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Seong Hyeon Choi

In the US State Department’s catalogue of priorities for the next five years, Taiwan rates exactly zero mentions.
The department’s Agency Strategic Plan does list peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific as a goal but its top focus after national security is the western hemisphere.
The plan sets out the direction of US foreign policy and foreign assistance between 2026 and 2030 and in doing so, sidesteps the island entirely.
It is a contrast to the White House’s National Security Strategy (NSS) released a month earlier, which said that deterring a conflict over Taiwan, ideally by preserving military overmatch, was a priority for the administration.
Observers said that the decision reflected Washington’s sense of insecurity on Taiwan and the downgrading of the island and the broader region in its priority list.
Like the NSS, the State Department’s plan put the western hemisphere at the top of its concerns.
The NSS formalised the “Trump Corollary” as the US administration’s focus, making it an extension of the Monroe Doctrine that aims to deny “non-hemispheric competitors” influence in the western hemisphere.
The State Department document described this policy as the “Donroe Doctrine” and, unlike the NSS, singled out China as an “extra-hemispheric power” to guard against.
“Our allies [in the western hemisphere] will no longer feel isolated against China or any other extra-hemispheric power, and the United States will remain the region’s partner of choice on the issues that matter most,” the plan said.
But when it came to the Indo-Pacific, the plan focused on Washington’s economic and commercial interests in the region, rather than its security concerns.
Although it mentioned that China had undertaken an “unprecedented military build-up” over the past decade and called for the US to be prepared to counter by establishing a “favourable military balance” in the Indo-Pacific, the stress was on the need to “keep the trade routes free and open” and to “secure vital lanes of commerce” in the region.
Beijing sees Taiwan as part of China to be reunited, by force if necessary. Most countries, including the US, do not recognise self-governed Taiwan as an independent state, but Washington is opposed to any forcible change to the status quo and is legally bound to supply Taipei with weapons for defence.


Benjamin Barton, an associate professor of international relations at the University of Nottingham Malaysia, said it had been “quite confusing” to determine just who the Trump administration was targeting.
Barton said the language in the plan was more about “American insecurities of encirclement, infiltration and even invasion by foreign forces” than having to contend with a direct competitor.
He said this was tied to Washington’s “generally ambiguous” tone on China, saying the White House had “hemmed and hawed” during the second Trump administration as part of rationalising its policy in the western hemisphere.
“Even if Washington wants the world to believe that China is still enemy number one, its actions and the tone of the administration has adopted towards Beijing belie the sentiments of the first Trump administration, when containing China was the only game in town,” Barton said.
“This also reads as a warning shot to all [Community of Latin American and Caribbean States] not to entertain the prospects of any future strategic rapprochement with China – despite China already having a minor strategic presence in Latin America – Europe, and/or any other of American’s foes … at the risk of retribution à la Venezuela.”
Barton noted that the Indo-Pacific had “clearly fallen down the strategic pecking order”, compared to Trump’s first term.
He said that while Taiwan was clearly seen as a “pawn” in the context of the strategic rivalry between Beijing and Washington in the first term, the self-ruled island had not featured anywhere near as much for the Trump administration’s dealings with Beijing in recent years.
“The concept of the Indo-Pacific as a tool with which to contain China has almost vanished from existence. Trump has ostracised many of the US’ friends and allies by strong-arming them through tariffs and subsequently lopsided trade deals,” Barton said.
Marc Lanteigne, a professor of political science at the Arctic University of Norway in Tromso, said there was a “definite focus” within the State Department document on viewing Beijing as more of an “economic competitor than a strategic one”.
“The description of the security situation in the Asia-Pacific is vague at best, with no mention of regional hotspots such as North Korea or the South China Sea, and also no mention of hard security concerns such as nuclear weapons or arms competitions,” Lanteigne said.
“This also suggests that the US is mainly concerned with creating a sphere of influence in the western hemisphere, with less attention paid to other regions like the Asia-Pacific and Europe.”


That concern was evident earlier this month, when Washington abducted former Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro in a military operation to face charges in the US related to narcoterrorism.
After that, the Trump administration doubled down on its ambition to expand the scope of military actions across the western hemisphere, with an attempt to acquire Greenland.
Citing the expansion of Chinese and Russian military influence in the Arctic, Trump said the US needed to acquire Greenland to protect American national security. He threatened tariffs and even hinted at the use of force to realise the acquisition, only to say on Wednesday that he had dropped the plan in favour of a “framework” for a potential agreement covering Greenland and the Arctic.
Lanteigne said Washington’s overall goal now appeared to be placing a “keep out” sign in the western hemisphere and developing stronger American hegemony in the area, but the US had yet to develop a coherent economic strategy for developing trade in the region, and its ongoing use of punitive tariffs had “undoubtedly created distrust in American foreign policy motives”.
“This may ironically allow Beijing to present itself as a more stable and reliable alternative economic partner,” Lanteigne said.
“Ongoing threats to annex Greenland are supposedly based on the immanent threat of ‘Russia and China boats’ nearby, which do not exist. Nonetheless, this stance reflects the wider narrative of the Americas being under constant threat which only the US can address.”
Barton said that although China did have a growing presence in the Arctic region, it was “of little strategic significance and/or threat to American security and is far less prominent, in any case, than America’s own power projection capabilities”.
“China is a convenient go-to rationalisation for the Trump administration but name-dropping China only really serves to mask the administration’s more cynical and backhanded intentions regarding Venezuela, Greenland and the Panama Canal,” he said.


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The State Department skips direct references to the island as it outlines it foreign policy direction for the next five years


The State Department skips direct references to the island as it outlines it foreign policy direction for the next five years.


What about Taiwan? Why US foreign policy is now all about the western hemisphere

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}The State Department skips direct references to the island as it outlines it foreign policy direction for the next five years

The State Department skips direct references to the island as it outlines it foreign policy direction for the next five years