The People’s Liberation Army flew 34 aircraft near Taiwan on Tuesday and Wednesday. Twenty of them crossed the “median line,” the de facto border running down the Taiwan Strait between China and Taiwan.
The Chinese military also sent nine vessels near Taiwan, the island republic that Beijing claims as its own.
Yes, Beijing is unhappy that House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, fulfilling a promise he made while running for the post, is planning to visit Taipei.
Global Times, often used by the Chinese regime to issue threats it does not want to make officially, suggested “setting up exclusion zones that prevent McCarthy from landing.”
China’s regime routinely makes threats over Americans planning to visit Taiwan.
There was concern that Beijing would try to block Pelosi’s plane, but she landed in Taipei without incident the following month. The United States let the threat to assassinate her—and Biden—slide then, so the Chinese felt free to make a similar threat against McCarthy now.
It’s unlikely that Beijing by words alone will be able to intimidate McCarthy into not going to Taiwan, but it is almost certain Chinese officials will work on Biden. He was, after all, the weak link in the controversy in the run up to Pelosi’s visit.
Infamously, he tried to prevent Pelosi from going. His administration from all accounts leaked plans of her trip, thereby putting the visit in play.
This comment apparently convinced Chinese officials to turn up the heat because they could see Biden was wavering. The president’s words, unfortunately, emboldened the worst elements in the Chinese political system. It is no surprise then that Xi, during the July 28 phone call, thought he could threaten Biden’s and Pelosi’s lives.
So what should we look out for this time, now that the Chinese are manufacturing another crisis over a speaker’s trip?
“Beijing will be watching very closely for daylight between the White House and Speaker McCarthy for them to exploit, as was the case with Speaker Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan last year,” Steve Yates, chair of the China Policy Initiative at the America First Policy Institute, told me. “The White House was seen as urging Pelosi to postpone, minimize, or cancel her visit. Beijing uses division and confusion like this as part of its political warfare against Taiwan, undermining confidence that friends will stand with them against the world’s largest bully.”
Maybe Biden administration machinations no longer matter. Nancy Pelosi, as Yates correctly says, should have gone to Taiwan earlier in her tenure as speaker, but she has now made it difficult for her successors not to go, especially considering the change in American views of China.
The senator is right. Every member of Congress should go. And so should every president of the United States.
Biden, by making himself and America look weak on Taiwan last year, can remedy that mistake by taking a trip of his own to Taipei now. If nothing else, a presidential visit will show Beijing that not only are speakers unafraid of China but that the president of the United States is not afraid either.
