China should stay calm if Trump makes any sudden last moves, analysts say
- The US president could take further action on Taiwan to antagonise Beijing as the clock counts down to Biden’s inauguration
- But Beijing is unlikely to want retaliation to mar the start of relations with the new US administration, observer says
But tensions between the Trump administration and Beijing have continued to flare, with the US threatening to impose new sanctions on Hong Kong and mainland China over the arrest of more than 50 opposition politicians in a dawn raid last week.
And on Monday, the New York Stock Exchange will delist US-traded shares of China Telecom, China Mobile and China Unicom to comply with an executive order signed by Trump.
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Trump is also sending US ambassador to the United Nations Kelly Craft on a visit to Taiwan next week. Beijing, which claims the self-ruled island as its own territory, accused the US of “playing with fire” and said it “will pay a heavy price for its wrong action”.
Nevertheless, Chinese analysts said, Trump could still take further action to anger Beijing.
Yu Wanli, a senior fellow at the Charhar Institute, a Chinese think tank, said Trump could make another move in relation to Taiwan if he was determined to act.
“He might send someone else to visit Taiwan because he doesn’t need to mobilise a lot of resources to do it. If he does so, there won’t be any substantial consequences, but it will greatly embarrass China,” Yu said.
Victor Gao, vice-president of the Beijing-based think tank Centre for China and Globalisation, agreed that action on Taiwan was the most likely of Trump’s options.
“[Trump] might decide to do even more crazy things over Taiwan, for example, he might decide to dispatch more senior government officials to visit Taiwan,” Gao said.
“He might order some US military aircraft or ships to stop in Taiwan. He might invite more higher-level American officials to visit Taiwan, or as [has] been speculated, he himself may even make a surprise visit to Taipei,” Gao said.
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However, a Chinese academic who declined to be named because of political sensitivity, said that even if more senior officials were sent to Taiwan, Beijing would not want to take action that would hamper efforts to reboot relations with the upcoming US administration.
“China will surely not retaliate apart from trading words, unless it gets to an unacceptable level,” he said.
“For example, I do not see what serious retaliation China will carry out in response to the US ambassador to the UN visiting Taiwan. China knows clearly that Trump is just trying to do as much as possible to ruin Sino-US relations and to hurt China’s position in his final days.
“But China is not so dumb as to make retaliation the first move ... with Biden’s government.
“China can bear to wait a bit longer for Trump to get out of the picture.”
Gao also said that despite China being upset by Trump’s moves in the past, “China doesn’t need to do anything excessively right now, we just need to bide our time”.
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However, Ren Xiao, director of the Centre for Chinese Foreign Policy at Shanghai’s Fudan University, said Beijing would not back down if Trump’s moves threatened core interests, a common reference to Beijing’s sovereignty over Taiwan.
“Of course there are worries about Trump’s unpredictable and crazy actions in this time,” Ren said.
“But now with just around 10 days left ... Trump should be rather busy dealing with domestic politics.
“There should not be too much room for crazy action. I don’t think China needs to be too worried.”
