Taiwan defies China through the ballot. India must bite the bullet on its security concerns

India has behaved somewhat inconsistently in terms of political outreach to Taipei….An overwhelming majority in Parliament does not convert into equivalent clarity or confidence in the Indian government’s China policy

As expected, Lai Ching-te has won the Taiwanese presidential elections gaining for the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) an unprecedented third successive term in the post. Lai succeeds Tsai Ing-wen, the first woman to serve as President, who will step down after serving the constitutional limit of two terms.

Lai served as Vice-President to Tsai and represents a political party that is seen as pro-independence. China has long been involved in trying to subvert the island democracy’s political and economic institutions in pursuit of what it calls, ‘reunification’ — a historical fiction developed in the last century much like its claim over the South China Sea.

While Lai and the DPP have long moderated their positions and looked for greater engagement with China without explicitly recanting their pro-independence position, the Communist Party of China (CPC) with its black-and-white worldview has been unwilling to accept anything less than complete acknowledgement of the inevitability of ‘reunification’ from the Taiwanese political party. The CPC has been more comfortable engaging with the island’s other major political party the Kuomintang (KMT) — that also follows a ‘one China’ principle even if the latter has a different understanding of what that ‘one China’ is or should be. The CPC has, nevertheless, by various means indicated its support for the KMT in Taiwan’s political firmament.

The fact that Taiwanese voters ignored the recent uptick in China’s military coercion around the island — increased crossing of the median line in the Taiwan Strait by the PLA naval vessels and aircraft — threatening rhetoric and economic pressure to vote in a DPP President suggests that China’s tactics have failed; and it shows that the Taiwanese voters do not find Chinese threats of taking over the island by force to be credible. The DPP losing its majority in parliament —  the Legislative Yuan — is a signal on the domestic front to clean up corruption and a response to socio-economic issues, rather than an acknowledgement of Chinese pressure.

China’s likely response

It would be an interesting question to consider if a third successive DPP victory might cause the CPC to rethink its support for the KMT. However, even if this is the case, it is unlikely that Chinese disinformation campaigns and influence operations in Taiwan are going to stop.

To stop would be to accept that Taiwanese citizens are immune to the CPC’s propaganda, and would undermine the basis of China’s idea of peaceful ‘reunification’. It is, therefore, going to be impossible for CPC General Secretary and Chinese President Xi Jinping to step back from his current course because this would indicate that he and the CPC are serious about ‘reunification’.

Therefore, China will continue with threats about ‘reunifying’ Taiwan by force if necessary. Crossings of the median line by Chinese military ships and aircraft should also be expected to continue. In effect, the CPC and the PLA will begin to act increasingly like Taiwanese sovereignty does not matter, while trying to avoid building conditions up towards an all-out war.

China will also put in more efforts to reduce the number of Taiwan’s already limited number of diplomatic allies — mostly tiny states spread across Central America and the Pacific islands. Nauru has already switched diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China. This Chinese approach, might however, paradoxically increase the strength of Taiwan’s ties with the more substantial players in the international system — the US, the European Union, and Japan among others — all of whom maintain robust political and economic ties with the island.

India’s position

In India, meanwhile, Taiwan has gained increasing attention at least in part due to the DPP’s efforts while in power to build ties with New Delhi. India has behaved somewhat inconsistently in terms of political outreach to Taipei — Prime Minister Narendra Modi invited Taiwan’s unofficial diplomatic representative in New Delhi to his first swearing-in in 2014, but did not invite him in 2019. While BJP Members of Parliament have tried to attend in person Tsai’s presidential inaugurations, permission was withdrawn by the MEA the first time, while the second time in 2020 attendance was in the virtual mode.

Clearly, an overwhelming majority in Parliament does not convert into equivalent clarity or confidence in the government’s China policy. Whether the likelihood of another majority in the coming general elections will change the BJP-led Union government’s position by the time Lai’s inauguration comes around in May remains to be seen.

Either way, if India is serious about the Indo-Pacific, it can no longer ignore the question of Taiwan’s security and the implications that constant Chinese threats against the island nation have for regional security and attitudes towards India. While New Delhi is justified in thinking that the US and its allies bear a greater responsibility for Taiwan’s security than India does, it cannot always hide behind this argument if it is to strengthen its leadership role in the region. This is also true if New Delhi wants to impart confidence to other nations threatened by Beijing’s political, economic, and military coercion that India is both capable of defending itself and supporting them. In fact, in the age of interlinked regional security complexes and theatre commands for militaries, it is harder to argue that India can separate its security interests on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with China from developments in the East China Sea, South China Sea, or the Taiwan Strait.

China’s political, economic, and military coercions of Taiwan are an occasion for India to think more carefully and deeply about its larger security interests that go beyond the LAC. It is not just the Chief of Defence Staff that ought to be commissioning studies on Taiwan contingencies, but all departments of the Government of India.

(Jabin T Jacob is Associate Professor, Department of International Relations and Governance Studies, and Director, Centre for Himalayan Studies, Shiv Nadar Institution of Eminence, Delhi-NCR. X: @jabinjacobt.)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.