China keeps reunification agenda alive with pressure on Taiwan

CHINA’s unwavering pressure on Taiwan in the backdrop of its military preparations has increased ambiguity about its intentions. During US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan’s recent visit to Beijing, Chinese Politburo member and Foreign Minister Wang Yi asserted “that Taiwan belongs to China and that China will be reunified”. Reunification with Taiwan is high on Chinese President Xi Jinping’s agenda. Coinciding with Sullivan’s visit, China also showed an aggressive posturing towards Japan and the Philippines — both countries have signed a key defence pact with the US.

Tension across the Taiwan Strait has been rising after the leader of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Lai Ching-te took over as Taiwan's new President. Since then the Chinese authorities have been mounting military and psychological pressure on Taiwan. Beijing has issued sternly worded warnings, accompanied by personal threats, to Lai Ching-te against making statements that Beijing perceives as provocative. Tensions were raised further when Xi told the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to be ready to invade Taiwan by the 100th anniversary of its foundation in 2027. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director William Burns had mentioned in February last year that the US knew ‘as a matter of intelligence’ about Xi’s instruction to the PLA.

A few developments have contributed to the increase in tension. The electoral victory of Taiwan’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) for an unprecedented third time and the election of pro-independence DPP candidate Lai Ching-te as President was a setback for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and personally for Xi. The DPP victory came despite Xi having strengthened the CCP Central Committee’s (CC) United Front Work Department (UFWD) in late 2016, by doubling its budget and personnel strength. CCP cadre Song Tao was also brought out of retirement to head the crucial Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) of the State Council and the CCP CC’s Taiwan Office. According to reports, Song Tao, a close confidant of Xi, has “the deepest knowledge of the DPP” and has had many contacts and communications with his Taiwanese counterpart, Chiu Tai-san.

The UFWD has apparently intensified efforts inside Taiwan. Interactions with Taiwan’s main opposition political party, Kuomintang (KMT), have increased with a KMT delegation visiting China almost every week. KMT leader and former Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou has visited China at least twice and met Xi. China’s official Huaxia Ribao (Overseas Chinese Daily) almost daily reports Taiwanese officials or politicians’ visits to China. Taiwan’s armed forces personnel are also being targeted to win them over or get them to defect.

Ever since former US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in August 2022, China has maintained military and psychological pressure on Taiwan and kept alive the possibility of using the military to effect the reunification. The PLA Eastern Theatre Command has conducted numerous exercises in the Taiwan Strait and, departing from past practice, has now made crossing the median line almost a routine. They have carried out air and sea exercises around Taiwan and on its eastern coast, prompting observers to assess that the Chinese navy is rehearsing for a blockade. Separately, PLA ground forces and marines have carried out amphibious landing and para-drop exercises ostensibly in preparation for an invasion of Taiwan.

There are other indications of the Chinese leadership working to a timetable for the reunification, if necessary, by force. In April, for the first time, the Government Work Report presented by Premier Li Qiang to the National People’s Congress omitted the word ‘peaceful’ while referring to the reunification of Taiwan. At the 16th Straits Forum in Xiamen in June, Wang Huning, Politburo Standing Committee member and Chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, which is responsible for Taiwan’s reunification with Mainland China, also reiterated this.

Speaking at a seminar in Malaysia on May 8, Zhang Weiwei said that reunification had entered the ‘fast track’ and is targeted to be completed by 2027. Zhang, a close associate and supporter of Xi and former English Interpreter to Deng Xiaoping and late Premier Li Peng, is a Professor of International Relations at Fudan University and Director of its China Institute. Interestingly, Zhang was in France for lectures around the time of Xi’s visit and underscored that the Taiwan issue was high on the CCP’s agenda and that reunification would be effected soon. If Xi has returned from his European tour with the feeling that the US is distracted and Europe is preoccupied with the war in Ukraine, it would strengthen his view that China has a window of opportunity to move against Taiwan with minimal possibility of intervention by the West.

Whether China can successfully launch a military invasion of Taiwan is debatable. Nevertheless, Beijing retains the option of a sudden, swift operation to seize at least one or all three small islands of Penghu, Matsu and Kinmen just off China’s coast. Such a limited Chinese action will end before the US or other nations can react and enable Xi to declare he has begun the process of reunification — becoming the first Chinese leader to achieve this. The US will then face the difficult choice of either responding militarily or imposing punitive economic sanctions against China. Enforcing the latter will be difficult as American and European businesses are reluctant to dilute ties with China.

Countries in the region like Japan, Vietnam and India will certainly take a serious note of China’s actions and mull options. It would, nevertheless, be imprudent to disregard the possibility of Xi embarking on such an adventure.