Taiwan President Lai Ching-te met with former U.S. National Security Advisor Matt Pottinger in Taipei on Feb. 17 to discuss strengthening partnerships with the United States in security and building reliable “non-red” supply chains to sustain global democracies’ technological leadership.
A “non-red” supply chain is a supply chain that does not involve countries considered adversarial or high-risk.
Observers have said that former U.S. officials’ recent visits to Taiwan, including Pottinger, are beneficial in strengthening relations between the two countries.
Pottinger, who served as deputy national security adviser during U.S. President Donald Trump’s first term, is a visiting fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution and chairman of the China Program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a bipartisan think tank in Washington. He visited Taiwan with the think tank’s senior director at the Center for Cyber and Technological Innovation, retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery U.S. Navy, and met with Lai Ching-te and Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim at the Presidential Office on Monday.
Lai said that Taiwan hopes to strengthen the Taiwan-U.S. partnership in fields such as security, trade, the economy, and energy. “We will advance cooperation in critical and innovative technologies and jointly build secure and resilient non-red supply chains. This will ensure that Taiwan, the U.S., and democratic partners around the world maintain a technological lead,” he said. In this context, red supply chains refer to the global supply chains dominated by communist China.
Pottinger congratulated Lai on Taiwan’s economic development during his first year as president. He noted that Lai had pledged to allocate an equivalent of over 3 percent of gross domestic product for the national defense budget, which is equal to that of the United States, and that it was a good starting point for both countries to build deterrence.
Shen Ming-Shih, Director of the Division of National Security Research at Taiwan’s Institute for National Defense and Security Research, told The Epoch Times on Feb. 20 that Lai proposed to increase the defense budget through a special budget, which responds to Trump’s expectations.
Trump proposed up to 100 percent tariffs on semiconductors entering the United States on Jan. 27, which will hit Taiwan the hardest as its TSMC dominates the semiconductor manufacturing industry.
Su Tzu-Yun, researcher and director of the Division of Defense Strategy and Resources at Taiwan’s Institute for National Defense and Security Research, told The Epoch Times on Feb. 20 that building “non-red” supply chains will be a direction for future cooperation between Taiwan and the United States, which may help Taiwan bypass the tariff barrier.
“The Trump administration will realize that although Taiwan has a trade surplus of $74 billion from the United States, the supply chains can go in different directions, such as Taiwan purchasing energy from the United States, which will balance the trade surplus and deficit,” he explained.
Although Pottinger has not joined the current Trump administration, “it does not mean that his influence has decreased or that his views are insufficient. It is valuable and meaningful to express Taiwan’s determination to defend itself to the American think tank community by meeting with him and Montgomery,” Shen said.
Meeting Former Trump Officials
Pottinger resigned from the Trump administration after the Jan. 6 Capitol incident in 2021 and later testified at the Congress Jan. 6 hearing.
Pottinger’s visit to Taiwan followed recent visits by Mike Pompeo, who served as President Donald Trump’s secretary of state; Nikki Haley, who served as Trump’s U.S. ambassador to the UN; and Mike Pence, U.S. vice president during Trump’s first term.
Haley and Pence are on Trump’s White House blacklist, while Trump has revoked Pompeo’s security detail.
Taiwanese lawmaker Hsu Chiao-hsin (KMT) expressed concerns that Lai kept meeting U.S. political figures with whom Trump has severed ties, which would cause Taiwan disaster.
Regarding such concerns, Shen said that these former U.S. officials are very supportive of Taiwan, “and they represent the policies and attitudes of the Republican Party in the United States. The more friends we make, the better. We cannot stop interacting with them just because they are not favored by Trump.”
“Moreover, they still have influence on the Republican Party and Congress,” he said. “Politics is temporary, but their support for Taiwan may be permanent. At present, there is no sign that the Trump administration opposes or retaliates against Taiwan because of this. What’s more, they are here to attend a meeting and it’s just a routine visit, so there won’t be a problem,” Shen said.
Restore diplomatic relations with Taiwan?
A few days prior to Pottinger’s visit, the U.S. State Department’s official website deleted a line about not supporting Taiwan independence on Feb. 13. On Feb. 7, 24 U.S. lawmakers introduced a resolution that calls for the abolition of the “outdated, counterproductive and dishonest” One China policy and to restore formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan.
Taiwan, officially called the Republic of China (ROC), is the last territory of the republic established in 1911 in China. The ROC’s nationalist government retreated to Taiwan in 1949 after being defeated by the communists in China’s civil war. The CCP then established a communist regime in mainland China known as the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The CCP has never ruled Taiwan, but it claims sovereignty over the island and has never ruled out annexation of it by force.
Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter severed diplomatic ties with ROC, which had been an ally to the United States for decades, including during World War II, and built official diplomatic relations with the PRC in 1978.
“Deleting the line of not supporting Taiwan independence does not mean supporting Taiwan independence or China’s unification, but rather opening up options for the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to make a choice without the threat of force,” Shen said of the wording change.
After deleting the wording, the U.S. State Department changed the People’s Republic of China to China. “These all indicate that Rubio’s State Department is more in support of Taiwan,” Shen said.
“However, in the short term, the United States will not establish formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan unless the United States totally sever ties with China and must establish an alliance with Taiwan, or the United States uses the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and Taiwan as leverage to pressure China. Otherwise, it will be difficult to achieve,” Shen said.
These changes show that the United States is focusing on dealing with China, Shen said, “and if China retaliates strongly, it may lead to breaking off relations, but at most, it will form a new Cold War confrontation rather than a hot war or long-term conflict between the two sides.” He predicts, “but Trump will find ways to widen the gap with China and suppress the Chinese economy so that it cannot challenge the United States.”
Su shares a similar view. “The U.S. policy is very clear. As Defense Secretary Hegseth said, the CCP is now the main threat. In other words, the entire U.S. policy is turning to letting the European Union and NATO handle the affairs of Europe and Central Asia while the United States is focusing on confronting the CCP. This is the real structural change, which is relatively beneficial to Taiwan,” he said.
