IL-18 GOPer supports nukes to Taiwan

[Jake]

The ROC already has nukes (alledgedly) and selling nukes to Taipei wouldn't really affect the US-China relations, but it's bad policy to support nuclear proliferation and this guy's campaign manager hopefully ripped him a new one. Unless there's a major Chinese expat community, this shouldn't even come up in a congressional campaign.

BTW, are Pershings still built/maintained/operated by the US. I didn't think, but...

[Jake]

It reinforces the frame that Schock is too inexperienced to be elected to Congress. Why should voters trust a 26 year old who thinks the way to place pressure on China is to arm Taiwan with nukes? What would the U.S gain from such a move? Run a cost benefits analysis and find a reason for the U.S to alienate China.

No shit. It's extremely stupid policy because it antagonizes China, not because it "risks a major rift with the world's fastest growing economy". It merely risks a rift with the government of that nation's economy.

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This hardly would provoke China into a nuclear confrontation, especially when you understand that no one in China would seriously consider acquiring US nukes. The KMT is looking likely to run away with the Presidential Election in 2008; Ma is leading every poll by quite a lot. The idea of China starting nuclear war over arms sales is ridiculous. No one in power is willing to risk the inevitable full scale war that would occur, nor are the willing to risk the economic upheaval nuclear or even conventional war would cause to their economy.

Schock merely was making a (extremely) stupid off the cuff comment; one that he probably believes, but never should've said during a campaign. No worse than Obama's comment on Pakistan.

And to ask a question of the article, who the hell would buy that much US currency right now. China would certainly lose vast amounts of money if they made such a move.

[Jake]

I will never understand why China is so extremely outraged over Taiwan's moves toward indpendence. They have 1.3 Billion People and over 3 million square miles of land. Why do they need more of either one? China's behavior on this issue is one of their worst qualities.

Read up some on the Chinese Civil War. The mere existence of the ROC would be similar to the Confederate States of America being allowed to remain in power in South Carolina (ignoring that South Carolina is not an island).

[Jake]

It'd still be a loss of face for the Chinese government. They decided ages ago that their policy would be to treat Formosa as a rebellious province. If they back off that now, how do they treat their other provinces who want out?

And to why it's such a big deal, check out the ROC's GDP, their South China Sea claims, and where they sit off the coast. All of that could be the PRC's.

[Jake]

problem is, no other provinces really want out (except maybe Tibet and Xinjiang, but they were never really part of China until the mid-20th century), especially with the economy booming as it is. China's doing well now; a lot better than it was 15 or 20 years ago, and the leaders in Beijing aren't going to mess that up by trying to retake Taiwan.

That's a really, really big except. And it doesn't particularly matter whether "they were never really part of China until the mid-20th century"; they're sure as hell part of it now and the PRC is not going to let valuable pieces of its country go. Xinjiang/Tibet contribute ~$44 billion to the Chinese GDP, equivalent to Angola (1.7% of national GDP). Not an extremely significant portion of the national GDP, but big enough. The ROC's GDP is ~$356 billion, a figure that would be 12% of Chinese GDP if the two countries were reunited. That's why the PRC will never accept there being two countries; economics prevents it.

And the last sentence is obviously true. They also are never going to accept a two nations system.