Why Australia must defend Taiwan (and itself)

11 Apr Why Australia must defend Taiwan (and itself)

Written by Peerson Lynch

The global order is in its most perilous state in eighty years. President Xi Jinping remains determined to destroy Taiwan’s democracy by force. Ours could be next. Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA) students are being taught that Australia will be at war with China by 2025. Almost half of Australians believe the country should send troops to help defend Taiwan. They are right.

However, the Labor government plans to spend only $48.7 billion on defence this financial year, a figure dwarfed by China’s 2022 defence budget. We kowtow to the PRC’s claims on the island. Australia’s Joint Communique with China establishes the basis of Australia’s One China policy: that Taiwan is not a sovereign state and that the Taiwanese authorities lack the status of a national government.

We need to increase this military spending and decease this diplomatic deference.

Taiwan is crucial to our security. Taiwan sits at the centre of the first west Pacific island chain. As the US has understood since World War II, strategically no location in the Far East occupies such a controlling position. China views Taiwan as a ‘cork in the bottle’, limiting its ability to project power in the East China Sea. Beyond defensive concerns, a PRC-controlled Taiwan extends Chinese missile ranges another 150 nautical miles to the east, a direct threat to Australia’s allies such as Japan and South Korea.

A communist Taiwan makes real China’s ‘nine-dash line’. Beijing’s claim that the South China Sea is properly a ‘Chinese Lake’ could become reality, allowing it to interdict shipping routes fundamental to Australia’s economic security. Xi could blackmail Canberra with far greater menace than he does presently. The ‘first island chain’ – Taiwan, Japan, Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Australia – and the ‘second island chain’ – Guam, Palau, and the Marianas – are crucial to slowing Chinese expansion into the Pacific Ocean. They also negate Chinese access to the deep-water ports it needs to operate naval bases. Breaking this chain will allow China to meddle in and threaten the sovereignty of regional powers, Australia included. We should take warning now, before it is too late.

Taiwan leads the global semiconductor industry. It accounts for more than half of the world’s production, and over 90 per cent of the world’s advanced microchip production. As Australia transitions towards 5G and internet becomes more essential to state power, Australia’s dependence on Taiwanese microchip production will only increase. Australia and its allies cannot easily replace these gizmos if their supply is interrupted. To combat this, Washington is debating the construction of a $17.8 billion chip plant in Arizona. Potentially significant, this looks like national security window dressing. If Taipei’s independence is extinguished, Australia cannot rely on theoretical U.S. factories to make up the difference. Taiwanese and Australian economic interests go hand in hand. Australia must recognise and act upon this.

Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and Malaysia all feature in Australia’s ten largest export partners. They also abut the South China Sea. Chinese expansion into Taiwan places stress on Australia’s access to that sea. This threatens Australia’s export market and could spell disaster for the economy.

The democratisation of Taiwan over the past fifty years has created an ethical responsibility for liberal democracies everywhere, but especially in the Asia Pacific. We cannot allow autocratic might to extinguish democratic right. This duty is further clarified when we consider that, despite many attempts at compromise, Taiwan has durably resisted sublimation into the People’s Republic. This is not merely an ideological argument. Maintaining the US-led global order, which the defence of Taiwan advances, is in both Australia’s strategic and economic national interests.

A failure to support Taiwan would signal a willingness to defer to China in all regional matters. This reordering of great power influence in East Asia would have stark consequences for Japan and South Korea. Failure to defend Taiwan would telegraph to those allies that Canberra is not a reliable ally and, more broadly, that south and northeast Asia can no longer rely on liberal democracies to maintain stability in the western Pacific. Japan is the lynchpin of Australia’s Asia strategy. It needs to be politically reinvigorated by proving we will act in its defence. The QUAD alliance will be a mere paper tiger without that commitment. The loss of Taiwan to mainland China would damage American credibility, and reduce the ability of Australia to form values-based alliances in the Asia Pacific.

For strategic, economic, and political reasons it is in Australia’s interests to help Taiwan defend itself from Chinese aggression. While fears about Chinese retaliation are valid, Canberra has more to lose in appeasing communist expansion than in acting swiftly and in coordination with its democratic allies.