The Taiwan Relations Act in era of clarity

ON SATURDAY LAST week, vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴), Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Chen Kuan-ting (陳冠廷) and other international strategy experts took part in a forum organized by the Formosa Republican Association to mark the 45th anniversary of the US’ Taiwan Relations Act (TRA).

Forums related to the TRA have generally involved more reminiscences than visions, as Taiwan was for a long time stuck in the rut of strategic ambiguity.

However there was a completely different climate at this forum, as could be seen from Hsiao’s and Chen’s remarks, and the evidence presented by experts and academics.

The new climate has emerged because of the changes in the international strategic situation. The world has entered the age of strategic clarity.

As international relations expert and regular On Taiwan columnist Guermantes Lailari said at the forum, the very title of the TRA made it clear from the outset that Taiwan is Taiwan. The US sought to ally itself with China against the Soviet Union during the Cold War and to join hands with China to fight terrorism during the War on Terror, and only for these reasons was it temporarily inconvenient to openly offend China.

That is why the US repeatedly said that it “acknowledges” that China defines Taiwan as one of its provinces, but Washington has never agreed with or recognized such a claim.

Now that the age of strategic clarity has started, US support for Taiwan is becoming ever clearer. It has in repeated public statements emphasized that Taiwan is Taiwan and changes of regime in China have nothing to do with Taiwan.

Miles Yu (余茂春), who served as China policy adviser to former US secretary of state Mike Pompeo in former US president Donald Trump’s administration, presented a pre-recorded talk at the forum in which he said that some details of the TRA are still less than ideal.

For example, the region to which it applies only includes Taiwan proper and the Penghu archipelago, which the TRA calls the Pescadores, but Yu said that it should include Kinmen and Lienchiang counties off the coast of China’s Fujian Province, as well as Pratas Island (Dongsha Island, 東沙島) and Itu Aba Island (Taiping Island, 太平島) in the South China Sea. Also, the TRA talks about “the people on Taiwan,” which would include any foreign tourist who sets foot in the nation, so this should be corrected to “Taiwanese.”

Regarding these two loopholes in the TRA, as well as other experts’ suggestions that the TRA could go further than it does, the government and public should work hand in hand to have closer interactions with the US Congress and urge it to make amendments that improve the TRA.

Another thing to aim for is for not just the US, but also at least the world’s most important countries to have their own versions of a TRA. This idea is no flight of fancy given that the newly established Conservative Party of Japan, which has a former mayor of Sendai as one of its advisers, has as one of its main demands that Japan should enact its own version of the TRA.

The government and public can march separately and strike together to establish contact with Taiwan-friendly parties and politicians in the world’s most important countries, and ask them to promote the enactment of their own TRAs.

If the US, Japan, the UK, Australia, Canada, Germany, France, Spain, Italy and Switzerland all had TRAs, they would be obliged to obey the law, providing greater safeguards for Taiwan’s security and boosting the nation’s progress toward being a normal country.

Tommy Lin is president of the Formosa Republican Association and the Taiwan United Nations Alliance.