United States Secretary of Defense Lloyd believes China won’t be invading Taiwan anytime soon.
He made these remarks at a recent press conference after a meeting between US and Japanese foreign policy and military leaders.
“I won’t second-guess Mr Xi but I will tell you that what we’re seeing recently is some very provocative behavior on the part of China’s forces and their attempt to reestablish a new normal,” Austin said with regards to a China question. “We’ve seen increased activity, aerial activity in the straits, we’ve seen increased surface vessel activity around Taiwan and again, we believe that they endeavor to establish a new normal. But whether or not that means that an invasion is imminent, you know, I seriously doubt that,” he added.
Austin urged China to maintain lines of communication open. “That dialogue is enormously important,” he emphasized.
It’s no secret that US foreign policy decision-makers are trying to conduct a “pivot to Asia”, which will focus on containing China’s rise. The current Russo-Ukrainian conflict has largely delayed this pivot. Nevertheless, the security crisis in Ukraine could serve as an omen of what is to come if the US and its allies in the Collective West try to turn Taiwan into an anti-Chinese bulwark.
In an ideal world, Taiwan would be a fully sovereign nation. However, China treats it as a rogue, breakaway province. As China grows stronger, it will try to assert itself over the island in terms of economic and military influence. This is practically inevitable. If China reaches its full potential, it will undoubtedly maintain escalatory dominance in Taiwan due to its proximity to it and the type of firepower it could deploy to repel a potential western escalation in the area.
Instead of trying to get into a conflict that could result in a nuclear exchange, the US can handle the China question in a much more pragmatic manner. Namely, by pursuing economic decoupling from China and limiting migration from there. Essentially, this is the America First way of addressing this issue.