- Xi Jinping accused the US of trying to trick China into invading Taiwan, the Financial Times said.
- The Chinese leader made the claim to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, per the FT.
- One expert told BI it’s a sign that China is “genuinely surprised” by the attitude of US officials.
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For decades, the US has adopted “strategic ambiguity” toward Taiwan, positioning itself as the country’s most steadfast ally, while declining to explicitly say whether it would come to Taiwan’s aid if China attacked.
But the mood in Washington, DC, seems to be shifting, with Congress showing itself more “overtly supportive of Taiwan than only a few years ago,” Graeme Thompson, an analyst with the Eurasia Group, told Business Insider in November.
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“The US has plenty of public figures now talking of Taiwan like it is a new Ukraine, and some even saying it needs to be diplomatically recognized,” Brown added.
Large scale ground invasions are generally a losing game.
But the Chinese strategy towards Taiwan has always been the same strategy as Hong Kong, Tibet, and Mongolia. Become economically invaluable and set policy through soft power.
The only real incentive to send in ground troops would be to respond to a Cuba Missile style escalation. And it no longer looks like the Americans are interested in installing short range missiles on the island, now that they have exhausted themselves arming Ukraine.