Notes on Why Taiwan: (4) Conclusion and comments

This is not the conclusion of the whole book but serves well as the concluding points of the parts that I cited in previous posts.

"As Tu Wei-ming writes, 'Educated Chinese know reflexively what China proper refers to' and are deeply imbued with the idea that 'geopolitical China evolved through a long process centering around a definable core.' Taiwan, though, was never part of that definable core. It was swept into the Chinese orbit only after Dutch and Spanish aggressors expressed interest in its potential as a base from which they might engage China in international commerce, gaining advantage over the Portuguese who occupied Macao (p.42)."

"Indeed, one scarcely risks provoking objection by observing that Beijing has invested far more political capital in pursuit of its claims to Taiwan than it has in most of the territorial disputes it settled with neighbors... One does not regularly read or hear, for instance, that the future of China's 'rise' and development depends on recovering sovereignty over Diaoyutai, the islands in the South China Sea, or the territory that India governs as part of the state of Arunachal Pradesh (p.29)."

"If Taiwan is valued in part because of its geostrategic salience, then every act by the United States or Japan that Beijing interprets as encouraging or exploiting the autonomy of Taiwan is a strike at the heart of the PRC's sense of security (p.162)."

"Taiwan's people seek the dignity of sovereignty and the assurance that so long as they do no harm to the PRC, Beijing will regard the island with neighborly comity. However, the geostrategic perspective leaves adherents in Beijing-- like the sailors Odysseus ordered to fill their ears with wax-- unable to or unwilling to hear Taiwan's plea in any way other than as an insidious challenge to China's future that must, without concern for cost, be overcome (p.164)."

Published in 2007, Why Taiwan received two book reviews: J. Bruce Jacobs in China Journal and Robert Green in Taipei Times. Both are favorable to Wachman's use of the historical material to argue successfully that Taiwan was not part of China. Robert Green has a funny comment:

"At the heart of this reading is the idea that relative strength dictates the imagined geography of security planners and the desire for a greater sphere of influence. Historically, this is a telltale of an expansionist power. As a nation's military capacity grows, so does its appetite for influence. Suddenly, ever-more-distant 'buffer zones' are necessary for security, and often far-flung geographic locations take on an immediacy and vitality for a nation's defense. Lord Salisbury, prime minister of Great Britain during the height of its imperial expansion, once quipped that his military advisors, if they had their way, would 'garrison the moon to protect us from Mars.'"

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