Amid heightened tensions between China and Taiwan, Chinese President Xi Jinping told a former Taiwanese president who supports unification that the countries “belong” together.
“Differences in systems cannot change the fact that both sides of the Taiwan Straits belong to the same country and nation,” Xi said.
“External interference cannot stop the historical trend of reunion of the country and family,” Xi said, in comments reported by Taiwanese media and published by Reuters.
…
Beijing claims the independent island of Taiwan is a Chinese province and has threatened to use force to achieve unification. China frequently sends warplanes and naval vessels to circle the small island democracy and has been mounting an increasing number of military drills over recent years.
Because the winds are blowing in his favour. Xi (and the rest of the world) have watched Russia take land with little repercussion. The reaction to the invasion of Crimea was mild and allowed for the full on invasion years later. The rules have changed and now leaders are seeing that taking land, which used to be seen as a relic of the past, is back on the menu.
The US and a lot of the west is afraid to get involved and do what needs to be done to stop Putin, and Xi knows that if he waits for the perfect moment Taiwan will be his.
The US is building domestic chip manufacturing in case they lose TSMC, and once it’s operational one of the main reasons they consider Taiwan an asset will be gone. Xi likely is hoping the war in Ukraine and Israel will continue and “news fatigue” will render people uninterested in a new conflict. I’m not sure what the final nail will be that makes him move, but a controllable president like Trump getting in is a good bet.
I think there are two differences between Taiwan and Ukraine: Putin is fucking insane and might actually use nukes if attacked directly by a NATO nation, but I don’t think Xi would do that (I could be wrong on both assessments). And Ukraine doesn’t really have anything the world wants, while Taiwan (like you correctly pointed out) is about the only place that makes high performance computer chips and nobody wants China to have a world-wide stranglehold on that product.
Ukraine has 24% of the world’s supply of noble gasses used in computer chip manufacturing, along with 35% of the remaining helium on the planet.
I think the Russians want this very much and that is why Russia is even in Ukraine.
I think Putin is out of touch and lives with a completely different world view than you or I, but I don’t think he is insane or suicidal. Look at how far away he stayed from people during COVID.
I think we do ourselves a disservice by bowing down to his sabre rattling every time he reminds us he has nukes. We know, and he also knows the second one will drop on his head if he tries it. It’s just posturing to get people likrnus arguing and making his land grab seem more legitimate, like there’s nothing we can really do.
He will always have nukes, and if we alwuas back down because not them he will always get his way.
Ukraine is a huge exporter of grain. Breadbasket to much of the world. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/07/ukraine-s-food-exports-by-the-numbers/.
I think, before any chip maker in Taiwan is taken by chinese forces, their factories and laboritories might explode for some reason or another. I don’t think that China can take them without catastrophic loss of very expensive and sensitive equipment that requires very specialised workers they don’t have. All of these things can’t be replaced in a reasonable time frame, especially at war.
If China follows through with an invasion, they might be after something else.
The US is providing funding for companies like TSMC and Intel to buld fabs in the US. The reality is that TSMC is having a very hard time hiring and deal with cultural gaps between Asian working mindset vs. American working mindset. There’s going to be some serious pain getting these fabs up and running.