I have asked this question to many people, including Taiwanese, US citizens, foreigners, etc. and have yet to really obtain a satisfactory answer:
Why does the PRC treat Taiwan this way?
As a point of reference, during the past two years in May at the World Health Assembly meetings in Geneva, the Taiwan authorities (and Taiwan’s allies) have stressed that it makes sense for the PRC to support Taiwan to obtain “observer” or “associate member” status in the World Health Organization . . . . . and in fact a lot of good will across the Taiwan Strait would be generated if the PRC would support this type of formulation . . . . . however, the PRC will have nothing of it.
There are many other instances which one could point out over the past few years where the PRC could have offered a “helping hand” to the Taiwanese government and/or Taiwanese citizens in the international arena, and could have thereby generated some goodwill . . . . . with perhaps causing the beneficial side-affect of restarting cross-strait discussions . . . . . . however the PRC just seems most concerned with sabatoging Taiwan in the international community, and little else . . . . .
My point is: How does this current attitude of the PRC leadership contribute to the goal of eventual reunification, especially if “peaceful reunification” is what has been continually stressed by the world community?
I think they reached an all-time low after the 921 earthquake when they insisted all aid pass through Beijing, and that foreign rescue workers were only allowed to come here after they gave permission.
After Taiwan had previously donated huge sums of money in aid to China after natural disasters I thought this was particularly disgusting.
It’s really funny when you meet a PRC citizen in a third country and they ask why Taiwanese aren’t friendly to them
First, the idea that Taiwan is not a part of the PRC and should not immediately return to the fold is ridiculous to them. There is also a mindset that, taiwan was able to sit by happily during all the travails that the PRC has been through. These mindsets form the background for such a policy. The feelings of taiwanese people about it do not enter into the equation.
The direct reason for such acts is the fear of taiwan achieving recognition. They feel it is important to attack any act which would imply recognition, no matter how small or insignificant, on every level, lest its acquiescence imply acceptance. Even minor functionaries will consider such issues when dealing with Taiwan lest they be reprimanded.
Taiwan is an independent country in every way except for its lack of(formal) recognition by the international community. If PRC were to allow this recogniton to take place then Taiwan would be an independent country in every way & would (in the minds of the PRC) be only one logical step from true independence.
I also believe there is a deep insecurity in the PRC goverment that if they let Taiwan go then which part of the country will be next. If they give in on this they may also be concerned that this may embolden thier own citizens to belive that regime change is possible in the PRC itself.
[quote=“Hartzell”]My point is: How does this current attitude of the PRC leadership contribute to the goal of eventual reunification, especially if “peaceful reunification” is what has been continually stressed by the world community?
Any opinions?[/quote]
I have two answers for you … take your pick:
I think your confusion is based in the misapprehension that the goodwill of the people of Taiwan is actually considered important. The PRC does not do ‘goodwill’.
If you are a 1-party state, then your leadership is based not on doing things which keep the people happy, it’s based on doing things which keep the hard-core party faithful happy. In a similar way, the concept that Taiwans policy is (in some way) dependent on the goodwill of the people does not really register. Thus, instead of trying to convince the people of Taiwan, they have been focusing on convincing what they see is the true leadership in Taiwan - the KMT (Like the KMT, they haven’t quite realised what being a democracy entails).
Promise the KMT economic benefits (for the country as well as for the individuals), positions of power in the new unified China, and the jobs done. No need to involve the messy proletariat who, because they are Chinese, are clearly not ready for democracy anyway.
China’s policy towards Taiwan has nothing to do with Taiwan, and everything to do with keeping the Chinese (on the mainland) happy. One thing keeping China together is very heavy-handed nationalism “We are strong, we are proud, we are …Chinese!” (that sort of thing). To fuel this, you need a few enemies to throw vitriol at occasionally. The religous-extremist loony Dalai Lama is one, and the leadership in Taiwan is another.
Taiwan is really convenient because, whenever you need a bit of national unity (or need to hide some bad news), you can claim Taiwan is about to declare independence, and get everyone to “pull together” for the national cause. It is also a useful proxy for anti-Americanism (China would be united if it wasn’t for the evil imperial running-dog capitalist pigs in the USA).
That this policy doesn’t actually help move towards reunification is beside the point - it keeps the people on the mainland happy.
This could be a good thread for me. The main reason I’ve never really stuck my head into Taiwan politics (the board or the area in general) is because I really don’t get the PRC-ROC thing being discussed in this exact thread. I’ve never managed to get a straight answer as to why Beijing views Taiwan as a province - actually let me correct myself there, I’ve never been able to get a straight justification for why Beijing views Taiwan as a province of the PRC. I’ve seen a lot of logical, reasoned, and researched arguments for why Taiwan isn’t, but none for why it is.
a bully needs somebody, anybody to beat up on to keep the other kids under his power. china is a bully. mean spirited and relentless in pursuing the objectives of the CCP. time zones? no. everyone is on beijing time.
lots of parts of “the mainland” don’t want to be part of china. xinjiang, tibet, hainan island and heck, the whole south maintains dreams of rejecting the northerners. HK ain’t going along happily. the homeland of the manchus has been gerrymandered into a crazy quilt of provinces allowing the han policy of divide and flood to work the magic it does.
china needs somebody to cast in the black hat to keep all the aforementioned disparate peoples on at least one common page. taiwan plays her role so well china may keep it up forever.
anyone who has ever been to the PRC can tell you that Taiwan really isn’t very high on China’s list of pressing needs. flogging taiwan regularly unifies the rest of china- something the CCP often needs.
as a result of the sino-japanese war, china “ceded in perpetuity” formosa to japan.
england relinquished claim to the US colonies. the two sides signed an agreement. can england now nullify that agreement and claim control over the US? would such a step be recognized? isn’t china(publicly) following such a route: unilaterally abrograte an international agreement and pretend it never happened?
privately, china and the US are on the same page regarding Taiwan: the US(via the Allies) holds the papers. when the time is right, the US will finalize taiwan’s status by giving it to china. such is a carrot china ACTUALLY wants. uncle sam knows it. until that day comes, china will use the cross-straight animosity to create greater unity on their side. just as chiang rationalized why he didn’t fight the japanese as eagerly as he did the CCP: national unity first, outside aggressors second. the US will keep up the strategic ambiguity until the very last minute, long after everyone has realized the inevitable.
all taiwanese should be taking proactive steps to secure secondary passports. the qing gave them to japan. japan gave them to the US. the US WILL give them to china (when the time is right). i ain’t saying such is right or fair but merely identifying a past trend and projecting it out a bit.
versailles treaty? will of the people to determine their nationality? tell it to uncle ho or the iraqi kurds. nationalism is a bitch.
[quote=“skeptic yank”]as a result of the sino-Japanese war, China “ceded in perpetuity” formosa to Japan.
England relinquished claim to the US colonies. the two sides signed an agreement. can England now nullify that agreement and claim control over the US? would such a step be recognized? isn’t China(publicly) following such a route: unilaterally abrograte an international agreement and pretend it never happened?[/quote]
that’s a pretty sketchy analogy. if you had had a taiwanese independence movement in 1895 leading to a “cession in perpetuity” it would hold water. the key words there as you stated yourself are “as a result of the sino-Japanese war.” China has a good case that it was forced to make the cession through the aggression of an imperialist power.
I would say that is a considerable oversimplification of the situation. the us holds nothing that it wouldn’t be happy to give up in an instant. it holds a royal pain in the ass, the constant threat of war with China hanging over its head. more a hot potato than a carrot, but one that we have to hold if our ideals and commitments mean anything.
China is irredentist, and it teaches its citizens to believe that China must be unified in order to survive. It therefore wants to take back all places that have ever been a part of China.
China is a communist police state. It is treating Taiwan considerably better than many communist police states have treated other places in the past, and better than it treated places like for example Cambodia.
CHina is a mindcontrolled Soviet style dictatorship and nobody in that sad country can think independently, especially the bureaucrats who do all the talking and diplomats. They act just like the Soviet puppets did pre-USSR collapse. It’s that simple, Mr H.
Mind control, thought control. We are not dealing with real human beings there. Puppets, robots. Mindcontrolled puppets. Powerful control systems.
“ceded” and “cessation” have divergent meanings. you quoted me as having used the latter when i used the former. china signed a treaty with another country. china gave land away as part of that agreemment forever. it wasn’t a 99 yr lease (ala hong kong) but FOREVER.
again, nationalism is a bitch. the sooner the people of taiwan wake up and take steps to ensure their own individual (not collective)well-being the better they will be. no matter who their daddy is, be it qing or PRC or KMT or USA or DPP or…they are still gonna have a daddy.the rules of nationalism preclude such. small states exist at the largess of large neighbor states. the only way to win such a game is not to play. a passport is freedom; the more passports you have the more freedom you can grasp.
Before the 1895 Sino-Japanese war, taiwan was a part of qing-dynasty China.[/quote]
Yes. And the Qing Dynasty was a Manchu-run Empire. Taiwan, like China, Mongolia, and several other places, was part of an empire controlled by the Manchus. Taiwan was never part of any state controlled by an ethnic Chinese emperor.
China treats Taiwan badly because it is an expansionist imperial state, and Taiwan is one of the few prizes left from the Great Game of the 19th century. In other words, it does so because it can.
That’s why, after they take over Taiwan, they’re gearing up for the upcoming Iran-China War. Parts of it were under Chinese authority during the Tang Dynasty. The Empire must be reunited! Viva la Silk Road satrapies!
Vork just made two really important points. Taiwan was a frontier/aboriginal zone to the Manchus–not reallly part of their Chinese possession.
To expand on his second point: China is trying to join a world order that no longer exists–the world order of the great powers at the beginning of the last century. It’s behaving like one of those powers at a time when Taiwan wants to be a normal, moden country.
As to why the PRC chooses to block Taiwan in every diplomatic engagement, the answer is simply that the CCP does not want any other nation to aknowledge in the least Taiwan as a sovreign independent political entity. It may seem petty to block Taiwan from practically everything no matter how insignificant, but the thinking in Beijing goes is that the blackout must be total for it to be effective.
As for the issue of Chinese Nationalism. I will have to answer that question with the default reply that it is designed to provide legitimacy for the CCP now that it has abandoned Marxism-Leninism. For people who think that the PRC is going to somehow fragment along ethnic lines, that is pretty much simple wishful thinking by anti-China stealth imperialists. A line of thinking highly popular with Taiwanese separatists, Japanese rightists, and the occassional beetlenut addled Westerner who thinks fancies himself a Sinologist. If the PRC were to fragment, it would be more likely along provincial or political lines, with certain cliques or cadres within the former PRC carving out local power niches for themselves. That China will fragment into Tibet, Xinjiang, Manchuria (which doesn’t even exist anymore no matter how much people use the term, now it is simply Liaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiang), and the always ludicrous “south” is simply the wistful and quaint dementia of sinophobes.
As for the Manchus not being Chinese, I am afraid that is no longer the case. Originally the Manchu’s were regarded as foreigners, even up until the Republican Revolution which used this to provoke nationalist sentiments to overthrow the empire. However, after that to promote national unity, such rhetoric was downplayed by the early Republicans. The communists continued to downplay ethnic divides, with Mao Zhedong even writing against Han Chauvinism in his desire to promote one Chinese identity. The fact of the matter is, this campaign to promote national over ethnic awareness has been successful. Today, the political and social reality is that manchus are Chinese, if not han-chinese. That they were considered a foreign conqueror then is irrelevant. They are no longer foreign now.
As to the notion that everyone in the PRC is some kind of mindless communist drone, I am afraid you should exercise more your allegedly “free” intellect.
“I have the greatest admiration for your propaganda. Propaganda in the West is carried out by experts who have had the best training in the world – in the field of advertizing – and have mastered the techniques with exceptional proficiency … Yours are subtle and persuasive; ours are crude and obvious … I think that the fundamental difference between our worlds, with respect to propaganda, is quite simple. You tend to believe yours … and we tend to disbelieve ours.”
[quote=“skeptic yank”]dalton,
yes all analogies are lacking.[/quote]
Why use them then I would say that some are more lacking than others.
[quote]
“ceded” and “cessation” have divergent meanings. you quoted me as having used the latter when I used the former. China signed a treaty with another country. China gave land away as part of that agreemment forever. it wasn’t a 99 yr lease (ala Hong Kong) but FOREVER.[/quote]
ceded or cession or whatever, it was a condition for ending military hostilities. with the defeat of Japan the return of territoires that were stolen from China was a natural result.
[quote=“v”]
Yes. And the Qing Dynasty was a Manchu-run Empire. Taiwan, like China, Mongolia, and several other places, was part of an empire controlled by the Manchus. Taiwan was never part of any state controlled by an ethnic Chinese emperor. [/quote]
I have always thought the manchu dynasty and china to be synonymous. that certainly would seem to be the prevailing usage in all the history I have seen. your interpretation is rather unique.
[quote=“cm”]
“I have the greatest admiration for your propaganda. Propaganda in the West is carried out by experts who have had the best training in the world – in the field of advertizing – and have mastered the techniques with exceptional proficiency … Yours are subtle and persuasive; ours are crude and obvious … I think that the fundamental difference between our worlds, with respect to propaganda, is quite simple. You tend to believe yours … and we tend to disbelieve ours.”[/quote]
subtle manipulation tends to be more believable than outright lies, and for good reason
[quote=“skeptic yank”]
… small states exist at the largess of large neighbor states. the only way to win such a game is not to play…[/quote]
When you are a small state you don’t have the luxury of deciding whether or not you want to play - you are in the game because the big dogs have decided you are in it. Protestations to the contrary are futile.
Actually, the only way for a little state to win is to adopt the Israeli defense - have the nuclear capability to obliterate your enemies - and be sure that they know it - all the while crying to the rest of the world that you don’t now, nor will you ever…
Actually, I’d be mighty surprised if the Taiwan military hasn’t already thought of this.
I would say that some are more lacking than others.