The Country We Pretend Doesn't Exist

Seems like every other day or so, there is another encouraging story of countries in the vicinity of what we still insist on calling the South China Sea (we really need a rebranding of that body of water, that should never have been given such a misleading name in the first place) asserting their rights against the attempted landgrabs and colonisation of the PRC.

I'd noticed the earlier stories, such as the Japanese patrols, and the reopening of Subic Bay, but honestly, couldn't think of anything specific to say on the matters.  This, on the other hand, struck me about the story regarding Taiwan:

Taiwan, which lacks the diplomatic ties to negotiate with the other five governments with claims in the South China Sea, has installed $1.29 million worth of solar panels on Taiping Island since 2011 to light a cluster of buildings and provide power for construction of a 200-meter (yard) pier due for completion by year's end, the head of the island's coast guard said Friday.

Taiwan has been an independent country for almost seventy years.  Not a country we choose to pretend to be independent, like 'Palestine', but an actual fully-functioning autonomous entity.  The US (which likes to pretend that international borders haven't changed since the second world war), and most countries in the EU, granted quick recognition to Kosovo, which declared independence from Serbia in 2008.  And yet, the vast majority of the countries on the planet, maintain the fiction that Taiwan, seven decades of actual independence regardless, is still* a province of the People's Republic of China.

Some of these countries used to recognise Taiwan, as the ROC (Republic of China), but later switched their recognition to the PRC.  I've never understood this 'choice' -- How was recognition of the obvious independence of mainland China from Taiwan ever dependent on rejecting the obvious independence of Taiwan from mainland China ?  Were we not capable of recognising both East and West Germany ?  Are we not capable of distinguishing between North and South Korea ?

Of course, I'm being a bit disingenuous here, as if I didn't know full well the political intent of forcing countries that wanted closer economic ties with the PRC to reject Taiwan.  As if I didn't understand their economic motivations in betraying a country that may have been, and may yet prove to be a valuable ally.

It still stinks.  We in the West scarcely dare say boo to the PRC, even when they steal from us, spy on us, threaten us and our allies militarily, engage in cyber-terrorism even.  Because we're so desperate for access to their markets and their cheap labour.  Meanwhile, we turned our back on a peaceful ally in Taiwan and officially embraced the insane One-China dogma of those on the mainland who would willingly destroy the Taiwanese utterly rather than allow them their rightful independence.

And now here we are, with the PRC threatening the sovereign waters of Vietnam, Indonesia, the Philippines, et al.  And the country similarly and more historically thus threatened, Taiwan, 'lacks the diplomatic ties to negotiate with' them, because they, like so many other cowardly governments worldwide, stabbed Taiwan in the back, so greedy were they for relations with the PRC at any cost.

Here's the countries, according to Wikipedia, that have recognised, mostly in the last few years, 'The State of Palestine':

Image: Wikipedia, User Night w  CC SA 3.0

OTOH, the tiny few remaining countries in green below have official diplomatic relations with Taiwan, whilst those cowards in blue maintain some sort of unofficial relations.

Image: Wikipedia, User Alinor  CC SA 3.0

As I said above, it is encouraging to see countries in the 'South China Sea' pushing back against the PRC's aggression just off their shores.  But if they wanted to truly send a signal to the PRC of their displeasure, then decades-long belated recognition of their neighbour and potential ally in Taiwan would be a hell of a place to start.


* Almost got myself there

** Oh, and in case it is brought up at some point, no, the situation with the South China Sea is not the same as that with Russia and Eastern Ukraine, the latter conflict being largely if not primarily created by Western hostility against and encirclement of Russia, which hardly relates to the circumstances of the Chinese Civil War in the 'forties.  And the differing attitudes towards the PRC & Russia, both being motivated overwhelming by corporate greed, with geopolitical principles bent at will to whichever attitude might bring about the greatest possible profit in the short to medium term, even if in the long term, those attitudes might lead to global thermonuclear war.  Much as the likes of idiots such as John McCain (or, for that matter, even Vladimir Putin himself) might like to fantasise about a 'new Soviet Empire', Russia is in fact a much lessened nation, than its Soviet predecessor, responding more in the manner of a cornered animal, but no less dangerous for that.  If you want to find yourself a new imperial project (other than the perpetual one of the United States of course), Southeast Asia is where you will find it.

*** Assuming in all of this that the Taiwanese would not be so insane as to assert the same made-up 'nine-dash' claims for their own nation, which would be equally absurd as the same claims of the PRC.