US Ties Trade Conflict with China to Taiwan

Typical of the militarist actions of the Bush Administration, they have somehow decided that the implicit trade competition with China is one sphere of conflict. When trade talks fail to make progress, the Pentagon sends a threatening message defensive of Taiwan.
In their twisted view of the world, somehow the huge in indebtedness to China must also have some calculation in the process. Perhaps the threat of defaulting on the loans to China has some coercive power. At any rate, the Chinese will certainly take this threat seriously and will also escalate their defensive posture and offensive rhetoric.
washingtonpost.com

In the report, the Defense Department explicitly describes what would happen if China should attack Taiwan, the self-governing democratic island that Beijing claims as its own. It says China does not yet have "the military capability to accomplish with confidence its political objectives on the island, particularly when confronted with the prospect of U.S. intervention."


An attack could severely damage China's economy and lead to international sanctions, spur a Taiwan insurgency that could tie up the Chinese military for years, and possibly cause Beijing to lose its coveted hosting rights for the 2008 Olympics, the report said.


"Finally, China's leaders recognize that a conflict over Taiwan involving the United States would give rise to a long-term hostile relationship between the two nations _ a result that would not be in China's interests," the report said.


[...]The report comes after high-level U.S.-China economic meetings this week failed to reach any breakthrough on the countries' biggest economic dispute: China's currency, which American manufacturers say is undervalued by as much as 40 percent. That makes Chinese products cheaper for Americans and U.S. goods more expensive in China.


The Pentagon report also said the People's Liberation Army has been acquiring better missiles, submarines and aircraft and should more fully explain the purpose of a military buildup that has led some to view China as a threat. It noted, however, that "the PLA remains untested in modern warfare."


Loren Thompson, a defense analyst with the Lexington Institute, said China's military still is relatively modest, despite the country's huge population and booming economy.


"There really isn't much in China's military programs that would lead you to the conclusion that they want to do anything beyond being influential in East Asia," he said.


If the Bush administration were truly worried about the possibility of a Chinese military challenge, he said, it would be rethinking the vibrant trade ties between the countries, which it has yet to do.


"If China was really a threat, would we be moving our factories there at the rate of one a day?" he asked. "During the Cold War, nobody in America ever proposed building television sets or cars in Russia."