Zheng Yongnian on U.S "Imagination" of the Taiwan Issue, Calling for Mainland China to Maintain Strategic Patience
Prominent Chinese Political Scientist Reveals Four U.S. Self-Influenced Narratives on Taiwan
Following Lai's inauguration, the United States Department of State congratulated Taiwan. In response, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs promptly lodged a solemn representation with the United States government. Spokesperson Wang Wenbin said
“The US actions seriously violate the one-China principle and the three China-US joint communiqués. They severely breach the US's political commitment to maintain only cultural, commercial, and other unofficial relations with the Taiwan region. These actions send a gravely wrong signal to the "Taiwan independence" separatist forces.“
Professor Zheng Yongnian, a Chinese political scientist at the Chinese
University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, has also written several blogs on this issue.
from CCG translated one of Zheng’s posts focusing on cross-strait relations in his newsletter Pekingnology.
The one I bring today was written before the inauguration, named “America's Taiwan Imagination and Taiwan Fear.” Zheng Yongnian believes that the U.S. is engaging in large-scale cognitive warfare over the Taiwan issue.
Since the onset of the war in Ukraine, the U.S. has started to believe that mainland China might undertake similar actions against Taiwan. Then, it started shaping and spreading such a perception to the world: that the mainland would solve the Taiwan issue by force in 2027, and if mainland China's plan cannot be stopped, then Taiwan will be the next Ukraine.
Furthermore, the US started to sanctify Taiwan and shape Taiwan from all aspects as if it were the "lifeblood" of the entire “West.” Different from narratives like “undetermined status of Taiwan." This new cognitive warfare is mainly targeted at the United States and the Western camp, with the aim of uniting the Western camp to target China collectively.
He believes that there are four levels of imagination that compose this new self-influenced cognitive warfare; they are
The imagination of Taiwan as an "independent country."
Geopolitical Imagination: Imagine Taiwan as the pillar of Japan's defense and a springboard to prevent mainland China from threatening U.S. allies in the Indo-Pacific.
Democratic imagination: which believes once mainland China solves the Taiwan issue, a China-centric "illiberalism" may replace the U.S.-led liberal system.
Economic Imagination: Highlighting Taiwan's high-tech electronic chip production capabilities, believes that once mainland China "controls" Taiwan, if Taiwan's chip factories remain intact and continue to operate, then China will "control" the supply of almost all the world's most advanced semiconductors.
He suggested that mainland China, on the one hand, needs to fight back against the US cognitive war because the cognitive war conducted by the US is based on the imagination of Taiwan and is extremely deceptive to the US itself, Taiwan, US allies, and the world. On the other hand, it needs sufficient strategic composure to avoid being disturbed by the US cognitive war. For the mainland, it needs to demonstrate strategic composure towards the United States and strategic patience on the Taiwan issue and advance the process of national reunification according to its own established strategy.
Below, I have attached the translation of the article:
The US Imagination and Fear of Taiwan
01 The Taiwan issue is the core of US-China relations
The Taiwan issue has always been the core issue in US-China relations and constitutes the main axis of the development of US-China relations. Although the Taiwan issue is not the whole of US-China relations, if the Taiwan issue is not handled well, the two countries will quickly lose the basis for interaction. This is not difficult to understand. For mainland China, Taiwan is a question of China's sovereignty, and there is no room for compromise or concession on this issue. For the United States, as China continues to rise, when no force can contain and encircle China, Taiwan has become the only effective "tool" against China.
Although US-China relations have entered a mode of "free fall" since the Trump administration - deteriorating in all aspects, China has demonstrated its resilience in all aspects.
In terms of economy and trade, Trump started "hard decoupling" with tariff policies, damaging China's interests while also damaging US interests. Biden inherited Trump's economic and trade policies, and in many ways went even further. Although the Biden administration also uses the concept of "de-risking" after the EU replaced "decoupling" with "de-risking," for Biden, "de-risking" is "soft decoupling," and the ultimate purpose of containing and suppressing China has not changed in the slightest. In fact, the Biden administration has developed a strategy called "strategic decoupling," which aims to strangle China's development in key technology areas. Biden's claim to impose a 100% tariff on China's new energy products is part of this trend. In geopolitics, the United States has built or is building at least seven multilateral alliances around China, intending to contain China geopolitically (see the article "The Probability of War and the Hope of Peace" for details). In the ideological field, Biden defined US-China relations as a relationship between "American democracy" and "Chinese authoritarianism" as soon as he came into office, and convened the so-called annual "Democracy Summit" to shape China as the "opposite" of Western democracy on a global scale.
However, despite the fact that the United States has invested a great deal of human, financial and material resources in all these areas, it has not only failed to make China submit, but has also had the opposite effect in many areas. How to deal with a China with great resilience remains a key issue for US strategic departments to consider.
Since the Trump administration, there have been several rounds of major confrontations between China and the United States on the Taiwan issue. Various political forces in the United States have been escalating the Taiwan issue and frequently and bottomlessly touching the red line of mainland China. This has led to mainland China having to "fight back," resulting in a situation of "mutual fighting" between China and the United States: the United States promotes Taiwan's "independence" in a "salami-slicing" manner, causing mainland China to advance national reunification in the same way. For the United States, this is not worth the gain. Therefore, the U.S. administration has become relatively more "rational" and does not want to adopt an overly aggressive policy on the Taiwan issue to cause direct confrontation between China and the United States, let alone lead to open conflict. Biden needs to consider many factors, including the general election, the Russia-Ukraine war, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, etc. At least at this stage, the United States does not yet have the energy and ability to directly conflict with China on the Taiwan issue. This is the reason why the Biden administration has repeatedly set up "guardrails" in US-China relations.
02 The means by which the United States fights the cognitive war on the Taiwan issue
However, from any perspective, this kind of "rationality" of the United States is an expedient measure. In fact, since the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war, the United States has been intensifying its cognitive war against mainland China on the Taiwan issue worldwide. The U.S. cognitive warfare in the Russia-Ukraine war has been very successful, and the U.S. wants to transplant these successful experiences to the Taiwan issue.
Although people all know that the United States is waging a cognitive war on the Taiwan issue, few people know what type of cognitive war the United States is waging and the impact of its various forms of cognitive warfare on the national reunification of mainland China.
In academia, cognitive warfare is generally seen as a means of creating conflict by combining multi-domain technologies, with the goal of influencing the way individuals, groups or nations think about a particular issue, event or situation. The purpose of cognitive warfare is to influence and disrupt existing, mutually trusting social networks, deepen opposition, lower morale, and undermine an opponent's ability to plan and carry out activities by releasing false information.
However, from the U.S. experience of cognitive warfare in the Russia-Ukraine war, cognitive warfare can target both the enemy and oneself (or one's own camp). For the enemy, the goal of cognitive warfare is to attack the other side; for oneself, the goal of cognitive warfare is to strengthen oneself or consolidate one's own camp. Naturally, these two areas are interrelated and mutually reinforcing. On the Taiwan issue, the U.S. cognitive warfare is also basically carried out in these two areas.
In the former, the United States actually began cognitive warfare against mainland China while conducting cognitive warfare against Russia over the Russia-Ukraine war. At the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war, the United States believed that mainland China would take advantage of the opportunity of the Russia-Ukraine war to restrain the United States to solve the Taiwan issue on its own. This is why the United States has been deepening its contacts with Taiwan in recent years, including arming Taiwan, sending military personnel to Taiwan under various pretexts, and raising the level of officials visiting Taiwan. After mainland China did not solve the Taiwan issue as the United States imagined, the United States has changed the timetable for mainland China to solve the Taiwan issue in recent years, creating the so-called "2027 problem," that is, mainland China will solve the Taiwan issue by force in 2027. This is a typical cognitive war, with a "pre-emptive" characteristic.
Cognitive warfare is a typical game. In this case, the United States wants to deter the other side from launching or canceling its action plan through a cognitive war. However, the so-called "action plan" here is the Chinese action plan perceived by the United States, not the actual action plan of mainland China. It is not difficult to understand that in recent years, the United States has been shaping and spreading such a perception to the world: if China's mainland plan cannot be stopped, then Taiwan will be the next Ukraine. Of course, this is not only the United States, but also its ally Japan is more enthusiastic on this issue. Former Prime Minister Abe put forward the concept of "Taiwan's security is Japan's security," and current Prime Minister Kishida has gone even further than Abe on this issue.
On the Taiwan issue, the greatest interests of China and the United States are exactly opposite. That is, the greatest interest of the United States is the peaceful "independence" of Taiwan, while the greatest interest of mainland China is the peaceful reunification of Taiwan; and the second best interest of both countries is to maintain the status quo in Taiwan. The problem is that there is no fixed status quo in the Taiwan Strait. For mainland China, where is national rejuvenation without national reunification? As the country continues to rise, the issue of national reunification must and will inevitably be resolved. For the pro-independence forces on the island, they will inevitably seek every opportunity to pursue independence. For the United States, if it cannot prevent China's national reunification, then it must use Taiwan as a tool to interrupt China's mainland modernization and even to destroy mainland China.
Considering these factors, the United States will continue to deepen and escalate this level of cognitive warfare. Recently, as "520" approaches, U.S. officials are again fabricating the "theory of undetermined status of Taiwan." This is not difficult to understand, because these are all "tools" in the U.S. cognitive warfare "toolbox."
However, the United States is accelerating a larger-scale and deeper "cognitive war" on Taiwan, that is, sanctifying Taiwan and shaping Taiwan from all aspects as if it were the "lifeblood" of the entire West (especially Japan). If the aforementioned cognitive warfare is directly targeted at mainland China, then this level of cognitive warfare is mainly targeted at the United States and the Western camp, with the aim of uniting the Western camp to collectively target China.
03 The collective imagination of Taiwan by the United States and other Western countries
Not long ago, Andrew S. Erickson, a professor of strategy at the China Maritime Studies Institute at the U.S. Naval War College, Gabriel B. Collins, a research fellow at the Baker Institute for Public Policy's Center for Energy Studies at Rice University and director of the Eurasia Energy and Geopolitics Project, and Matt Pottinger, who served as U.S. Deputy National Security Advisor from 2019 to 2021, jointly published an article titled "The Taiwan Catastrophe: What America—and the World—Would Lose If China Took the Island" in Foreign Affairs magazine (February 2024 issue). This article is representative and reflects the "Taiwan perception" shaped by the United States (and some Western countries).
On the Taiwan issue, the imagination of the United States (and some Western countries) is mainly manifested in the following levels.
First, the imagination of Taiwan as an "independent country."
Although UN Resolution 2758 has long clarified Taiwan's status, US political forces often ignore the UN resolution and regard Taiwan as an "independent country." Although the determination of Taiwan's status is a prerequisite for the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States, the US administration's position on this issue is inconsistent, and its officials often blur the previous government's position and occasionally release the "theory of undetermined status of Taiwan." In the strategic circles of the United States and some Western countries, when discussing the relationship between mainland China and Taiwan, concepts such as "annexation," "occupation," and "aggression" are often used, as if Taiwan is an "independent country." However, from the perspective of cognitive warfare, this is not difficult to understand, because Taiwan's "independence" is the greatest interest of the United States.
Second, the geopolitical imagination.
The geopolitical imagination originates from Douglas MacArthur. In June 1950, when the Korean Peninsula was on the brink of war, MacArthur wrote in a memorandum: "In communist hands, Formosa (the Western name for Taiwan at the time) can be compared to an unsinkable aircraft carrier and submarine tender ideally located to accomplish either an offensive or defensive strategy by the communists, and it would be a terrible threat to any counter-offensive operation we might envisage from Okinawa and the Philippines." MacArthur pointed out how Japanese imperialism, which ruled Taiwan from 1895 to 1945, used the island as a "springboard for military aggression" to expand out of East Asia, and warned that communist forces could do the same.
In the U.S. cognitive warfare on Taiwan, Taiwan is imagined as the pillar of Japan's defense and a springboard to prevent mainland China from threatening U.S. allies in the Indo-Pacific, because once Taiwan is unified by mainland China, China will be able to realize its territorial claims on the Diaoyu Islands and the South China Sea.
For the United States, if mainland China "annexes" Taiwan, it would be a geopolitical disaster. The United States could lose valuable trade and investment opportunities in Asia. Just as the United States made efforts in the 19th and early 20th centuries to implement the Monroe Doctrine and eliminate European influence on the American continent, an Asia "taken over" by China would have a devastating impact on U.S. economic interests. More seriously, the United States would be driven out of Asia, as Kissinger once told people, and the United States might begin to look like "a lonely island on the world's coastline."
For Japan, Taiwan is an important part of the "first island chain" formed by Japan and Taiwan, so in order to ensure Japan's security, the entire island chain must always be in the hands of friendly countries. If Taiwan becomes the location of PLA bases, or becomes mainland China's "unsinkable aircraft carrier," Japan's power will be greatly weakened.
In the U.S. (Western) cognitive warfare, the impact of Taiwan's "fall" on the Philippines and other Southeast Asian countries is even more severe. At that time, mainland China will have the ability to complicate the United States' access to the world's most populous, economically active region of East Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Indian Ocean coastline.
Taiwan's unification by mainland China even involves the issue of nuclear proliferation. The fact that the United States cannot protect Taiwan means that the United States' security commitments are invalid, and the United States' allies will be strongly encouraged to become nuclear powers. Japan has the greatest potential to become a nuclear power, with its own nuclear fuel processing facilities and possibly the world's largest plutonium stockpile. South Korea has a world-class civilian nuclear program with 26 reactors in operation. If Japan or South Korea develop nuclear industries, other countries may not stop there. Asia's nuclear proliferation could even spread to the Middle East, where Iran continues to approach the nuclear threshold. If Iran develops nuclear weapons, Saudi Arabia will almost certainly do so as well.
Third, the democratic imagination.
In recent years, the U.S. and Western countries' "democratic imagination" of Taiwan has exceeded people's imagination. The Economist Intelligence Unit ranks Taiwan as the 8th most "democratic" "country," surpassing all countries in Asia and even the United Kingdom and the United States, which have a longer history of democracy. They believe that once mainland China solves the Taiwan issue, a China-centric "illiberalism" may replace the U.S.-led liberal system that has brought significant improvements to humanity for eighty years.
Fourth, the economic imagination.
The U.S. economic imagination of Taiwan is very "contemporary," that is, Taiwan has world-leading high-tech electronic chip production capabilities.
The semiconductor manufacturing industry is the pillar of almost all industries considered important strategic industries today, and is the lifeline of the big data world. The world produces about $600 billion worth of chips each year. From smartphones and cars to supercomputers, chips are present in these products, with a total value of trillions of dollars, and the services provided by these devices each year are also worth tens of trillions. The latest generation of chips (5 nanometer or smaller chips) are produced in only two places: Taiwan (by TSMC) and South Korea (by Samsung). Currently, Taiwan accounts for about half of the world's total semiconductor production capacity, and an even higher proportion of the most advanced chip production, possibly up to 90%. The large number of Taiwanese semiconductors have driven global technological progress, the AI boom, and the rise of U.S. tech giants worth trillions of dollars (Apple, Google, Microsoft, NVIDIA, etc.). A war for this territory could easily trigger a global economic recession. The U.S. (West) believes that once mainland China "controls" Taiwan, if Taiwan's chip factories remain intact and continue to operate, then China will "control" the supply of almost all the world's most advanced semiconductors; on the other hand, if mainland China "occupies" Taiwan's chip foundries in their entirety, it may be difficult to reach pre-war production levels after a war. Power outages, software upgrades, and disruptions to foreign equipment, maintenance, and engineering supplies will all strangle Taiwan's chip factories. For months or even years, the "occupied" factories will face severe difficulties, especially considering the economic sanctions against China that will be imposed by global democratic countries. The world will usher in an immediate "Great Depression."
No matter from which angle, the United States has an unusually rich imagination on the Taiwan issue, and many places even far exceed Hollywood movies in the United States. But it is also very obvious that the logic of this level of cognitive warfare is very simple: the first step is to sanctify Taiwan by exercising various (knowledge) imaginations; the second step is to shape the West's fear of losing Taiwan; the third step is to show why other countries should stand with the United States to "defend Taiwan."
04 The absurdity of the US perception of Taiwan and China's composure
The intention of the US cognitive war on Taiwan could not be clearer, nothing more than two: one is to prevent China's national reunification, and the other is to intensify the tragic degree of mainland China's resolution of the Taiwan issue.
For mainland China, there is no reason to underestimate the impact that the US cognitive war on the Taiwan issue can have on national reunification. The US sanctification of all aspects of Taiwan will inevitably intensify the intensity of the conflict between mainland China and the US (and its allies) on the Taiwan issue. If Taiwan becomes so sacred to the US (and its allies), then the US has sufficient reason to protect Taiwan. On the other hand, as mentioned earlier, Taiwan belongs to China's sovereignty issue, and there is no reason or room for any compromise.
For mainland China, on the one hand, it needs to fight back against the US cognitive war, because the cognitive war conducted by the US is based on the imagination of Taiwan and is extremely deceptive to the US itself, Taiwan, US allies and the world. On the other hand, it needs sufficient strategic composure to avoid being disturbed by the US cognitive war and advance the process of national reunification according to its own established strategy.
For China, national reunification is not a game, not a "deal" with the United States. National reunification reflects the will of the entire people. Even if there is a conflict or even a war between China and the United States (or its allies) on the Taiwan issue, there is no possibility of the United States (and its allies) winning from any angle. On the Taiwan issue, the United States naturally has a strong will, and as indicated by the cognitive war it is engaged in, if Taiwan becomes its "lifeblood," the will of the United States will inevitably become stronger and stronger. The core of the problem is that the ability of the United States is getting weaker and weaker. In the Russia-Ukraine war, the United States also fought a cognitive war against Ukraine in this way. But NATO led by the United States did not fight this war as it wished. Experientially, it has already evolved into a protracted war. In the Middle East, the United States is incapable of solving even issues like Afghanistan. Even the hawks in the United States have no certainty that the United States has the ability to deal with China, the second largest economy.
On the Taiwan issue, internal changes in the United States are also a variable that needs to be considered. In this regard, Trump represents American realistic thinking, that is, the United States no longer has the ability to provide unconditional protection for its allies, and the United States should change its international strategy. Last time, as soon as Trump took office, he implemented a radical "withdrawal" policy. After Biden took power, although he restored the alliance policy, he did not show that he has the ability to provide benefits to the alliance. Recently (April 30), the U.S. TIME magazine published an interview with Trump, discussing his vision for governance if he returns to the White House. Trump reiterated that allies who do not pay should rely on themselves, and refused to reveal whether he would "defend" China's Taiwan region. The reason given by Trump is "deal," that is, if there is a clear answer, it will be limited to being passive in interactions with China. The implication is that the Taiwan issue can be "traded." Therefore, TIME magazine described Trump's international policy as "transactional isolationism."
Changes on the island of Taiwan also need more attention. The impact of the Russia-Ukraine war on the people of Taiwan is profound. NATO, which is considered the most powerful, not only does not have the ability to "protect" Ukraine, but has instead led to Ukraine evolving into a "proxy" for the war between the United States and Russia. For the people of Taiwan, the United States does not have the ability to protect Taiwan, just as the United States does not have the ability to protect Ukraine. Although the "Taiwan independence" forces are still trying every means to promote Taiwan independence, more and more people on the island want to "maintain the status quo forever." According to the latest long-term public opinion survey in Taiwan, the number of Taiwanese people who support "maintaining the status quo of cross-strait relations forever" is increasing year by year, and has been the highest among all options since 2022.
No matter what, if we realize that under the wrong perception of China, the cognitive war conducted by the United States on Taiwan will eventually be counterproductive, then there is no reason to be led by the nose by the cognitive war of the United States. For mainland China, on the one hand, it needs to demonstrate strategic composure towards the United States and strategic patience on the Taiwan issue, and on the other hand, it needs to advance the process of national reunification according to its own established strategy.