Speaker's Stopover: The Substance and Sequela

To be sure, Nancy Pelosi is not the first U.S. House speaker to visit Taiwan. In 1997, Republican Newt Gingrich paid a visit to Taipei, where he met with Taiwan’s then-president Lee Teng-hui and delivered a speech underscoring the American commitment to the island’s security. He also traveled to Beijing, where he reiterated, in no uncertain terms, that the United States will defend Taiwan when attacked. It was an uneventful visit and rang no alarm bells. A quarter-of-a-century later, China’s foreign ministry levelled the angry claim that the current U.S. Speaker’s visit “seriously infringes upon China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” and even announced plans to encircle Taiwan in a series of live-fire missile exercises. A Communist Party propagandist even threatened to “forcibly dispel Pelosi’s plane” by shooting it down if necessary.

Shortly after Pelosi arrived, Beijing announced military drills in six sea areas surrounding the main island of Taiwan, starting the morning after her departure and running to Sunday. The plan was unprecedented in how close the zones were to Taiwan, including some that overlapped Taiwan’s territorial waters stretching 7 miles (12kilometers) out from its coastline. After addressing parliament and meeting the Taiwanese president, Pelosi flew out in the afternoon of the following day. Tensions took a turn for the worse the next day, when the People’s Liberation Army fired almost a dozen Dongfeng ballistic missiles and made dozens of incursions over the highly symbolic median line. Japan said at least five missiles landed within its exclusive economic zone, and some had flown over Taiwan’s main island, just south of Taipei. Beijing doubled down on its threat by accusing its critics of being evil, of interfering with internal affairs, and declared its response to be just and right. It announced sanctions against Pelosi and her direct relatives, before suspending or cancelling multiple cooperation mechanisms and dialogues with the US.

American support for Taiwanese democracy and security has been a pillar of U.S. foreign policy for decades. The Taiwan Relations Act, which obligates the United States to provide Taiwan with the weaponry it needs to defend itself in case of attack, has been in effect for 43 years. If Gingrich’s visit to Taiwan never constituted a breach of any agreement, then neither did Pelosi’s. What changed since then?

Perhaps what is different now is that the United States, convulsed by domestic politics, increasingly appears irresolute and confused on the international stage. The humiliating rout of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, the reluctance to supply Ukraine with the wherewithal to win the war against Russia, the feckless response to the wrongful detention of U.S. citizens abroad — China sees in Washington a superpower unsure of itself and nervous about confronting its foes. In a phone call on July 28, U.S. President Biden sought to assure his counterpart, Xi Jinping, that “the U.S. policy has not changed.” But that does not seem to be the view in Beijing. As China’s Foreign Ministry put it on August 2, in its view, Washington, going back to the days of the Trump administration, has been gradually “hollowing out” its “One China Policy”. In the call, Mr. Xi warned Mr. Biden that “those who play with fire will perish by it” and said he “hoped that the U.S will be clear-eyed” about the consequences.

This latest crisis comes at a time when China-U.S. relations are already on edge. This explains why even officials in the Biden administration and the U.S. military had called on Ms. Pelosi to reconsider. Ironically, that prospect was likely diminished by China’s stern public warnings, which all but ensured the trip would go ahead as a cancellation would have been politically costly for the Biden administration. Domestic political considerations appear to be driving both sides into their respective corners in this entirely avoidable crisis.

Pelosi’s motivations for the visit have been speculated to be anything from securing her political legacy to an attempt to tout the Democrats’ record as tough on China before midterm elections. To this extent, she repeatedly framed her visit as aimed at showing the strength of U.S. commitment to Taiwan, and as bipartisan in nature. Pelosi did not ever appear to bring up “One China Policy” in her comments. White House officials have made the point that Pelosi represents a different branch of government and members of Congress have travelled previously to Taiwan. That the visit appears to have been driven largely by Pelosi, who has been sharply critical of China’s policies in Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong, rather than by the Biden administration, has not appeared to have assuaged Beijing. A sharp response, in Beijing’s view, would dissuade other countries from engaging with Taiwan at higher political levels.

The fact that neither side wants, nor can afford, a military confrontation may yet see the current tensions defused with each side walking away and claiming a show of strength for their domestic audiences. The latest crisis has, however, made clear the perilous state of relations between the world’s two biggest powers. It is unlikely to be the last.