chinese to unite against the "American plot to divide China".

Tensions between the PRC and ROC continued after the end of the crisis. In the 1960s, the ROC made several attempts to invade the PRC, which was weakened by internal political turmoil and worsening relations with the Soviet Union. The PRC responded by maintaining a strong military presence along its southeast coast. A number of ROC Air Force reconnaissance aircraft, including five U-2 spy planes, were shot down by PLA forces over the PRC territory. Skirmishes between the two sides continued until the late 1970s.

Third Taiwan Strait Crisis

In 1995, the ROC President Lee Teng-hui accepted an invitation by Cornell University to deliver a speech on Taiwan’s democratisation experience. The PRC viewed such a visit as a recognition of the ROC government diplomatically and strongly opposed the visit. Despite promises by the U.S. State Department of the President Bill Clinton to the PRC government that Lee would not be given a visa to enter the United States, in May 1995, the U.S. Congress passed resolutions asking the State Department to allow Lee to visit. The State Department relented on 22 May 1995 and the PRC condemned the U.S. for ruining Sino-U.S. relations.

On 7 July 1995, the Chinese official Xinhua News Agency announced missile tests to be carried out by the PLA near the Taiwan Strait and warned foreign aeroplanes and ships to avoid entering the target zone. Between 21 and 23 July 1995, a total of six DF-15 (CSS-6) short-range ballistic missiles (SRBM) were launched from an unknown location in Fujian Province, with five of them hitting the target zone in the international water northwest of Taiwan. At the same time, a large amount of PLA troops were mobilised in Fujian Province.

Between 15 and 25 October 1995, the PLA Nanjing Military Region carried out a joint air force and navy exercise north of the Taiwan Strait. Between 15 September and 20 October 1995, a large amount of ground, air, and naval forces were deployed to the Fujian Coast. Between 31 October and 23 November 1995, a joint service amphibious assault exercise was carried out on Dongshan Island near the Taiwan Strait.

With the Taiwanese presidential election approaching in 1996, the PRC intended to send a clear message to the Taiwanese electorate that voting for Lee Teng-hui meant war. A further round of missile tests and military exercise was carried out from March 1996. In the early morning on 8 March 1996, two DF-15 SRBMs were launched almost simultaneously from two locations in Fujian, and hit two target zones 25 to 35 miles (just inside the ROC's territorial waters) off the ports of Keelung and Kaohsiung. This was followed by another two missile launches shortly after.

On March 8, 1996, President Clinton ordered the deployment of the Independence carrier battle group (CVBG) to international waters near Taiwan. On the following day, the PRC announced live-fire air and naval exercises to be conducted near Penghu between 12 and 20 March 1996. On 11 March 1996, the U.S. deployed the Nimitz CVBG from the Persian Gulf to the Taiwan Strait. Beijing responded by conducting a joint-service amphibious assault exercise on Pingtan Island near Taiwan between 18 and 25 March 1996.

Despite PRC’s military intimidation, Lee Teng-hui was elected as ROC’s 9th President on 23 March 1996. The PRC’s policies were proven counterproductive, arousing more anger than fear. The missile tests and military exercises also pushed the United States to continue its arms sales to the ROC and further strengthened the military ties between the U.S. and Japan.

PRC Military Modernisation and Missile Deployment

The setback during the 1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis has stimulated the PRC to pursue further military modernisation. Since the mid-1990s, the PLA has been actively acquiring various advanced military hardware and technologies from both domestic and foreign sources in order to obtain advantages over the ROC military as well as deter the United States from intervening should a conflict breaks out between the PRC and the ROC.

As an important step to its maintain military domination against Taiwan, the PRC has been stockpiling short-range missiles aiming at Taiwan in its southeast coast region since the mid-1990s. The number of short-range missile in the PRC’s arsenal had increased from 200 in 1996 to around 1,000 by 2007, with the majority of them deployed in the Taiwan theatre. With the PRC-ROC relations improving following the election of the ROC President Ma Ying-jeou in May 2008, there have been reports the PRC was considering to withdraw some of its missiles targeted at Taiwan.

The PRC has also been seeking means that could deter the U.S. military forces in time of crisis with Taiwan. In particular, the PRC has been exploring ways of jeopardising the U.S. military command, control, communications, and intelligence (C3I) system so that it would not have to face a direct confrontation with the United States. One example being the anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon test carried out by the PRC in January 2007, demonstrating its ability to attack the U.S. satellites which are key to U.S. military operations.

Last update: 16 February 2009