The Geostrategic Importance of Taiwan by its Geography to The USA: Part 2

 

                                                                                                

Aptly asked the Seventh Fleet to prevent any attack on Formosa. As a result of this action, the Chinese administration on Formosa has been asked to halt all air and sea activities against the center region. The Seventh Fleet will see to it that this is completed.

The United States was now openly committed to defending Taiwan against Chinese hostility, as well as to maintaining stability in the Taiwan Strait, which may be jeopardized by Taiwanese military engagement. The explanation had less to do with protecting Chiang Kai-shek or even Taiwanese people and more to do with Taiwan's international predicament in East Asia and America's vital interests. General Douglas MacArthur, who was responsible for Japan's postwar interim structure, expressed the United States' stance in Japan's obvious expressions:

"I accept that if you lose Formosa, you lose access to our littoral line of defense. Both the Philippines and Japan would be irrational from a tactical standpoint. From our vantage point, we effectively lose the Pacific Ocean if we surrender or lose Formosa. We don't need to worry with Formosa for bases or anything else. However, Formosa should not be allowed to fall into the clutches of the reds.

If the opponent captured Formosa and then the Pacific Ocean, the hazards of that sea being used as a route of progress by any potential foe would unfathomably increase.”

Taiwan was afterward referred to by MacArthur as "a robust plane carrying battleship." He inferred for China because Washington did not envision Taiwan as a forward base for hostile actions against China or any other nation. All things considered, it was a potentially vital resource for China that might be used as a staging ground for antagonism against Taiwan and other US objectives in the region. In what became known as the First Taiwan Strait Crisis, China blasted the islands of Quemoy and Matsu in 1954. The United States replied by entering into a formal peace treaty with the Republic of China on Taiwan (as well likewise with the Republic of Korea after the finish of its conflict with the North).

President Dwight D. Eisenhower explained the rationale for the Taiwan protection agreement as follows:

Formosa and the Pescadores would disjoin the existing, independent of the temperamental, balance of moral, monetary, and military forces on which the serenity of the Pacific rests. It would create a rupture in the Western Pacific island chain, which serves as the geological spine of the United States and other free countries' security framework in that sea.

Furthermore, this rupture would interfere with north-south correspondences amongst other key components of that impediment, as well as impair the financial existence of states friendly to us.

Formosa's geographical region is such that if it falls into the hands of a force hostile to the United States, it establishes an adversary prominent in the real focus of our guarded border, 100 to 150 miles closer to the surrounding agreeable portions Okinawa and the Philippines-than any location in mainland Asia. As a result, even when the United States and the Republic of China had a formal mutual protection agreement, the United States consistently saw Taiwan as a critical key resource that should not be allowed to be influenced significantly, rather than as a staging ground for hostile activities against China or other potential adversaries in Asia.

 That thinking has carried over to the present time frame, but it might alter if China's new expansionist policies in Northeast and Southeast Asia put America's partners in jeopardy and increase the likelihood of a China-US confrontation.

The Chinese siege of the seaward islands was resumed during the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis in 1958. The preservation of Quemoy and Matsu became an issue during the official mission in 1960 when both Vice President Richard Nixon and Senator John F. Kennedy promised to defend Taiwan from Chinese hostility. The Taiwan-China and United States-China deadlocks over Taiwan continued for the next ten and a half years and a half, with the Seventh Fleet acting as the master in the Taiwan Strait via the organizations of the two sides. During the 1960s, Taiwan acted as an unflinching collaborator, providing calculating, insightful, and other assistance to the United States during the Vietnam War.

The situation altered dramatically with President Nixon's opening to China in 1972, to play the China card against the Soviet Union and obtain Beijing's support for a dignified American pullout from Vietnam. Nixon and his national security adviser, Henry Kissinger, were so intent on enlisting China as a vital ally against the Soviets that they began making concessions on Taiwan even before Nixon visited China, flouting their ostensibly "pragmatist" standards of never offering up something without receiving something in return. Nixon withdrew the Seventh Fleet from the Taiwan Strait and began the process of removing any superfluous US military offices from Taiwan.

Then followed the Shanghai Communique, Beijing's "one China" rule that Taiwan is crucial for China, and Washington's "one-China policy" that it is dependent on China and Taiwan to hash out their differences peacefully. The US-Taiwan Mutual Defense Treaty remained in effect for the time being, but the writing was on the wall for Taiwan's future in the global community. After seven years, the Carter administration recognized the People's Republic of China, severed official diplomatic ties with Taiwan, and terminated the 1954 guard agreement. Once again, an official institution in Washington ignored Taiwan's inherent worth in favor of forging strong connections with China.