Behind the Taiwan issue

[Greg.D.]

Somebody's been watching too much Wolf Warrior:

Taiwan again scrambles jets to intercept Chinese planes, tensions spike

 

TAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan’s air force scrambled for a second day in a row on Monday to intercept Chinese jets that approached the island claimed by Beijing as its own, as tensions between the two took on a potentially dangerous military dimension.

 

Taiwan’s Defence Ministry said Chinese jets, accompanying H-6 bombers, briefly crossed an unofficial mid-line in the Taiwan Strait that separates the two, prompting its air force to rush to intercept and give verbal warnings to leave.

 

The Chinese aircraft then withdrew to the western side of the line, the ministry added, without identifying the jets.

 

.......

 

On Sunday too, Chinese jets, including J-11 fighters, flew into the Bashi Channel then out into the Pacific before heading back to base via the Miyako Strait, located between Japan’s islands of Miyako and Okinawa, to the northeast of Taiwan.

 

.....

 

There was no immediate comment from China on Monday’s incident. This is only the second time since 2016 that Taiwan has said that Chinese jets had crossed the strait’s median line. Their military aircraft tend to keep to their own sides.

 

China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, though, urged Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) “not to play with fire”.

 

The DPP have been “adopting a stance that increases cross-strait confrontation, intensifying new moves for Taiwan-U.S. collusion, using the opportunity to seek independence and openly carrying out dangerous provocations”, it added.

[Allon]

I hope Taiwan is smart enough to move their radar sites after each encirclement. A "fly by" is often done to map the location of radar, including gun site radar, during the fly by. Flying a second time determines if the radar is mobile and moved. If there is constant movement after such an exercise, then Taiwan is a formidable enemy in a defensive position.

Type of radar means something too. If Taiwan has over the horizon radar, they probably knew the planes were coming the moment they took off and where. If Taiwan has ECM's on the ground, I hope they kept them down so they are not discovered.

 

Now it's resources. How many men does China want to lose in order to get Taiwan? Same with Taiwan, especially, unless the US steps in. Three major task forces are supposed to be in or near Taiwan, to fend off such an attack.

 

It's a good time to divert China to a real foe, someone they can beat now that Hong Kong is indefatigable.

 

In this scenario, an island, someone is going to lack the discipline not to fire. Then we shall see.....hope not. The world has had enough killing.

[amberjack1234]

Exactly.

[Randy W]

from the Nation

 

 

The WHO Ignores Taiwan. The World Pays the Price.

 

• Taiwan was more prepared for the coronavirus than any other country, but the WHO puts politics first.

 

 

There is an island nation off the southeastern coast of China where public health officials saw the pandemic coming—and took action before China did. Nearly three months after reporting its first confirmed case of Covid-19, this country has only reported 348 positive diagnoses and five deaths. It was one of the earliest countries to be hit and has one of the lowest infection rates.

 

. . .

 

Taiwan, Italy, and the United States all confirmed their first cases of Covid-19 within days of one another. But unlike the other two countries, Taiwan has so far avoided mass deaths—so much so that on Wednesday, President Tsai Ing-wen announced that Taiwan would donate 10 million surplus masks to places including Italy and the United States.

 

. . .

 

Last weekend, the absurdity of this geopolitical paradox was laid bare in a news broadcast that quickly went viral. In a Skype interview, journalist Yvonne Tong of Hong Kong public broadcaster RTHK asked Dr. Bruce Aylward, a senior WHO official, if the global health body would reconsider Taiwan’s membership.

On Tong’s laptop screen, Aylward’s face twitched. He blinked for several seconds. Then he said he “couldn’t hear the question.” When Tong offered to repeat herself, Aylward cut in: “No, that’s OK, let’s move on to another question then.”

“I’m actually curious to talk about Taiwan as well,” said Tong. Aylward’s face disappeared—he had ended the call.

When Tong called back and repeated her question, Aylward replied, “Well, we’ve already talked about China. And when you look across all the different areas of China, they’ve actually all done quite a good job.” He thanked Tong and ended the call again.

The surreal exchange lasted all of one minute. But for Taiwanese people, it summed up a lifetime of gaslighting. During this outbreak alone, the WHO has kept changing how it refers to this country of nearly 24 million, going from “Taiwan, China,” to “Taipei” to the newer and bizarre “Taipei and its environs.” It also allowed China to report Taiwan’s coronavirus numbers as part of its own total, instead of reporting Taiwan’s numbers alone—a conflation that created headaches for the smaller nation. Some other countries enacted travel restrictions on Taiwan along with China, despite the former’s drastically lower infection rate.

When geopolitics dictate health policy, however, the most serious effects are rarely just economic. The WHO’s distortion of Taiwan’s reality has consequences that should be measured in human lives.

 

 

 

[Randy W]

from Time and Tsai Ingwen

 

 

President of Taiwan: How My Country Prevented a Major Outbreak of COVID-19

 

As we see another day with ZERO new cases, TIME publishes a sincere, straightforward, and clear statement from the President of Taiwan, 蔡英文 Tsai Ing-wen about how Taiwan fought #COVID19 .

❤️

#Taiwan #TaiwanCanHelp #TaiwanIsHelping #ProudOfTaiwan #coronavirus #WuhanVirus

https://time.com/collection/finding-hope-coronavirus-pandemic/5820596/taiwan-coronavirus-lessons/

 

 

 

Taiwan has one of the world’s top health care systems, strong research capabilities and transparent information that we actively share with both the public and international bodies. Indeed, Taiwan has effectively managed the containment of the corona-virus within our borders. Yet on a global level, COVID-19 is a humanitarian disaster that requires the joint efforts of all countries. Although Taiwan has been unfairly excluded from the WHO and the U.N., we remain willing and able to utilize our strengths across manufacturing, medicine and technology to work with the world.

Global crises test the fabric of the inter-national community, stretching us at the seams and threatening to tear us apart. Now more than ever, every link in this global network must be accounted for. We must set aside our differences and work together for the benefit of humankind. The fight against COVID-19 will require the collective efforts of people around the world.

 

 

[Randy W]

from China Pictorial on Facebook

Quote

The claim by the ruling Democratic Progressive Party of Taiwan that it informed the World Health Organization in December that COVID-19 can be transmitted from person to person is totally unfounded, the mainland's Taiwan affairs authority said on Friday.

https://www.facebook.com/553929144732479/posts/2709029352555770/

Edited January 11, 2021 by Randy W (see edit history)

[Allon]

Interesting reprint of an article from National Interest, a somewhat conservative group that specializes in so-called "American realism." They are said to have connections to American intelligence. On the Chinese aircraft industry, especially the J-11 or the Russian SU-27. Taiwan gets its air force for the most part from France and the US.

 

The Chinese defense industrial base is infamous for its tendency to “borrow” from foreign designs, particularly in the aerospace industry. Almost the entirety of China’s modern fighter fleet have either borrowed liberally from or directly copied foreign models. The J-10 was reputedly based on the Israeli IAI Lavi and by extension the United States’ General Dynamics F-16; the J-11 is a clone of the Russian Su-27; the JF-17 is a modern development of the Soviet MiG-21; the J-20 bears an uncanny resemblance to the F-22, and finally, the J-31 is widely believed to rely heavily on technology appropriated from the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. Appropriation saves China time and money on research and development, allowing it to modernize the PLAAF at a fraction of the cost of its competitors. However, the appropriation strategy remains constrained by bottleneck technologies due to lack of testing data and industrial ecology. This problem is starkly illustrated by China’s ongoing difficulty in producing a high-quality indigenous jet engine.

 

 

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/one-enormous-problem-tailing-chinese-air-force-93426

 

 

Taiwan can win a war with China. .....a little old but still relevant......

 

https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/09/25/taiwan-can-win-a-war-with-china/

 

Chinese commanders fear they may be forced into armed contest with an enemy that is better trained, better motivated, and better prepared for the rigors of warfare than troops the PLA could throw against them.

 

[Randy W]

Taiwan seeks a seat at the WHA - from the SCMP on Facebook

https://www.facebook.com/355665009819/posts/521474498757918

Edited January 11, 2021 by Randy W (see edit history)

[Randy W]

Global Times has this to say about that

 

 

[Randy W]

from Al Jazeera English

 

Taiwan's Tsai Ing-wen says no to 'one country, two systems'

 

After inauguration for second term, island's president says Taiwan and China must find peaceful way to coexist.

Taiwan wants dialogue with China but cannot accept its proposal for "one country, two systems", President Tsai Ing-wen said on Wednesday, calling for both sides to find a way to coexist but drawing swift condemnation from China.

 

"Both sides have a duty to find a way to coexist over the long term and prevent the intensification of antagonism and differences," she said.

 

"Here, I want to reiterate the words 'peace, parity, democracy, and dialogue'. We will not accept the Beijing authorities' use of 'one country, two systems' to downgrade Taiwan and undermine the cross-strait status quo. We stand fast by this principle," Tsai said.

 

. . .

 

The Global Times tabloid, meanwhile, quoted a Chinese spokesperson saying that Tsai's party "gangs up with foreign powers to hinder peace of Taiwan Straits and use (the) pandemic to attain separatist goals."

 

Taiwan was "severely damaging" the peace and stability of the region, it added.

 

 

[Randy W]

from the SCMP

 

Is PLA planning to seize Taiwanese islands in South China Sea?

“The landing exercise is part of the PLA navy’s regular training to achieve Beijing’s plan to bring the South China Sea under its control,” he said.

. . .

Taipei-controlled Pratas and Taiping islands lost their geostrategic importance to Beijing after it developed eight artificial islands nearby, military observer says

At least one aircraft carrier from PLA Navy set to take part in summer exercises, which will also incorporate landing drills, insider says

 

The Pratas and Taiping Islands are located here

[Randy W]

from the SCMP

 

Chinese warplanes enter Taiwan Strait after US flyover

• Taiwanese military said it had detected a group of Su-30 fighters and had sent jets to intercept them
• PLA show of strength follows US transport plane’s flight over the island

Taiwan scrambled its warplanes to warn off the People’s Liberation Army fighter jets which crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait on Tuesday morning, the island’s defence ministry said in a statement.

 

The incursion came just several hours after a US C-40A transport plane made a rare flight into Taiwan over the southwest coast early in the morning.

 

 

 

 

[Randy W]

from the Global Times

 

Chinese mainland slams US military aircraft’s flight over Taiwan Island

 

Pilots navigate their Su-30 fighter jet to the runway and wait approval to take off during a flight training mission organized by a naval aviation brigade under the PLA Eastern Theater Command on February 18, 2020. Photo: China Military

 

The US military aircraft's flight over Taiwan was an illegal and serious provocative act, Zhu Fenglian, a spokesperson for the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council, said in a statement on Thursday

Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) authorities on the island colluded with foreign forces to violate China's sovereignty and security, actively sabotaged peace and stability in the Taiwan Straits, and brought calamity to safety and the well-being of people on the island, Zhu said.

"We solemnly warn DPP authorities, as they should not misjudge the situation, not underestimate the Chinese people's strong will and firm determination to safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity, and should stop the said actions at once," Zhu said.

The Chinese Ministry of National Defense or the PLA has not yet released a statement on the incident as of press time.

Global Times

 

[Randy W]

from the SCMP

 

Three in Taiwan’s Hong Kong office forced out over ‘one-China’ declaration

• It is understood the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office plans to continue operating in the city, though it is now left with only one director-level staffer
• Earlier this month, Beijing’s Taiwan Affairs Office warned Taipei against ’messing up’ Hong Kong, and described its ruling party as a ‘black hand’

“While in Hong Kong, [you should] rigorously abide by the one-China principle and Hong Kong’s Basic Law, as well as the rule of law in Hong Kong,” the declaration reads.

 

The trio were told they would either have to sign or be unable to renew their visas, something they refused to do while awaiting the results of their applications, according to the source. They ultimately left Hong Kong as their visas had expired.

 

 

[Randy W]

in the Global Times - the "National Sinner"

 

‘Godfather of Taiwan secessionism’ dies at 97

By Yang Sheng, Zhao Yusha and Fan Lingzhi Source: Global Times Published: 2020/7/30 22:32:51

• He had a chance to be a ‘great man, but eventually became a national sinner’

 

Lee, who took office in 1988 and retired in 2000, has long been decried as the "godfather of Taiwan secessionism" by mainland citizens and because of his flattering attitude toward Japan. Denying his Chinese identity was heavily criticized by Chinese on both sides of the Taiwan Straits.

Chinese mainland netizens also noticed the report. Some said, "What a shame, because we want him to be punished for his treason when we reunify the island." Others also criticized heavily that Lee "has forgot his own origin, and betrayed his ancestors."

Lee was a member of the pro-reunification Kuomintang (KMT), but later betrayed the KMT's principles to support localism and separatism. Even after leaving office, Lee was vocal about separating the island of Taiwan from the Chinese mainland.

"Lee had a chance to be a great man to promote reunification with the mainland, but he chose to be a 'strongman' in the island, as he wanted to be the founding father of Taiwan separatism, so he eventually ruined the KMT, the island, as well as the cross-Straits relations. He is a sinner of the Chinese nation," Yok Mu-ming, honorary president of the New Party of Taiwan, told the Global Times.