What’s stopping China from invading Taiwan? | News Desk

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I'm amy and esif and my name is marcel nadima we tackle a big news topic each week we will have guests on the program we will have analysts who will attend to go as deep as possible into the question we have, but we want you to help us ask the questions today because this show is really about

what

you want to know and you can do it in the chat, so feel free to ask anything. ask you want any feedback you want too and we will take everything you say and tell it to our experts and how it works we will show you in just a second and don't forget to take the quiz we have a quiz going and we are going to present the results during a show that's always fun when the most people get into it because then we have good and valid evidence, scientific data that's out right now this week, as we promised.

Let's get into a news topic and this week it's Taiwan, we wonder

what

's

stopping

China from

invading

Taiwan. This is the biggest flare-up and tensions in the Taiwan Strait in the last 25 years and we're going to look at it, give some background on why that happened, but also consider the question of why if China is the military power in that region, If the United States has basically looked the other way since these military exercises have been held in the Taiwan Strait, why? stop China from

invading

Taiwan because something is happening right now, but to give a little background on what we're going to talk about, we have a video so everyone is aware of what's happened in the last week.

How worried are you? situation in Taiwan because China is maintaining a bit of control over the entire island now. I'm not worried, but I'm worried that they're moving as much as they are, but I don't think they are. let's do something else now Beijing is basically blaming the United States for the escalation here in the Taiwan Strait there is a status quo um there is a kind of daily life that has been happening for a long time in Taiwan and China has been saying that The visit of Nancy Pelosi escalated and on the other hand, Taiwan says that, well, actually China is using that as a pretext to carry out these drills and show their power to put pressure on Taiwan and the US because they couldn't be carried out out such sophisticated things.

Drilling a day early because of Nancy Pelosi's visit, so yeah, like you said, it's a story that's been going on for quite a while and maybe we should understand where this is coming from, like the saying Taiwan, China, China , reunification, that's a phrase that they use it quite often, but reunify what's true, um, to give us background on what China, what Taiwan is the history of Taiwan and how we got to the situation where we're now going to have to Melissa Chan, you guys might even know her, she's dw. anchor from asia and she is also a freelance reporter, she has written for the new york times and the atlantic and the guardian, she will give us some kind of context and then we will have bonnie glasser, who is one of the leading experts on this topic.

Taiwan, China and United States relations. She is from the German Marshall Fund and she will give us the geopolitical aspect and we will ask her questions about the role of the United States because that is very important to understand the situation there and finally it will be possible. I don't really talk about the situation in Taiwan without looking at the situation there. We're going to talk about the 23 million people who live on that island and what life is like for them now that the situation has escalated over the past week and I'll be talking to dw correspondent William Yang, he's in Taipei.

He'll wake up at three in the morning to talk to us, so if you have questions about what life is like in Taiwan right now, you should keep his questions to himself because it will give us a great view of the situation on the ground. I mean, we might even have people in the chat who are tuning in from Taipei or anywhere else in Taiwan, so feel free to let me know. Tag me in Marsala ima and I'll get back to you. This is a great topic to address. We have great experts, but we also have great people here at the studio and we just want to bring you in and introduce them. for a moment with hannah costigan news editor here um she'll look at the whole thing and make sure we don't miss anything um then we have felix fiedler, he's our technician, if something goes wrong, he's the guy you can call and Probably has gone wrong before, there's that and don't curse it since you're already so involved in the chat.

First of all, I want to say hello to a Nick Blaine Justin P Chat couple in Amsterdam and I want to show you how it works. um so I'm going to take a question that you guys have asked before and I'm going to ask it to michaela kavanagh, she's our news reporter here, news

desk

reporter, and she's going to answer a question that's like watching Germany more because Jonas Jonas had asked about PVC. I'm curious if Germany is as dependent on Chinese factories and the Chinese market as it is on Russian gas and if anything is being done to prepare for a possible decoupling, so I understand what Germany's role is in this, yes.

Well, that's a really great question and it's a question that people have been thinking about here. It has been on everyone's lips in Germany for the last week and a half, including the German government and the EU. The short answer is, do you know Germany? It depends on Russia for gas, but Germany depends enormously on China for raw materials, so China is Germany's number one trading partner, for goods, and at least it was last year, so you know, when we talk from this. We are hugely dependent and what do we need them for, we need these raw materials and these rare earth elements for things like things that contribute to the climate, a kind of climate transition, for clean energy transitions, like you know, electronic vehicles, cell phones . lots and lots of cell phones um materials solar panels wind turbines LED lamps electric motors um so you know, this is something that's on the government's radar like I said and you know, frankfurter steinmeier, who is the German president, said um, he doesn't want to." Leaving Germany somewhat vulnerable to blackmail from any country," he said, and so the name of the game is really diversification, is what the German government says and that's why they're looking at places like Latin America to see where else.

Germany can say who else they can partner with to get these raw materials that we so need, but maybe you know, in the worst case, they may not be able to get them from China, so to answer Jonas' question, yes , they are very dependent and yes. I have it on the radio radar, but I haven't necessarily taken any action yet, as far as you know, jamming and communication or anything, yeah, yeah, yeah, and uh, kudos to Jonas for asking that question, you guys maybe don't know, but we are based in Berlin, Germany and We have been doing a lot of programs about crises and how they affect the world, but also about how they affect Germany, and it seems that there is a theme here that wars are breaking out where Germany, Suddenly, he realizes that maybe we shouldn't do it.

I have been so dependent on this world power. Very good question, yes, better late than never, that is true, but the question we are going to focus on today is what is

stopping

China from invading Taiwan and to understand that, we first have to understand why China. Why are people talking about a possible invasion? What interest does China have? Invading this island, uh, which is off their coast, um, across the Taiwan Strait, um, and to really break it down, we'll have Melissa Chan, uh, you can come in now, Melissa. uh applause emojis in chat, waiting very patiently in the wings for us to introduce her, she's a presenter for dw asia so if you guys have tuned into that channel then you've probably seen her there, you might have seen her work too in the new one. york times at the atlantic guardian i am a general expert on the region and we are very happy to have you here melissa I am excited I am excited to participate thanks for inviting me and regards to jonathan fung, he's actually joining from taipei Wow, that's amazing, and really Getting into this topic, what I was talking about before is China's interest in Taiwan and we have a clip that is a kind of collage of what Xi Jinping has been saying since 2019 about what China believes is the future of Taiwan felix Can we, yes, yes, we are listening to that reunification with our best efforts, let's reunify, let's pause and restart, are we willing to fight for the prospect of peaceful reunification with our best efforts, because reunification through peaceful means is what more beneficial to both parties and the entire nation, but we will not rule out the use of force and will reserve the option to take all necessary measures.

The Taiwan issue is purely China's internal matter and no external interference will be tolerated. No one should underestimate the determination of the Chinese people. will and ability to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity, the historical mission of the reunification of the homeland must and will definitely be carried out, much applause, that first clip was from 2019, the second clip was from October 2021, so just last fall when things were also escalating a bit in the

taiwan

strait this is president xi jinping of

china

a growing superpower not yet a superpower but growing in military power and what he's saying there I heard two things basically reserves the right to use military force and says Taiwan will one day be reunified like the lord it uses with China.

What interests do you have in reunifying Taiwan with China? Yeah, I think what's really interesting, of course, is that words are very important in this kind of story and reunification certainly implies that Taiwan was once a part of it. of the People's Republic of China and that it makes a lot of sense for Taiwan to be absorbed back into China, but the fact is, and this is a historical fact, that the People's Republic of China has never controlled Taiwan in its entire history, so that is the number one. We see reunification unification I think it's really important for journalists around the world to think about the language when they talk about this right, even with the word unify it suggests that there was a hole that if you look at the history of Taiwan is not the case and The Another thing is that I think we've learned from Putin that we should pay attention to what autocrats say, that we should take them very seriously, we should take them at face value instead of taking their words and then reinterpreting them into something that maybe will do we feel more comfortable he has said that he is not going to rule out the possibility of force we should take that very seriously the world should definitely take that very seriously and I don't understand when there are people who poop that possibility seems to exist Actually, I I mean a lot of people, but what you said before is really interesting: reunification itself is a myth because Taiwan was never part of mainland China.

We have a really old TV reel that shows one of the first news reels they covered. uh, the founding of Taiwan, wow, it was called Formosa back then, um, that's how they refer to it in this reel, but if we could play that, then we can talk about that last safe bastion of the Chinese nationalist army that continues With feverish preparations to repel the long-awaited communist invasion from the mainland, mock raids and mechanized maneuvers express Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek's heroic determination to fight whatever the future holds, so that was back in 1949 and they were already talking about the possible communist invasion.

Invasion from mainland China What has happened since then? Generally, you don't need to tell us. Can you explain world history to us? Give us the history of Taiwan. I mean, like you mentioned Formosa, right, that's a Portuguese word. I mean, it's really indicative of Taiwan's complex history. It has been fully or partially controlled by so many powers, be it Europeans, and in the 20th century, it was a colony of Japan. What we just saw in terms of the black and white images is the fact that there was a civil war in China after World War II and the losers, basically Guam Dang, moved and fled to the island of Taiwan. , so it became a considerable group of people who considered themselves Chinese and lived in Taiwan, of course, you have to take that into account. although before it was not an empty island, there are indigenous people, there is an indigenous population and there are people who have lived there for many generations, so it is an island with a complex history and I really think it goes back to I think the most important thing is to stop talk about history to a certain extent and just keep your eyes fixed.

The situation here has to do with self-determination. You have a group of people of 23 million people who want to mind their own business and that's it. That should be good enough without having to do it, I think it's very, I mean, we see this in a lot of conflicts around the world where authoritarian states or any partystarts to turn to history to validate or substantiate their control over an area and I think you know the values ​​of I think the most important values ​​are um or the self-determination of the people, and this is what the people in Taiwan want.

They don't want anything to do with the People's Republic of China, in terms of political control, Taiwan has its own kind of founding myth and calls itself the Republic of China and also claims some kind of reunification. I mean the Republic of China China is something that was established by the losers of the civil war and this was not in cooperation with any of the people who lived there at the time and for many years Taiwan was administered as an authoritarian state, it was not like that. until much later than the democratic process, in fact, it had its first elections in 1996.

So this is a young democracy, people have died for this democracy, there was no conflict in the classic sense of a war, but people had You have to stand up and fight. To know the current situation in Taiwan in terms of the freedoms that it has, I mean, of course, I'm sure many people know that Taiwan is a very progressive and liberal democracy, it's the first place in Asia where marriage between people of the same sex. it has universal healthcare, some other things that I think people need to understand as well because there are a lot of people who don't understand that you know this is really a de facto independent state.

When you pay taxes in Taiwan, you are not paying. Beijing, you are paying the Taipei government. You have your own passport. You have, like I said, universal health care. I said that? Don't know. Well, yes, it's good to know that universal healthcare exists. It's a system. um set in place um and uh you know it has its own country code when you call right and actually here's a fun fact like when you're in Beijing and you want to travel to Taipei there were direct flights there uh actually , were previously covered. many direct flights, you still had to go through the international terminal in Beijing, so no matter what the rhetoric of the Chinese government in Beijing says, they recognize even if they don't want to, that is, if they didn't, if they were convinced that Taiwan is part of China, so you would take a domestic flight, but they aren't, so it's a fun and interesting fact, there's a lot going on in the chat, a lot of people agree with you, and there's a lot of people like TSP who really want to understand the role of the United States in all of this because, um, he or she wonders if the United States will defend Taiwan militarily when it comes to the point and how to get to what the US policy is in all of this .

The United States does not have a policy to automatically defend Taiwan militarily in the event of an attack and I think that is something that many people do not necessarily understand that there is an agreement to provide aid and assistance to Taiwan in the event of an attack and this implies that Over the years a lot of sales of military equipment from the United States to Taiwan, so that's the short answer. I'll be brief because it seems like there are a lot more questions, but I mean, look, I mean, maybe go a little further to the right, like Biden spoke and said wrong, he spoke wrong, or he said three times, he suggested that the United States would come to Taiwan's defense in the event of a military attack only to be quickly walked back by White House staff, so you know, Biden. is known for trash-talking and a lot of people it's not necessarily the first time he did it, you know, Biden was Biden trash-talking for the second time, the third time he did it, people were wondering, you know, so America has a policy called strategic strategy. ambiguity but people were like man, this is too confusing, it's like a strategic confusion, what are you trying to say here?

There is nothing more ambiguous than saying something three times and taking it back each time, well others have taken it back for him and perhaps to continue with another community question, Jim Flagg asks: Was China doing these exercises for the world or for your own people? That's a great question, I think both, but if you wanted to ponder it, there are certainly a lot of performative actions that the Chinese state does for its own people, I mean, in many ways, Beijing has painted itself into a corner because the propaganda in China is very strong, I mean, even even very progressive Chinese like, for example, someone in China who believes in LGBTQ rights, right? talking to them about Taiwan is like it's one of those conversations that you just can't have as if Taiwan is automatically part of China.

This has been instilled for years in patriotic education there. It wasn't always like this. The way this wasn't always the case since the beginning of the People's Republic of China, this is something that has been pronounced noticeably in the last 20 years, so you've created a population of nationalists, that's what you wanted and now they want blood . It's shocking how many people in China when I was there who actually believed it was worth shedding blood killing people in Taiwan to retake it. I think that's something we don't emphasize in the world. doesn't know enough and of course in a country of 1.4 billion people you will always find people who don't disagree, correct people who are against an invasion of Taiwan, but it's very scary how many people believe that.

Taiwan is part of China and will do so if necessary. They agree with the military invasion. Yeah, well, you said the myth that China is using this idea that they were once unified and they want to reunify them. This is a myth that has been built. to encourage the Chinese to support the government's plan to basically take over Taiwan, but if we talk about history and mention that at the beginning it was a military dictatorship, very supported by the American army, there was a military base on the island that no longer exists , but at first the United States was hopeful that if they could maintain this kind of Taiwan as resistance to the Communist takeover of China, Taiwan would one day be the launching pad for an attempt to push back against China. in a partner of the US, so this is, although it is not what Beijing talks about rhetorically when it talks about reunifying Taiwan with the homeland, it is that it is not China's consideration that Taiwan does not just deal with its own affairs, but that is part of it.

Of the United States' design to maintain dominance in that region, I think in the early years after World War II and the Civil War, that was certainly the case, but the big moment was when the United States broke diplomatic relations with Taiwan, the republic of

china

and it was changed to the People's Republic of China, there was a great desire on the part of Beijing at that time to do it precisely because they did not want one of the many reasons, but yes, from the beginning the idea arose that Taiwan could be a release. pad, but Taiwan has moved forward, it is a generation of young people who have never lived in China, never been born in China, mostly, true, maybe some, there are some in exchanges and things like that, but people have their own identity, Leave me alone.

To give you an example, in current surveys, more than 90 percent of people in Taiwan consider themselves Taiwanese, less than five percent of people in Taiwan consider themselves exclusively Chinese. Now this number was not the case 20 years ago, over time the place has developed its own identity. By the way, it always had a separate identity, right, I don't want to be misunderstood, and especially after democratization, they are looking at China, they are looking at authoritarianism and they say we have nothing to do with this place. In fact, we have a tweet from the president of Taiwan. What I find interesting about this, if you could already share your screen.

I've highlighted the word she uses very often, status quo, so she tweeted this after Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan. If you listen to a speech from her or if you read a tweet from her, this is the most used word, she always says that to talk about what are her demands, basically, what does the status quo mean to Taiwanese? So linking one here is basically saying that she's just not going to do anything that would upset or rock the boat, right? Beijing's great fear is that Taiwan will declare independence from it. I said before that it is a de facto independent country.

But it has never declared itself as such and Taiwan has done it or rather China has done it. I have always said that this is one of the red lines, you can't declare independence if you do, you know it will be fire and brimstone, so, Beijing has accused Tai of encouraging independence, of being pro-independence, so this is something. that she has really said it outright because there are also disinformation campaigns and disinformation campaigns that say that people in Taiwan want to declare independence, so that is a misunderstanding for a lot of people in China is that they think that all these people in Taiwan are ready to declare independence and actually that's not the case again in polls, the vast majority of Taiwanese understand that declaring formal independence would be really dangerous, I mean look what happened when an 82 year old woman dressed in pink appeared in Taiwan as if China had lost.

It's, you know, pelosi pelosi, another story. I didn't know she was wearing pink. It was like she was wearing pink shoes anyway. um, so that's my style. The right thing, imagine what would happen if Taiwan declared independence, so she, this is Tai, says that the status quo nothing is going to change, we are not going to change the objectives and we reiterate that and also counter the propaganda that is now part of the status quo. Taiwan is the leading force when it comes to semiconductors and cheats. The Amsterdam gym flag and coffee time say well, the main reason to answer our question of why China has not invaded Taiwan.

Still, they say at least well because they say it's about the chips and If Taiwan cuts China off semiconductor chips, this would eventually destroy China and really hurt them, so maybe that's also part of the reasoning that none of the status quo is moving because they actually have some influence there, it's very difficult to say correctly, I mean. One of the reasons Xi Jinping might not be taking action right now is because he is still in a period where he is sealing his leadership position in China. He's going through a process and he's about to get his third term and then you know he's going to be a leader for Dictator for Life, right, so that might be a consideration from Beijing, I mean part of the problem with all of this, right? ?

Your big question, what is stopping China from invading Taiwan, right, is that we just don't have a sense of Chinese leadership and thinking about Xi Jinping, he might be thinking about semiconductors and I want to emphasize to people that this sounds like semiconductors, who cares, this is so important, it's like Russian energy, you know, for the EU, it's that important, like what's the problem with Taiwan. makes the most advanced semiconductors in the world, the semiconductors are made by Taiwan and Taiwan pretty much only makes them, I mean there are a lot of other countries that make semiconductors, but they make the most advanced ones that are used in US military aircraft, so it's gold .

It is extremely valuable and if that is a route, if semiconductors stopped being manufactured in Taiwan, if there was a blockade or there was a conflict, this will not only affect the United States, it will affect the EU, it will affect everyone. It is the developed world's version of the grain that is trapped in Ukraine. 92 of the most developed semiconductors come from Taiwan and the other eight percent come from Korea, so you really see that Melissa just said that she plays an important role answering our guys' questions. she and she also plays a role, as she said she, in the rest of the world.

I saw one of these types of simulations and he said, "Well, if these semiconductors are removed from the market, there will be a huge loss in the world economy, so it really plays a role for the rest of the world, guys, I just want to move things here because our next guest is waiting and we only have him for a limited time, um, if you said Melissa, no one has an idea what China is thinking, but if anyone knows, it could be Bonnie Glaser, she's from the German Marshall Fund, director of the Asia program and we're going to bring her in.

It's going to be great to get her perspective on what's stopping China from invading Taiwan now we were talking about various issues, we're talking about the history of Taiwan and what I want to start with you is we have a real graph. which we have produced that shows that basically compares Taiwan's military to China's military, if we could improve that, we can just see the discrepancy here, um, China is completely dominating Taiwan's military if you compare active personnel from 2 million to 169,000 tanks and artillery, 15,000 to 2,700 aircraft in total, China's dwarfed Taiwan and um, also in naval ship submarines, a little less, Taiwan has quite a few submarines, but overall, it's a bleak outlook for Taiwan if he were completely alone, given that it is not Taiwan's military that is preventing China from invading.

China, well, thank you very much for the question, obviously, first, agreat graph, but Taiwan has 23 and a half million people and China has 1.4 billion, so it's not surprising that Taiwan's military is much smaller, but I think actually the answer to your question about what's stopping China invade Taiwan is that the invasion of Taiwan, the use of force against Taiwan is truly a last resort for China. They want unification by other means. They have tried to use the carrot and stick. They have given incentives to Taiwanese businessmen so that students who really want to win without a fight want to instill a feeling of psychological desperation among the people of Taiwan and convince them that they know that they really have no choice and that their future will be better for them and their children if They simply agree to integrate with China, so the use of China's military capability buildup is really to deter Taiwan from becoming independent.

It is certainly to deter the United States from intervening. It's there as a last resort and there may come a day when China decides to invade Taiwan, but I think. that the exercises we have seen over the last week were not a prelude to an invasion, they were a warning sign to the United States, to Taiwan, you raised the issue before to the domestic audience, yes, they were also to placate the audience national, uh, she's angry. about the speaker of the US House of Representatives visiting Taiwan and of course they were exercises to hone China's ability to conduct joint operations to impose a blockade and take other measures against Taiwan, so They serve multiple purposes, huh, bonnie.

There are a lot of questions for you in the chat, especially when it comes to the military side and I want to ask Anazimir one of them. The question is how many troops China would need for a successful landing and how many it can. are they actually transported there, well that's a great question. I think most people say they would need at least 100,000 troops um. The second half of the question is hotly debated, so if you focus only on your Navy amphibious landing ships and their transport vehicles, I have to conclude that they do not have enough lifting capacity, but some experts argue and I think this is a worthwhile argument, considering that China actually plans to use what we call its white helmets or its coast guard. its law enforcement vessels as well as its maritime militia, so that includes a lot of fishing vessels and that this is not like a temporary plan for China that it is using while it builds larger transport ships.

Actually, this is their plan that China often relies on. its maritime militia and law enforcement ships to carry out missions in the South China Sea, so why not in the Taiwan Strait? So there are people who argue that the PLA is capable today of transporting large numbers of soldiers across the strait, perhaps enough to seize and control Taiwan now I want to continue with that because I read it before in the chat, people said that yes, maybe by numbers the Chinese army is big, but from experience it is actually lacking a lot because the last war was a proper war that The Chinese army was involved in the Vietnam War, which took place in the late 70s and early 80s, so that plays a role that they don't really have experience in, especially when it comes to Taiwan, which is a very difficult type of mission to invade Taiwan like in general, does that play a role?

These or the simulations are sufficient. Well, I think the Chinese military, what they write about their own capabilities, suggests that they understand that they have shortcomings. There are areas where they really don't have the more advanced capability that they just had. They really began to carry out joint operations in recent years. They are implementing defense reforms. They are trying to adopt more integrated command and control, but it is difficult to get the services to work together. It has taken the United States a long time. It's time to really hone that capability so it's definitely a challenge and the military knows it's a challenge that said if the Chinese Communist Party decided today that its party legitimacy was in jeopardy because Taiwan had declared its independence or because the United States said he would no longer have a one China policy if we decided to recognize Taiwan, so I think if the PLA is told to invade Taiwan, he will do it whether he's ready or not, and I just want to remind people, uh, in the chat and if the people who are just joining us what we're talking about today is why are you stopping China from invading Taiwan and I think the reason why we're so focused on the military here as well, I mean the first question is what is stopping china um from invading

taiwan

and you said well they want to do it peacefully but i think in the back of everyone's mind is yes xi jinping has said many times that china taiwan will meet china with beijing and taiwan is walking away more and more of the idea that they would ever let that happen, I mean, polls show that there is an overwhelming majority of people there will never agree to be reunited by uh with Beijing and they are also strengthening their military to make sure that doesn't happen. , It is not like this? avoiding the topic if we say there won't be a confrontation one day because right, if Beijing says well, we'd rather do it peacefully and Taiwan says, well, we'll never do it peacefully, then I think that's why so many people want to talk about the military here because seems like the logical conclusion so let's break this down a bit, it's a real question, um yeah, I'd love to know why we shouldn't worry about a world war in the next year or two.

Definitely not in the next year or two, so most people I talk to who are experts in this area believe the real threat could come later this decade or in the early 2030s, I'm not really talking of that. next year or two, you have to think about Xi Jinping's cost-benefit calculation and you have to think about the risks if he invades and loses, what, what is the impact on the reputation of the party in China at home, with the party . It is considered that it has not defended the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the nation, that could affect its position in power or even the government of the party, and on top of that there is the cost of the reaction of other countries that would probably forge an anti coalition -China.

With the United States, the world would turn against China, so China gains Taiwan but loses its ability to achieve its global ambitions, and let's remember that CJ's most important global ambition is not just to accumulate great power and possibly even become a superpower. , but it is also national. Rejuvenation of the country is the goal for 2049 that includes becoming a leader in innovation and technologies, for example, and those sets of goals, all the goals associated with natural rejuvenation, would be put at risk if China uses force against Taiwan, so I think. You really have to look at how Xi Jinping thinks about costs and benefits.

I mean what Xi Jinping has said about Taiwan, it's really important to look at everything he's said and he's said very little. That's the first point, most of what he has said has been said by previous leaders. Reunification is inevitable. It is a historic mission of the Chinese Communist Party. You know, the use of force is not ruled out on the table, but peaceful reunification is the way. What would they prefer now that all these things have been said for years? Xi Jinping has said two things that previous leaders didn't say first in 2013, he told a former Taiwan vice president when he met him on the sidelines of a regional meeting. he said that we really shouldn't pass on our differences between Taiwan and mainland China from one generation to another and then he said at the 19th party congress that national rejuvenation cannot take place without reunification and that has suggested for the first time It's time we really There is a timeline and that has worried people a lot, but I bet you that by 2049, Xi Jinping will not be ruling China, he will be like 95 years old.

So if you look at the actuarial tables, he will be someone else, c Jinping. cares about what he does while he is a leader, I think that question is the reason I asked it too, I think it is on everyone's mind that we just saw an authoritarian ruler invade a country, Ukraine, without regard almost completely the consequences and I think that That's what surprised everyone to think that maybe we are living in a world where war no longer means what it used to and that everything could be lost if the wrong calculations are made because we have seen Russia just plays its cards there, so I think a lot.

A lot of people are worried that China is going to do the same thing, but what I hear you saying is that it's not the same country, not the same ambitions, and maybe a completely different calculus. Now one of the questions in the chat was: how do you breathe? Of course, China is not Ukraine. Taiwan is not Taiwan, it is not Ukraine. China is not Russia. in terms of technology and he asks technology what role does technology play in all of this because as I understand it, China wants to be the world leader or maybe even be the world leader when it comes to technology, what role play?

In short, the conflict with Taiwan, frankly, technology is central to China's conflict and the competition with the United States much less with Taiwan, this is a question of who will be the technological leader of the world, so if we go back to 2015 and to China In the 2025 plan that Xi Jinping put in place, you can see these 10 really core areas of strategic technology that China wants to dominate in and semiconductors are one of them and of course Melissa Chan talked about that, you mentioned , I think 92 percent of the most. Advanced semiconductors are produced in Taiwan, so China depends on them, the United States depends on them, just like everyone else.

China is not going to go to war over semiconductors, that is not their main concern when it comes to Taiwan, so I just don't think so. That is the most important thing in Xi Jinping's calculation, but when it comes to competition between the United States and China, Xi Jinping has discovered that technology is absolutely crucial to developing advanced capabilities and competing with the United States around the world, so they are investing huge amounts. amounts of money in artificial intelligence in machine tools and in many areas, so what I have understood so far is that at some point there will be some type of escalation, but to return to the question we want to ask, basically, why?

China has not yet invaded Taiwan. They weren't ready yet. It's fair to say. I think I said more than that. It's not just that they are not ready. They want to solve their problem with Taiwan without using force. That's your preference. I do not rule out the use of force, there may come a time when they feel they have to use force, but they have not decided that they will use force and it is not their preference. Well, actually we have a map that I would like to bring. Now, when we talk about why the war would be, why China could lose from the war, why that would not achieve its objectives, neither in the medium nor in the long term, we want to analyze the situation that they find themselves in.

We are facing in the Pacific if there were to be an open conflict. If you have it, you have Michaela. This basically, first of all, describes where they conducted military exercises, so it was last week where China landed missiles at sea in the Taiwan Strait and also around Taiwan which completely surrounds the island and that gives you an idea of how close Taiwan is to China, but if we zoom out, here are all the allies of the United States, the United States is still the dominant military power in the Pacific. and these are all the countries that would essentially come to the aid of the united states and taiwan if it turned into a military conflict and again this is the vast pacific ocean that divides the united states from china and if you can get some perspective on how far apart they are the United States of this area of ​​the world that they are still dominating militarily, but what we have seen in the last few years, in the last 10 or 20 years, is that China has gained military dominance in that area in some ways. that was perhaps not expected before and relative to the US it is losing dominance, is that why we have not seen a reaction to these drills in Taiwan?

Is this an indication that the US is looking the other way, not at all, no, the United States? The United States is certainly going to react to these drills. You, you, when you showed the map. I think you said that America's allies, that you know, would get involved in a war in the Taiwan Strait and I and I want to ask a question. Note that teams from South Korea, uh, Thailand certainly won't get involved in a war in Taiwan. I mean, we don't know if the United States would engage in a war on Taiwan trade. I think as the relationship between the United States and China continues. to intensify the likelihood of the United States coming to Taiwan's defense will grow exponentially, I think this has been the trend in recent years, so Taiwan,I mean, it made the rounds, that's for sure, when it happened and it made the rounds in Hong Kong, China and Taiwan, yeah, I mean, this is it.

This is something that Chinese diplomats have been a Beijing strategy that, frankly, I think the United States was slow, I mean, they have been very aggressive, very strategic in terms of participating in international institutions that, frankly, in the later world. The Second War period was created by the United States and so you have a lot of representation in the UN and in UN organizations like the WHO, where there are many Chinese diplomats who exert a lot of pressure, so they have played. uh you know they've gotten into the international game international institutions game keep in mind remember Donald Trump turned you know he pushed back the United States and withdrew from these organizations and basically ceded territory to the Chinese to allow them push your agenda correctly.

I mean, in many ways, as you long referenced the international, the international order was established by the United States and allowed the United States to push its agenda and now we see a much more insular DC, at least under the latest president. um, that allowed the Chinese to actually move in and they're involved in the human rights council, um, for example, in geneva, um, and I can list over and over again, there's all these kinds of international organizations that govern, you know , like the Internet, you know, flights. international flight and they have been very engaged, I mean Beijing now, two things I want to mention first, we asked the question, kind of an additional question in the chat, if anyone knows how many other countries have officially recognized Taiwan. and gustavo palos who some may remember from the first episode i was there you remember he actually guessed it right he's like a dw superfan he says 13 what an extra applause for you you knew you needed the right answer um and the second thing What you really want to get from what Melissa said is kind of, um, the idea. of when the United States is a little bewildered and perhaps the film no longer plays the role in its place, who perhaps steps in and Surah asks what role other Central Asian countries could play in this case.

If the United States remains inactive, what role can they play? plays um we have William he's coming with us yeah okay so we can answer that first and then bring William uh yeah I'm sure you want to answer so the question was about what role the other Central Asian countries. the future of central asia geographically is too far from taiwan to really be a player and they are a bit stuck their concern is actually managing the relationship between russia and china they are a bit stuck between these two powers in terms of how they orient themselves, so I don't think it's a calculation regarding Taiwan.

Short answer. What I think is interesting is to return to this clip of who where one of those who I think is wearing it is a Tedros advisor. I'm sorry, I can't pronounce his name. On camera you meet the director general, yes, of the World Health Organization, so he's a very important person in the World Health Organization and he can't even answer a question about Taiwan, which makes me wonder what life is like in a country and how to maintain it. a status quo that excludes you from important organizations like the world health organization, now there are other organizations, human rights councils, and maybe it's unfair to be excluded from them, but when you have a global pandemic and you can't even get an answer According to advisors to the general director of that organization, it seems that it could become a humanitarian crisis at some points.

That's the status quo in Taiwan right now. I am simply accepting that you are not part of the global community. So I want. bring william yang because he's in taipei um he woke up at three in the morning to do this interview with us um but he's a very dedicated journalist he's been on dw news very often recently um but for a while now, right, william, I've been with you for a while, yeah, and we want to hear from you, first of all, what the situation is right now, in general, so I think the situation here since Pelosi landed or even before she got there now it has remained relatively calm.

People haven't really been saber rattling or panicking even though there have been six straight days of Chinese military exercises in Taiwan and the proximity of these exercises, according to expert analysis, is dangerously close and I have been running all kinds of different scenarios where miscalculations could have occurred, but I think the Taiwanese are really used to this kind of increasing bullying from China on a day-to-day basis, so stop them whenever they want. what they felt is that these military exercises are more like more signals from Beijing, stronger signals from Beijing rather than thinking that Beijing is really around the corner and trying to push with their armies because they still trust the government's assessment and they also feel Beijing is not completely ready to make the final move yet because there are other factors that they feel will slow Xi Jinping down or at least make him think twice before doing that, so people here decided that.

You know, instead of feeling too overwhelmed by these possible apocalyptic scenarios or the potential for an invasion, they should move on with their lives, but at the same time keep an eye on what's really happening in the neighborhood. Carry on, stay calm, carry on with the situation, we actually have some impressions from the people on the streets of Taipei, um, if we could play that, um, this was done a couple of days ago, uh, Hannah told me, but it gives you an idea of ​​what people are like. feeling after at least the exercises started we need a second to finish that very quickly no in the meantime maybe um william I'm really interested because for me it's crazy to understand in Taiwan when these military exercises happen what's the situation what's what's going on is that people are scared or they like how they react because it seems like at least when you cover the news it looks really dramatic and when you look you know you see planes flying and yeah I think a missile flew over the territory where the missile flies. about the cherry that kills you, we will see that there are all these like ships, do people change their behavior then or do I like how?

I'm really interested in the first reaction, what do you do? I'll probably take the first day of the uh, like, uh, exercise as an example, that day also happened to be Chinese Valentine's Day, uh, so instead of worrying too much about the 11 missiles that were fired by China and, according to four reportedly flew over Taiwan, people are still very romantic. dinners with your partner, you know, partners and people were buying fancy things for their girlfriends and there were people buying flowers to go home to celebrate this special day and very few people were really shouting together and trying to watch the news. and I look at everything, so I think this can be said to be a desensitization of all these years of bullying, like moves made by China, but I also think it's just the coping mechanism of the Taiwanese because they know that this is an escalation. version of the answer and they consider this to be a way for Beijing to actually try to implant more fear or more fear in their minds instead of trying to fire the missiles directly at Taiwan because you know China had introduced failed missiles. before in 1996, although it is not as dramatic or as close as this time, but for them this only reminds them of the way China tries to prevent Taiwan from engaging with the international community and both times it turned out to be the result of Taiwan.

Trying to engage with the United States at a very high level, we have the interviews ready for you so that we can interpret them very quickly, concerned about a possible world. I can't predict whether a war will break out or not. I don't want to. to think about it yes they have been saying it for a long time china has said that they will attack us but this time it has never happened they probably just want to scare us my children are worried about the war they asked what was possible here and where to hide I told them where the shelters are but we have no control over that I don't want to worry about something I can't control now one of those, especially the first commenter, was not a little indifferent but said whatever happens, happens and yesterday he asked: what does the general population know? ?

It's hard to understand the general population as a whole, but you want to know what the general population of Taiwan really wants to happen. The ideal would be if we look at the next five years. Ten years, what would you like? I think of course they are very practical about what they can want, so their greatest desire is to maintain the status quo, to maintain concern for the current way of life and to ensure that China is not. They are going to invade the freedom that you are enjoying right now or the rights that you enjoy under the democratic system here, but at the same time they wouldn't necessarily know how to expect more countries to suddenly change and recognize Taiwan as a country because it has never been like that since 1979, after the United States changed diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China, so I think for them more concrete support from different countries, even if it's not diplomatic recognition, means a lot. more that, you know, these countries are trying to use Taiwan as a way to make political gains domestically, so there's also a very interesting insight into Pelosi's visit.

I think more Taiwanese still see the visit as something positive. It is a way to show that the United States is still committed to collaborating with Taiwan at such a high level. Obviously, many of the internal discussions in the United States matter much less to them because I refer to them when they see a very high level. Official visit and appear in front of their eyes, that is the proof of the support of the USA, they would think much less of you, you know, how those movements could be interpreted in the USA, at the national level, you said that the Most Taiwanese want to maintain the status quo. the way the status quo is maintained and that's what the president has also been saying in a lot of the tweets of hers, but doesn't it bother the Taiwanese on some level when I think they may have seen this clip that we just played ?

The world health organization itself cannot recognize that Taiwan is an independent country with its own rules and treats it as if the pandemic in Taiwan were the same as that in China, although they have completely different systems and it would be absurd to think that everything What happens in China happens in Taiwan and treating them is the same at the public health level. I mean, this is not a joke, people's lives are at stake, it's not just the formal diplomatic relationship, does that bother you? this is not part of the status quo that they can get recognition, I think it is the same as the Taiwanese accepting the fact that knowing whether a war is going to happen or not is not really under their control, I think we all know very well that the Control over whether Taiwan can regain access to the assembly, not even as a full member but as an observer, is in Beijing's hands, so instead of trying to get really angry about something Taiwan doesn't do.

I don't really have any control, I think people prefer to trust that the government uses more creative ways to help Taiwan have more access to share information from other friendly countries that are willing to share the information with Taiwan, but at the same time I trust in the government for being more proactive when there are signs that maybe another pandemic or epidemic is on the rise, so for example in the last few days there was another new virus that was just detected within the China and Taiwan CDC. They immediately alerted the population here and they started sharing some of the information they were able to gather, which was also the same way Taiwan handled the emergence of the greed pandemic, you know, over two years ago, so Taiwan decided to close its border at an early stage and try to prevent the spread of the virus within the border and that is also why I think Taiwan was able to achieve its initial success and knows its motto.

It was actually studied or like a lot of countries sent representatives to Taiwan to try to get more experience of Taiwan's way of handling the pandemic, so I think it's just going back to how the Taiwanese view this lack of access to international organizations, I think at the end of the day, of course, they hope that one day there will be a way to convince Beijing to allow Taiwan and China to coexist in these organizations that have very little non-political meaning, right? Public health is the organization that will focus on the well-being of people's health, but at the same time I think you know very well that under the world of Xi Jinping that is becoming less and less unlikely because what China is now really .

What I'm trying to do is squeeze the space for Taiwan to have some kind of meaningful international involvement, although it may not be political. China can still use that as a wedge and away to put political pressure on Taiwan now. Well, we also have our own super user in Taiwan, Jonathan Fung, and he says that life in Taiwan is more or less unaffected by exercises, so I have another impression, um, there, one of the things I work on , I was kind of interested in something. What Josh asked is basically, maybe talking about the Taiwanese military and you know what role it plays and maybe you understand for yourself, William.

I saw a report, I think, in our colleagues in the department that suggested that okay, they're something like that. They are taking it seriously and there are more and more people who are at least trying to learn how to use a gun. They are like checking and well, where are the bunkers. So it's something that's seen as a surge in popularity where people just think about it more and just from people's perspective, I think okay, eventually I need to prepare for it, so maybe let's think about it more, let's do like an alphabet on how to use a weapon.

I think increasing people's awareness of what they need. being familiar with the basics, you know, like weapons or at least knowing how to operate them, was brought on by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, so after February we started to see a lot more private companies with the legal license to actually organize this type of weapons training camps to start seeing an increase in registrations for similar participants and normal citizens who use their free time at work or on the weekends to participate in these types of similar training camps and there are also organizations that lobby to increase people's knowledge about the type of first aid treatment because on the battlefields they felt that most Taiwanese actually do not have enough knowledge to know how to save other people who were injured or who are in a combat situation, so these types of workshops have also become very popular in recent months, so I think when people watch or read information or news about the military exercise this time, I definitely think there is a growing awareness compared Chinese military exercise because I think the fact that they still know that the potential for war will always be lurking in the back of their minds, but if they can start to acquire more basic skills, you know, that would be useful in a situation where that China decided to invade them.

They would know that they want to equip themselves with those kinds of skills, so I think there is a catalyst which is Russia, you know, the war in Ukraine. Obviously there are still a lot of parallels that can't really be compared to each other, but at the same time I think that scenario and the scenes and the unity that you see in the Ukrainian people have really shown and another interesting sign is that Taiwan has recently launched a program very new reservist training program that is much more robust and much more concrete with its similar training content and many Taiwanese have volunteered or at least hope to participate in those trainings because they felt This is the time to increase their skills real to know how to operate and you know where to stand and what role they can play in a real combat situation, but William, I want to say one thing about some of the volunteers. organizations or NGOs that teach first aid or even people who learn how to use air guns, actually because there are very strict rules about shooting in shooting ranges in Taiwan, but in reality we are talking about only a few thousand people.

I mean, we don't have concrete numbers, maybe I mean, maybe you do, but it's my feeling and I was also in Taiwan recently, as you know, very recently, actually, and Pelosi was coming in, we were going out, but, that's just it. a few thousand out of 23 million people, right, and number two, I'd love for you to talk a little bit more about what you were talking about, you know, increasing the number of reservists, but just about conscription, right, all men They need to serve for four months, that's not a long time, and from conversations I've had with people who have done their duty for four months, they don't learn much how to use a gun, they learn how to clean a gun, but there aren't even enough bullets. . in some cases to practice shooting and another way to put it is some people have said it's almost four months of push-ups and they don't feel like they're spending their time in the military and really learning how to defend the country. a little bit more about that um we don't have sound currently I think you might be muted or we've muted it I hope it's necessary so I think that's it until we sort out William I think what stands out for us is that there's an ambiguity Well, definitely. there are some parts that are okay, we have to prepare, but like you said, you probably know better than us too, these are not big numbers, it's not like Taiwan's population is like, oh, we have to reach out to each other. and we should learn it, there are some of them, but strategically Taiwan may have made a mistake by toning it down, especially learning exercises and equipping for this.

Okay, you're in a country that at some point maybe I'm going to enter. a military altercation a four month conspiracy like that's not enough basically I mean it used to be longer right it used to be two years and then they kept reducing it and now it's four months and that's actually something from a US perspective United, you know? People in DC have also privately expressed to the Taiwanese government that they aren't taking their own security seriously if they know they aren't and some of the things that Bonnie had said right, like Taiwan isn't watching, such maybe they have looked. in Finland, but they are not employing or deploying some of the preparations that people in Finland are right or looking at the South Korean recruiting service or looking downright at the Israelis, right, but I wonder if that has a lot to do with the Taiwan's belief that the United States would come to its defense because no matter how strong Taiwan is militarily, it would not be able to take on Beijing alone from an invasion by China, so perhaps the idea is that, if we have the United States supporting us, then we won't do it.

We need to prepare to defend ourselves, that is, we have made the comparison with Ukraine. Ukraine has long known that it was alone, that it was not a member of NATO, that it would not get any military involvement from the United States. while china and taiwan are calculating with a different result, i mean, there are certainly people in taiwan who take that view, it's a very dangerous view, right, because we just don't know, i mean, bonnie believes that the The United States, when the time comes, will intervene, but we just don't know and imagine if it were a president like Trump who, you know, seemed to have no scruples. the bus is william back, he hasn't done it yet, but I actually have a question to answer from the community, um, details of the territory and daryl, big name of the metro, um question, given the aggressiveness of the CCP, how have you kept Taiwan the control of I think it's pronounced jin men and Matsu, given the proximity of those islands to the minions, basically explaining that Taiwan is not just the main island, there are several other small islands and some of them are very close to the Chinese mainland, Very close to Jin Min it is simply the closest point to China. 1.2 miles away so you can watch.

I have been to Jinmen. You can see it. You can see China from there. I mean, look. I think part of that we also have a map. We're going to get closer there because it's totally crazy. It's crazy guys, five star restaurants like that, that's the island and it's much closer to mainland China than Turkey or Taiwan. You can really swim across the distance. Yeah, I mean, it's a great question. I have to confess that I am. I am not in a position to answer it completely. I'm not entirely focused on Taiwan's military, but I would say one reason is that it would constitute an act of war and would greatly increase, you know, cross-strait tensions, I guess.

The reality is that Taiwan probably couldn't do much. I think there is a battalion there, but it would be easily overwhelmed, but it would really fill out. I mean, it would really raise tensions. And the other thing that some people have thought is that if China were to do something so gradual, it might as well go directly to Taiwan. One thing I really want to mention is that you close the side. Well, we don't have the map. One thing I want to mention is that we are researching this saw. that there are many war games, so we basically simulate a war scenario.

In fact, we have prepared a video that was on vybo, which is the Chinese version of Facebook. We want to clarify, the user is not the Chinese government, there is nothing official about that. makes sense, but it shows that there is some popularity almost because the video has, I think, 200,000 plus 200,000 views and maybe we can switch to that and just so you guys get an impression of what it actually looks like. basically a Chinese user who created a scenario for the invasion of Taiwan, then a Chinese user made a simulation in 2020 of a Taiwanese invasion, so they just outline different ships and planes and you know what kind of strategic things they will attack first. um, what's next, who's coming next, we have a great analysis from our own Richard Walker, who really played out the different scenarios.

You know how this could play out, I actually want to talk less about the scenarios and more about this. kind of popularity and on the Chinese side, um, what's your position in terms of people, especially the younger generation, fantasizing about a military invasion of Taiwan, which is kind of yeah, so one of the things that people don't understand, um, it's that the younger generation in China is actually tougher and more nationalistic than their parents, you have to think that in the 1980s China was, this is like pre-tienem and square, there was a Openness in terms of intellectual exchange was a period when people felt they could start to express themselves and there was a lot of hope in terms of the political direction in which China could move, could possibly move, so those are the parents after the Tiananmen Square in Beijing and the The government decided that we can't have any of that, we need to instil more of what they call patriotic education, so it's usually the other way around, the parents are more conservative and nationalistic wherever they are and the children are not They don't care in China, it's really a change. the younger generation, the millennials, the z generation uh, they are much more nationalistic and that video you just saw about a possible invasion does not surprise me, as I said before, you know, Taiwan is one of those issues in China where even a Very, very progressive, socially progressive Chinese, they might be like I'm in favor of lgbtq rights, but oh Taiwan, Taiwan is part of China, like they don't talk about self-determination, the feelings and views of the people in Taiwan, so yeah, it's scary, I think, I think.

People need to understand that nationalism is largely a creation of the Chinese propaganda authoritarian state and that they have created a population of people who want to see Taiwan absorbed into China at any cost. What we have talked about before is the way opinion about Taiwan itself has also changed over the generation. He has seen many more people identify as Taiwanese rather than Chinese. He's seen a lot more people. More reluctant to ever imagine unification with China, with Beijing and the politicians in Beijing who are very pro-democratic and pro-democracy and this is really, I guess the second generation has grown up with a democracy instead of a military dictatorship, so really It has changed in recent years as well and my question is what is happening?

People who still feel connected to China. Is this something people talk about? Is opinion taboo or do people talk about it openly? They fantasize about one day becoming part of the large Chinese demographic that tends to be. really old people now established in generations octogenarians right people who came from o o or were children of people who came from mainland China, but it is a shrinking group of people and there is a unification group of people that most people in Taiwan consider extremists. they'll show up at protests and all that um and you know Taiwan is a free society, you can protest however you want um so yeah, I mean most of the people, even the party, the political party that's not in power right now. moment, which has been Traditionally seen as friendlier to China, is the political party of the former authoritarian state of Taiwan, even they have made it clear that they want to be left alone and see no path to unification and, certainly, another thing worth mentioning is hong.

Kong, that's right, one country, two systems, that line was actually applied to Taiwan before it was applied as a concept to Hong Kong back in the early 1980s when the British and the Chinese came to an agreement. agreement to hand over Hong Kong. Back off, so that hasn't worked very well for the people of Hong Kong and the people of Taiwan have givenaccount. Yes, he sent a signal to Taiwan. What can happen when Beijing decides to move when they want to? To do this now we have a lot of questions from the chat, some of them are even much more basic, but I understand it because in the chat there are people talking about the prc, the roc and the race and they ask what is the difference between the prc and the roc, which Which I understand.

If you just read those three letters, you'll say I don't know, yeah, I mean the People's Republic of China, which is Beijing and the Republic of China refers to Taiwan because again, I'm sure a lot of people tune in, right? You know? 90 minutes ago we probably weren't around for my explanation, but you know there was a civil war in China, the losers retreated to Taiwan and established what they considered the true representative government of China, Republic of China, Free China, if you will. and that's the residue, so Taiwan is a place of contradictions and oddities, just like its official name is the Republic of China, that's confusing, it doesn't make sense to a lot of people, even its flag, you know, um, in The Emblem It is the emblem of Guam Dong, the KMT, one of the parties in Taiwan, but it certainly does not represent everyone.

So you know, there are residues of things that happened in the 20th century that have stayed, yes, and I just want to acknowledge. I think we've lost our um correspondent in Taipei, William Yang, we want to thank him for joining us and we apologize, his sound went off and then we lost connection with him, but we want to thank everyone for asking him questions. a sense of what the terrain is like in Taiwan now that there are the greatest escalation intentions in the last 25 years and that is the focus of our program, which looks at what is stopping China from invading Taiwan.

We're still with Melissa Chan, we have time. for a few more questions, she was also recently in Taiwan. You can also talk about the situation on the ground because in the last part of our program we want to emphasize that the people who win are the ones who lose the most and the ones who gain the most depending on the outcome of this situation, the tensions in Taiwan are the Taiwanese themselves. and maybe it doesn't fit very perfectly. We may have lost William for now, but we have our own Jonathan Fung who is in Taiwan and is actually asking.

The one with the last big final question. Melissa wants to know what the best course of action is under these circumstances that we have now, let's say the status quo for Taiwan, where to go, I almost want to say, that was a question that I also asked Bonnie and I think it's difficult, I think Taiwan just needs to stay the course. the status quo um practice democracy so that democratic elections invest in their people um and I think so, I mean one thing is that with Pelosi's visit again there is a tendency to frame everything as a US and China issue, What does the United States want?

What does China want? wanted and what was really interesting in that whole narrative that came out of DC in terms of the furor over Pelosi was that no one really thought and stopped to ask what Taiwan wanted so I think you know the fact that Pelosi went is because she was invited and it meant a lot to the people of Taiwan as William said there will be a cost so it will be really interesting to see how it plays out in terms of how people in Taiwan feel if it was worth the cost. Sanctions and of course economic sanctions were immediately imposed on certain products in Taiwan and of course Taiwan trades heavily with China and then there are the ongoing military exercises that have been much more aggressive than in the past.

Yes, I think I mean simply. To explain the background, I think the reason many people are turning to the big global picture is because we have seen a shift in recent years with the election of Trump and a somewhat military retreat from the global stage. The United States withdraws from Afghanistan and then we have seen the power of Russia and China grow at the same time and there is also a chorus in the United States saying that we must engage with them, that we must maintain American supremacy in the world. We recently saw Russia do something that seemed unthinkable just a year ago, which is invade Ukraine, so we're stuck in this idea that the world has moved back into a great power struggle, which is something that left the debate. for many years, especially since the '90s, when Fukuyama declared the end of history and we all thought that was it because we had a status quo, a global status quo that we all agreed was the best course of action and We see a lot is changing now, but I think this is my last comparison between Ukraine and Taiwan.

I know there are so many things we can't compare, but I think what's important to understand in the conflict is that it does matter what Ukraine wants. It does matter, you don't even do it. If you are not a global player, you have so much power when you believe in something that you can see that Ukraine completely thwarted Russia's plans. Russia thought they were going to come in and take Ukraine in a matter of days and I think that could be a calculation that China is also betting on, but it does matter if Ukraine says no, we are a country and we are going to persist, we are going to continue to exist. , so I think this is not a moment of great global importance. power as military powers can do whatever they want, I think there is still a balance between ideas, idealism and materialism, if you want to be philosophical, I mean, I think the analogy is useful, it's great that we are careful when making that analogy. with russia, ukraine and china, taiwan, but it is a fact that president taiyin won of taiwan herself has made that analogy and in precisely the same way that you have just expressed, that is, she said just a couple of days after the start of the invasion, uh, that the In the same way that the Ukrainians are prepared to defend their country, that is how Taiwan is prepared to do it and the Taiwanese are prepared to do it now.

While we're relaxing, I just want to review some of the things that we may have talked about. Which I've talked about for the last hour and a half because for someone tuning in now they're like, "Wow, that's so many questions." The main question we had been asking was why he hasn't invaded China. Taiwan still um and what are the reasons why they haven't and maybe um for anyone who may have missed a couple of these points, can we summarize three of them and maybe try our best to visit what are your three favorite reasons? I mean, I would say that we should rewind and go back to what Bonnie said because she is the most important expert on Taiwan, in my humble opinion, in the English language world, but you know, one of the main things that she said is that there is one.

The possibility of no hot war is the fact that Beijing would rather not do the right thing. If there is some other way to do it peacefully or semi-peacefully, they would take that option and that is something that has been seen as a strategy over the years. Does China really encourage trade between Taiwan? I mean, actually, tick tock, it actually plays into this too, because Tiktok is a Chinese company. Many people in Taiwan are using it. There has been a lot of concern among people who study misinformation and disinformation. Much of the content comes from China.

Both places speak Mandarin Chinese, but the script is different in mainland China and in Taiwan, so you see a lot of people in Taiwan because everything is global now and they are interacting with the content. its borders, um, learning the simplified way of writing, which is the way of writing of the People's Republic of China, so you're seeing this as like a victory for China, like learning to write like they do instead of Chinese characters traditional, so everyone. these little things create cultural connections creating economic connections I think Beijing would prefer to see that as a way in, but I think it lost a lot of that through what I just said in terms of what happened in Hong Kong and maybe xi.

Jinping also feels that time is running out, so essentially there is still interest on the part of Beijing, Taipei, and Washington DC in maintaining a status quo that everyone benefits from in some way and they don't. I don't want that should answer that should answer yesterday's question too, frankly the only player among those three that doesn't want to maintain the status quo ultimately is exactly China, so yesterday there doesn't necessarily have to be a conflict in the first evil future. Ideally, obviously, for most people playing would definitely be conflict-free um no, no need to lose there um I think so and one thing I want to say not to end with a like uh yeah sorry darkness no, I mean we were talking about this before um We were thinking about themes for the show a while ago and one thing that came up is that today is Nagasaki Day, so it was the day 77 years ago when the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, essentially ending World War II, but with the loss of many lives and since that time we have been in a nuclear age and I think that remains at the bottom of any conflict and a deterrent to conflict today, especially between powers nuclear weapons like China and the United States, is that I can't afford to fight a war on that scale and I think that, hopefully, that's on the minds of most world leaders.

I hope that's part of Xi Jinping's calculus and I know it certainly is for Biden and Um, yeah, we as people living on this planet are hopeful that they're concerned that a nuclear war is not good for anyone. Yeah, and I think you very quickly said earlier that you had to ask a question in terms. Why hasn't the United States responded? Should not? Isn't that perhaps interpreted as a weakness? America in decline. I would say it's actually America at its greatest in terms of responsibility. It would be absolutely irresponsible. The United States needs to respond militarily either way right now, so I think this was, you know, the United States gets a lot of criticism, deservedly so, but in this case I think they're trying to lower the temperature and that's a good thing. of the great videos that we've mentioned in the chat, you can just scroll through the chat and find all the dw news that we've described and all the experts, all the analysis is there, and I want to thank them.

We chatted because it was amazing, we had so many comments and questions that really make the show really engaging, yeah, and I think our community is getting even better by following how the show is going. I feel like, yeah, it's better, I don't know, I think they're the ones making this show better, that's how I want to say it, that's how we love it, but we'll be back next week, we'll be here every week at 8 p. m. Central European Time 2pm New York Time is Eastern Standard Time and we'll be tackling another news topic next week.

You guys can always contact us and suggest something we love to do and follow your lead on what we should talk about and of course. we want you to join us there so you can give us your questions, that's what we do here, we're the dw newsroom and thanks to melissa chan for being with us and the whole team here at the newsroom, that's us. the news desk and very important, if you have any suggestions on what you want to see and what you want to do, watch us improve and don't hesitate to comment, we won't be mad at you next week.

I'm going to be there, I'm not going to be there and I just want to know what you guys would like to see where the show goes because it's really about what you guys want so feel free to comment and on that note sign off. thank you all thank you thank you