Taiwan – a Convenient Pawn?

 Off late strategic foreign relationship thinkers in India are lobbying hard for establishing formal relationship with Taiwan to counter the assertive China. To understand how Taiwan acts as a counter balance to China we have to go back to history.

It all started in 19th century in China, decline of Qing dynasty and birth of personalities who were going to shape its future for generation to come - Sun Yat-Sen, Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong. Taiwan till then was part of China. Two parallel events happened during this period - annexation of Taiwan by Japan and formation of Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP) also known as Kuomintang (KMT), which like the Congress party in India, became an umbrella party for people of various ideologies, by Sun Yat-Sen. Under this party the Republic of China (ROC) was formed with Sun Yat-Sen as its leader. After death of Sun Yat-Sen the mantle was passed on to one of his favorite Chiang Kai-shek. However, by then fracture in the KMT was becoming visible as the Communist faction under Mao started to rebel against Chiang. Second World War (WWII) also started meantime and Republic of China Under Chiang supported the Allied force to fight against Japan. With the end of WWII, Japan had to handover Taiwan back to China.

Meantime, civil war had started and Mao became more assertive to bring down Chiang. Chiang with his followers fled from Mainland China and settled in Taiwan, where is established his China’s government in exile.  By then, Communists under Mao had completed its domination over mainland China and formed People Republic of China (PRC). KMT under Chiang in Taiwan aspired for taking over Mainland China and “purge” it from Communists.

West recognized ROC for its role in WWII. Moreover, since PRC was under communist alliance with it was not possible as it was time of Cold War. Infact, ROC was initial signatories of United Nation. However, as it is popularly believed in diplomacy - there is never a full-stops between nations, there can be comma or semi-colons - allies started to recognize mainland China due to its highly competitive labor force which made it ideal for opening up offshore manufacturing units for companies all over the world. Thus 1970s, with opening up of China’s economy and access to the world, meteoric economic rise began and Taiwan had to bear the cost. In UN, ROC was replaced with PRC and this cascaded to all other world bodies. China forced countries who wanted to establish relationship with it, must recognize Taiwan as its part.

KMT still aspired, which now seems to be a mere wishful thing, to take over mainland China. In 1990s there was rise of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in Taiwan which ideologically took a more pragmatic stand. It considered Taiwan and mainland China as separate nations. Current President of Taiwan – Tsai Ing-wen is from DPP and is staunch proponent of independent Taiwan identity, which mainland China cannot accept.

With the above as the background we can well understand why again reestablishment of ties with Taiwan is gaining ground, which was conveniently severed off.  Now, time will tell if Taiwan is mere a Pawn of world power or this traction is for real.