US tours help firm impressions of Taiwan presidential contenders

DPP, KMT and TPP candidates have visited the US in recent weeks, meeting informally with foreign policy makers and officials

DPP’s William Lai played down his independence rhetoric while KMT’s Hou played up support for a strong military, analysts say

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Robert Delaney,Amber Wangin WashingtonandLawrence Chungin Taipei

Published: 6:00am, 23 Oct 2023Updated: 7:03am, 23 Oct 2023

Three months before Taiwan’s presidential election, the main contenders have mostly wrapped up efforts to garner support in Washington, and, analysts say, managed to convince policymakers that they do not seek to cross any red lines set by the US or Chinese governments.

With military tensions in the Taiwan Strait and around the island reaching unprecedented levels, their audiences were mostly looking for assurances from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate that he would not declare independence; from the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) candidate, they wanted to know that he would not work to appease Beijing.

The election to succeed President Tsai Ing-wen on January 13 looms as the frequency and scope of military operations in the area have grown, with the People’s Liberation Army assuming a “worrisome” posture towards Taiwan, noted Danny Russel, vice-president for international security and diplomacy at the Asia Society Policy Institute.

“Beijing’s rhetoric about Taiwan and unification is vastly more assertive and worrisome,” Russel said. “The PLA’s behaviour is breaking norms and magnifying risk to a degree that we haven’t seen before”.

Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen’s second and final term ends next year. Photo: EPA-EFE

Russel, the top US diplomat for Asia during the Barack Obama administration, said he did not believe that the messages that reached the ears of relevant people in the administration were alarming. “I think that they were well designed to be reassuring.”

Beijing considers Taiwan a rogue province, to be eventually united with the mainland, by force if necessary. The United States switched diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979, and ever since, like most other countries, does not consider the self-governing island an independent state.