Will 2027 invite conflict for Taiwan and China?

Kerry Brown:
It was more by accident than design. Since my first visit to Taiwan in 2000 (when I was serving as a British diplomat in Beijing), I have taken an interest in the island and revisited it many times in the quarter of a century since then. So, while I have never systematically studied Taiwan until recently, I have acquired a lot of knowledge in a somewhat unplanned way and wanted to try to think this through, in the current very chaotic and worrying global context, and see what conclusions I might be able to draw. I also wanted to try, as a complete outsider, to put myself in either China’s or Taiwan’s shoes.

This book therefore tries to achieve that balancing act. Whatever one’s own personal likes and preferences (and of course, there are many things about Taiwan’s politics and culture today that do make it an attractive place to relate to and feel linked to), an unforgivably realistic worldview has to recognize that China has, and is likely to maintain, its trenchant views on the island’s status for the foreseeable future. These cannot be ignored. We have to deal with this, whether we like it or not. So, this book on Taiwan was written with a strong awareness of that context, and that came from many years on either side of the Strait listening to different kinds of conversations, often ones which were diametrically opposed, and trying to work out how these can somehow be managed without the situation spiraling out of control.

Kerry Brown:
I think if we strip down the Taiwan-China issue to its essence, it is fundamentally about to what degree one side can assert its aims and desires over the other without there being knock-on effects everywhere else. I mean, if Taiwan and China were peripheral, small places with no real economic imprint, conflict between them would be unfortunate and undesirable, but it would at least be manageable. I don’t really see any way, however, in which the escalation of conflict—through trade, unconventional or conventional military means, or for that matter in any other area—is remotely manageable at present in this context. So, the quandary we have is that each side has wholly incompatible aims and desires, with the possibility that a move by one to preemptively assert its own objectives over the other will cause precisely the sort of imbalance and then turbulence that will upend everything else. Taiwan and China, as an issue, despite the huge differences in their respective populations and military sizes, are like two vast stones leaning against each other. Move one and the other tumbles. Therefore, it is best to simply leave them as they are, in a kind of balance, even if that relies on the other side not shifting.

It might be that one day, bolder, more proactive policies by the political West and others toward Taiwan achieve something new. Who knows: one day, the political situation in China might be different, or the sentiment in Taiwan might have changed. But at the moment, these look so fanciful as to be not worth thinking about. We just have to continue supporting the situation where the two great stones of Taiwan and China lean against each other, and no one gets too excited about trying to shift or change their position. The consequences if that went wrong are just too high.

Kerry Brown:
My feeling is that the two great red lines for China that would provoke it into action are well understood. These are unilateral declarations of independence by Taiwan or by the United States. Both, despite all the recent tensions, are very unlikely at present, and likely to remain so. For instance, the new secretary of state, Marco Rubio, reportedly stated in a phone call with his counterpart, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, on January 25 that “The United States does not support ‘Taiwan independence’ and hopes that the Taiwan issue will be peacefully resolved in a way accepted by both sides of the Taiwan Strait.” That is no more than an orthodox statement of the U.S. position since Washington shifted diplomatic recognition from Taipei to Beijing in 1979. And while Taiwan President Lai Ching-te might have a strong track record of supporting Taiwanese autonomy, he too is unlikely to risk the colossal fall-out by straying too far toward overt declarations of independence.

But of course, while it seems the general framework to manage Taiwan and China remains in place, the general rise of uncertainty in U.S. diplomacy and politics currently, and the very unpredictable style of President Donald Trump’s leadership, means that, alas, anything could happen. We are in a period of heightened uncertainty and tension, the kind of context where misunderstanding and mishaps thrive. So, while the dial is still some way from there being a real Taiwan crisis by 2027, it is edging a little bit closer as time goes on. We need to get to a situation where that direction is reversed—and we need to do it quickly.

Kerry Brown:
The outside world largely regards Taiwan favorably and sympathetically. And Taiwan has great soft power assets, and of course, gets deserved sympathy for the position it is in. No place should exist daily under threat and pressure. But the island has to play a balancing act. For the security of its people, the government cannot be too adventurous. In elections, on the whole, over the last few decades, Taiwanese have voted for those who support the status quo and offer more conservative, cautious approaches on cross-Strait issues. Of course, the vast majority of Taiwanese increasingly see themselves as Taiwanese, rather than Chinese Taiwanese, or even Chinese pure and simple. But they are very well aware of the harm that would happen if there was a breakout of conflict, and that they sit on the front line of this. So, they tend to support an approach that promotes Taiwan’s economic and other interests, but not in a way that is confrontational.

To be Taiwan’s president is one of the most demanding jobs in the world—not least because all but a handful of countries don’t actually confer legitimacy on you as the leader of a nation-state. You have to occupy a world of perpetual ambiguity and uncertainty, and yet do this while in charge of one of the world’s key economies and a population of 23 million people, a sizeable military, and your own currency, banks, and national anthem! This is a highly frustrating situation to occupy. So, it is natural that leaders like Lai seek moral and other forms of support in order to bolster the island. They have plenty of like-minded partners to do this with, in Europe, America, and elsewhere.

What Taiwan doesn’t want, however, is support from figures who are less invested in constructive sympathy and care for Taiwan, and are simply pursuing their own grandiose aims. Here I might cite a well-known British example: Elizabeth Truss, who was prime minister for about 50 days in 2022. Truss subsequently went to Taiwan in 2023. There she engaged in a number of events, supporting the idea that Taiwan was a bulwark by which to push back against what she described as China’s malign influence. While of course Taiwan might wish to enjoy the profile that comes from the visit of a former leader of a major partner and an important international player, Truss is a divisive figure. As I write in the book, her opponents in Britain accused her of Instagram diplomacy, with Alicia Kearns, a fellow Conservative and member of the Houses of Parliament, acidly commenting that “Liz Truss doesn’t have any influence any more – this is more about keeping herself relevant.” There are risks therefore with making some of these international connections—and making sure that they do sensibly serve Taiwan’s agenda of keeping its situation in the public eye globally, but not in a way that causes aggressive pushback and counterattack by Beijing.

Kerry Brown:
My argument in the book is that there is one thing you can say about both Taiwan and China in the last half a century, and it is that they are able to do things that surprise. In 1976, when Mao Zedong died, no one really foresaw the kinds of economic and other changes that happened in the following few years, leading to the country we know today. Nor, for that matter, did many people in 1989 believe that communism would last much longer there after the protests of June that year. In Taiwan, too, its transition to democracy over the 1980s into the 1990s was a big surprise, along with the ways in which this has proved sustainable and successful. Good and bad, Taiwan and China always have the ability to do things that were never predicted beforehand.

That means that we just have to preserve a space where, maybe in many years’ time, unexpected (and good) things can happen. China may well, after Xi Jinping, fundamentally rethink its current hard line on sovereignty, for instance. It might become more flexible. And for Taiwan, to be honest, it might consider the parlous nature of the outside world and deepening chaos or uncertainty in the political West, and change its views about its own status. Of course, as of today, both these possibilities are for the fantasists, and cannot form the basis of credible predictions. But one has to just create enough grounds to at least hope, even though there is not much tangible sign of supporting optimism at present. Our position is perhaps best described as defensive. We don’t know what resolution and success might be—but we can have a pretty good guess at how failure might pan out. We see it in the tragic war of Russia against Ukraine with tens of thousands of dead, and the never-ending fights in the Middle East. As of today, we can at least say that between Taiwan and China, since the 1950s, there has not, thankfully, been a conflict that has led to casualties and loss of life. Maintaining that is critical. It is quite simply a matter of life and death.