Xi Jinping says Taiwan “must and will be” reunited with China | Hacker News Reader

Xi Jinping says Taiwan “must and will be” reunited with China

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The "our government represents ALL of China" that both the PRC and ROC gov'ts proclaimed is/was a mistake. China and Taiwan are in practice and reality now two countries, and the people in each don't benefit from the saber rattling.

It would be the same as North or South Korea being the only "Korea" recognized by other governments or UN.

Taiwan isn’t a member of the UN and is officially recognized by only 16 countries as the most fear pissing off China.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_relations_of_Taiwan

They lost their UN seat in 1971 and haven’t been able to regain it since.

With China’s influence especially in Africa and the Middle East growing there is less and less chance of Taiwan being recognized as an independent country without a global conflict or a massive political shift in China.

"our government represents ALL of China" and Tibet, Xinjang, Mongolia, Taiwan and HK. China proper isn't such a large country after all.

For centuries China had been expanding and overraching and then collapsing and shrinking. Perhaps we are observing Peak China again?

I used to believe China could easily swallow Taiwan in military conflict, but the actual numbers are surprising considering their relative landmasses. Taiwan is not such an easy target to overthrow, and I doubt they'd lay down without a fight.

I found this article to be particularly enlightening:

https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/09/25/taiwan-can-win-a-war-wi...

Tangent: 'lay' is transitive and requires an object e.g. 'lay themselves down'

Otherwise use intransitive 'lie' e.g. lie down without a fight.

Thanks, IntelliSense!

/s of course, I actually learned from the parent comment lol

Assuming it's a traditional war. They might be able to create the right conditions for Taiwan to request annexation.

There are a lot of mainland Chinese in Taiwan and probably a lot of PRC supporters, some sort of coup, insurrection or civil war could be possible.

It's also possible for China to cripple Taiwan economically, take out some power stations and maybe other infrastructure and their industry collapses. This could even be done by foreign agents, they might not have to fire a shot directly.

Then there's the various cyber-warfare possibilities.

Sounds like empty rhetoric to distract the population from economic slowdown, trade war with US and general negative sentiments related to China both internally and externally.

On the other hand, most armed conflicts are preceded by rhetoric of some kind.

Taiwan has some leading tech companies, most notably TSMC who fabricate a huge portion of all ICs (chips) in the world. China has been investing a lot in building up it's own fabs, with some success - but still well behind TSMC. I wonder is part of this goal to take a strangle-hold on the world's technology manufacturing?

Yes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Made_in_China_2025

Helped along by consulting from McKinsey, of course.

Right. Chinese policy regarding Taiwan hasn’t changed then. Not really news.

The assertion of a call to action raises tensions and is certainly news.

I fear for the free people of Taiwan.

Never a dull moment to talk about the twilight zone that is Greater China

I would be happy to have Taiwan rule China.

>>I would be happy to have Taiwan rule China.

So convince the Chinese in mainland China and we can solve this without a shot being fired. Boeing etc will profit from this but Taiwan isn't going anywhere. Eventually a pro-China party will win and via...

I wonder if USA has a way to brick the weapons we sold /are /will be selling to Taiwan if China takes over? No doubt Chinese spies are in all branches of Taiwan politics and military.

Pro-Bejing parties are now the majority of the legislative in Hong Kong. It's only a matter of time before the same happens in Taiwan and they fall under the S.A.R system.

The fact that the KMT are considered China-friendly is hilarious considering the history of the Republic of China.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-taiwan-politics/taiwan-re...

Does anyone know the background here. Why is it that the Chinese government or people want to rule Taiwan as much as they appear to?

Here's the really long background info:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Civil_War

ROC (Taiwan) is the defacto legitimate government of China. They were defeated in war by communist forces and fled to Taiwan. At the time (1949-onward), America acknowledged ROC as the legitimate government of China, but only intervened to protect them in the Taiwan strait. You can simply read more detail on Wikipedia, etc(1). Then after Mao won control of China, he went on to oversee arguably the manslaughter and murder of more people than any other tyrant in history.

1-https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republic_of_China_retreat_to...

> ROC (Taiwan) is the defacto legitimate government of China. They were defeated in war by communist forces and fled to Taiwan.

They were defeated, and yet still considered the "defacto legitimate government of China"? How does that work? I would think very few people consider the ROC the "legitimate" government of Mainland China.

> America acknowledged ROC as the legitimate government of China

Why is this relevant?

I'm just stating what the historical facts are. Even the UN charter still to this day lists ROC as the legitimate government of China, but in the 70s they started letting the PRC sit in that seat.

> They were defeated, and yet still considered the "defacto legitimate government of China"? How does that work? I would think very few people consider the ROC the "legitimate" government of Mainland China.

They weren't totally defeated, but retreated to a "rump state" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rump_state) that still exists as an independent entity. Many countries, especially in the middle of the 20th century, would have preferred that government regain control of China from the Communists.

For an even more extreme example where that actually happened, look at the Baltic states. Their annexation by the Soviets was never recognized by many non-Communists states, and eventually their states re-established independence in a way that's generally considered continuous with their per-annexation states. They didn't even have the benefit of having rump states during the Cold War.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estonian_government-in-exile

> However, the Estonian government in exile did serve to carry the continuity of the Estonian state forward. The last prime minister in the duties of the president, Heinrich Mark, ended the work of the government in exile when he handed over his credentials to the incoming President Lennart Meri on October 8, 1992. Meri issued a statement thanking the Estonian government in exile for being the keepers of the legal continuity of the Estonian state.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estonian_Diplomatic_Service_(1...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baltic_Legations_(1940%E2%80%9...

I think you mean de jure. A mainland Chinese would not go to Taiwanese courts or abide by Taiwanese law, so you cannot say that most living in Qing China's imperial borders recognize the legitimacy of TW's govt.

Internationally, more countries abide by the PRC's One China policy than exclusively recognize TW, so it does not have international de facto legitimacy as well.

De jure... well, that would still be arbitrary. Go further back and one might consider the hereditary Qing successors to be the legitimate rulers. Or you might consider legitimacy to be conferred by the Mandate of Heaven, and by that reasoning China has never been more prosperous than the present in absolute terms, so then the PRC holds legitimacy.

Dejure is indeed a better-suited term than defacto. My mistake.

I was just trying to tell the history and articulate what happened. The meaning I intended was that the world and the US were allied with and recognized ROC. It is a case of "might makes right" where no court or treaty ever agreed to pass control, only war did.

It is in the culture of chinese to unify everything under its culture. It is a culture empire by nature. Before accepting the reality, Taiwan claim the whole china and in fact sort of still do they sort of still do to southern china sea.

There is nothing in chinese culture allow difference. Harmony is all under one rule only. No federalism. International approach to culture ... we will not see but one day if it is it will try to take on all culture barbarians. There is nothing but to keep all non-barbarian within the Great Wall. Even if it is e-Great Wall.

Globally one might say we should consider a model for one extra powerful (strong or big country as chinese woukdvput it) group. One may say just like America, Eu, Russia, Arabs ... that might be just worry of japan, Taiwan, Korea, Vietnam, ... past culture colony of china should be worry.

but given its one belt one road and the china of china taken of Africa, I am afraid it is much worst.

We are not talking about a country that respect humanity basic rights. Check out the 7 we do not talk about you know what is in store for the world or at least within.

Good luck to us. Hope it all fail. But prepare for the worst.

Not sure how strong support of us on Taiwan (and HONG kong) even though both has an American act to sort of protect their different level of independence. Good luck.

Maybe you can check this observation of mine but it appears that ethnically Chinese (Han) people seem to often equate criticisms on Mainland China poitics as being synonymous with attacks of ethnic Chinese people. It is very normal to see criticisms of China met with objections from Chinese people who are Singaporean or from the EU.

It also seems to me that Taiwan and Hong Kong are sitting at a place where they feel they are ethnically/culturally connected but don't want the political aspects of being a part of the mainland. On the other hand, people from the mainland (or connected to the mainland) seem to view those as the same things.

It'll happen eventually, and likely without force. Taiwan (like HK) enjoyed relative economic success versus China because of their ties with the west, beneficial strategic location and relatively small population. Now that China's an economic superpower, still growing and liberalizing (albeit slowly), theres less reasons for Taiwan to oppose reunification. I doubt it'll happen in the next decade, but it likely will within 50 years.

I don’t know much about Chinese people’s mindsets, but keep in mind that the Scottish and UK independence referendums were split about 50/50. Scotland is 5 million people, the UK is 65 million. A Taiwan/China unification makes as much sense to me as Canada merging with the United States.

Canada is ideologically quite separate from the US. Our histories diverged quite early, and we have fundamentally different ideas concerning governance. Linguistically and ethnically there's differences too.

China and Taiwan both believe in only one China, and both believe in reunification, albeit with differing ideas on how to accomplish it (Taiwan still calls itself the Republic of China).

I am not even sure you really meant it or you are trolling, but if you really believe what you wrote, I suggest you read up more about Hong Kong and Taiwan past and current status.

>theres less reasons for Taiwan to oppose reunification

What? Nothing you said in the previous sentence make any sense for reason of unification .

Much of the reason HK and Taiwan were so fiercely independent is because they enjoyed far higher living standards than mainland Chinese. The more successful China is, the more likely Taiwan is to join them.

Keep in mind that Taiwan, like China, ideologically believe in one China. When it's more advantageous for them to join China than to be a US satellite state, they will.

Taiwan doesn't believe in One China. That notion is intrinsically nonsensical. It's a bunch of people, with different beliefs.

They literally call themselves the Republic of China...

There were called that when they were a dictatorship, too.

Yes, and Mainland China has been threatening with military action if they would simply call the country Taiwan.

So yes your point was...?

> Taiwan doesn't believe in One China.

There is a reason that the area currently effectively governed by the Republic of China has been referred by the RoC government as the “free area of the Republic of China”, and it's not a lack of belief in the idea of one China.

That said, there is disagreement among RoC political parties on this issue, and some of the public positioning is influenced by PRC reactions, since the PRC (despite not ruling out force to reintegrate the whole area governed by the ROC in any case) seems less likely to wage war in the near term over the current dispute over who governs one China (which it seems implausible for the RoC to win) than Taiwanese independence (which is more plausible, and thus a bigger threat.)

Taiwan is not a sentient being, so it's incapable of holding a belief.

i think you missed news arbor Xi being elected if you think China is liberalizing, it was until Xitler was elected, then all went down the drain and China it's becoming more NoKo 2.0

One country, two systems - so the same as Hong Kong?

Not remotely. Hong Kong was only leased from China.

Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula were ceded in perpetuity by the Qing Dynasty to the British Crown. It was only the New Territories that were leased, for 99 years beginning in 1898.

However, it was agreed under the Sino-British Joint Declaration in 1984 to return all of Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty upon expiration of the New Territories lease on July 1, 1997.

what ifs...would have China eventually attacked Hong Kong, like Argentina did to Falklands Islands?

NATO doesn't cover faraway islands...

The parts of Hong Kong that were owned, and not leased, have basically no infrastructure to support people's lives. Hong Kong Island and Kowloon are basicslly residential and commercial only - there is no agriculture and the majority of the water and electricity comes from China and the New Territories.

My point was that "one country, two systems" is disingenuous rhetoric that has been used before by the Chinese government.

It is intended to be a precursor to takeover and an eventual crackdown on the liberties of the citizenry.

You gotta figure if the Chinese Politburo handicaps each US president on the odds of no US military response to a forceful re-unification attempt Trump is definitely going to be their horse.

Happy New Year, cross your fingers 2019 doesn't go down in history books as the start of World War 3 :)

Can’t think of any recent US President that would start a war with China over Taiwan. China will take Taiwan when it feels like it.

A US President will be unlikely to (voluntarily) start a war with China directly, but the US and Taiwan stand to mutually benefit from the US beefing up its military aid to Taiwan (the US because Taiwan is a massive allied economy that's enough of a threat to China for China to want to assert control, and Taiwan because they probably don't want to be steamrolled by a dictatorship).

I disagree. Letting the xijinping-dictatorship take over a democratic country would open the door for any and all further Asian invasions. The best chance to show all Hans that freedom can be won is on Taiwan.

I don't see how a War could happen between two Nations that has Nukes. Do they agree on not to use Nuke before the war?

There won't ever be a World War 3, if there is the next one might very well be the end of human civilisation.

Most nations have adopted a "no first use" doctrine, a promise not to use nukes until their enemy does. The only nuclear powers not to adopt this are the US and north Korea.

Is there a "Berlin Wall" between Taiwan and China?

70 miles of strait?

doesn't it seem to be more effective than a wall actually?

We will soon notice whether the populist West will support government with the consent of the governed or stand by while Taiwan is thrown under the bus.

The history of Crimea indicates that Taiwan's only hope is to aggresively apply violence as necessary for its independence.

If America has any earnest, genuine interest in all their wars abroad for freedom and democracy they must continue defense aid to Taiwan.

China's exports are about to surpass the US's. Its growing influence and capability stand in the face of an America that seems determined to tear itself apart rather than be united in the cause of leading the world with virtue of liberty and human rights

> The history of Crimea indicates that Taiwan's only hope is to aggressively apply violence as necessary for its independence.

That's the first thing I thought as well. They watched very closely what happened in Crimea. The timeline also aligns in that Crimea was transferred to the Ukrainian Soviet Republic in 1954, about when Taiwan had split as well.

What would other countries do if say Chinese soldiers wearing no insignia decide to go on "vacation" to Taiwan all of the sudden.

> We will soon notice whether the populist West will support government with the consent of the governed or stand by while Taiwan is thrown under the bus.

That's unfair, I think. There's a huge gap between "I don't agree with what's happening" and "I'm willing to risk nuclear war defending this cause".

But the west didn't just agree to risk nuclear war defending Crimea, the west actually agreed to cause nuclear war to defend Crimea, if necessary:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum_on_Securit...

Hell, Russia went as far as to actually raise the issue in the UN general assembly that the west hasn't lived up to it's obligations under that treaty.

So not only has the west proved it won't defend anyone, it has shown no diplomatic assurances of western states (or at least of the US, UK, France and China, and of course of the United Nations) are of any value whatsoever to smaller countries.

The only open tactic remaining is for all states that fear territorial annexation is to develop first strike capability with nuclear weapons. If you don't have that, you're at the mercy of Russia, and frankly, China and any western country. If one of them decides to attack, no help will be forthcoming, not even a UN security council protest.

All the comments here forget one very basic thing: if you aren't willing to serve in a war with China, you don't recognize Taiwan sovereignty. It doesn't take 2 countries to go to war, after all, it only takes one, and China is.

> But the west didn't just agree to risk nuclear war defending Crimea, the west actually agreed to cause nuclear war to defend Crimea, if necessary:

No, it didn't; the only thing Western powers (as well as Russia!) promised (per your own source) to do to defend the territorial integrity of Ukraine was “Seek immediate United Nations Security Council action”. Which the Western Powers did (Russia, of course, vetoed the action supported by 13 of 15 UNSC members.)

They did not promise to use military force, much less nuclear arms—especially not outside of the context of UN action—in the event of an attack.

Now, admittedly, given that any problem any of states protected by the Budapest Memorandum would face would almost certainly also involve a deadlock between permanent UNSC members who were signatories of the agreements, it should probably have been an obvious critical defect that there was no fallback position besides mutual consultation in the event of UNSC deadlock; particularly, the protected states could have demanded that the guaranteeing states each individually committed also to seek UNGA action under the Uniting for Peace (A/RES/377A) umbrella in the event of UNSC deadlock.

> Hell, Russia went as far as to actually raise the issue in the UN general assembly that the west hasn't lived up to it's obligations under that treaty.

Different obligations than the (weak tea) defensive one.

Xi should consider the effect of vastly reduced foreign trade after an attempt to take Taiwan by force.

All of my responses got what seems like an equal number of downvotes (4) sometime in the last hour, and this thread got ejected from the front page well over an hour before this happened.

Smells like the product of small little online brigaide.

-4 is the lower limit that a comment can be downvoted to, so the fact that they're all the same isn't particularly telling.

They were all positive, and each reduced by 4 points. Currently the lowest sits at -1.

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