Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s last action on Taiwan could topple one of the main foundations of US-China relations – further complicating a tense bilateral relationship just before President-elect Joe Biden took office, said former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
“What Pompeo is doing is placing a series of landmines for the next Biden government … salt the land in the US-China relationship in general and laying landmines in Taiwan in particular,” Rudd told the “Squawk Box Asia” of CNBC on Monday.
Over the weekend, Pompeo announced the lifting of all “self-imposed restrictions” on US relations with Taiwan – a democratic, self-governing island that China claims as its own territory.
Pompeo said in a statement on Saturday that the United States had unilaterally limited contact between its officials and their Taiwanese counterparts for several decades “in an attempt to appease the Communist regime in Beijing”. He then declared that all of these restrictions “no longer exist”.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo speaks at the US Department of State
Win McNamee | Getty Images
The move could mark the end of “China’s policy,” said Rudd, who is now president of the Asia Society Policy Institute.
A China policy is the principle by which the US and the international community recognize that there is only one Chinese government – under the Communist Party of China in Beijing.
“This has been the mainstay of strategic stability for the past 40 years or more,” said the former Australian leader.
“I think we need to understand that we are moving towards the end of ‘a China policy’. And what does this mean for markets? What does this mean for the international community? It is a new period of real strategic instability, as it is a fundamental item of faith in Beijing, ”he added.
The communist party never ruled Taiwan, but Beijing considers reunification of the island with the mainland an eventuality, and therefore Taiwan has no right to participate in its own international diplomacy.
China and Taiwan react to Pompeo action
China is said to have criticized the U.S. decision to lift restrictions on Taiwan, while the Taiwanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs thanked Pompeo on Twitter.
Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China, said that China is opposed to Pompeo’s action and will resolutely resist attempts to sabotage its interest, Reuters reported.
Meanwhile, Taiwan’s Foreign Minister Joseph Wu said that removing Pompeo from US restrictions on contact with Taiwan is a “big deal,” the news agency reported.
“Taiwan-US relations have been elevated to a global partnership. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will not let its guard down and hopes to continue to drive the development of Taiwan-US ties,” said Wu.
Rudd said that Pompeo may be motivated to harden the US position on China now, so that he can attack Biden for “softening” China, should the new government make any policy changes. Some media reports indicated Pompeo as a potential candidate for the presidency in 2024.
However, the Biden government is unlikely to deviate from the “strategic ambiguity” that has long been US foreign policy in Taiwan, Rudd said.
Ambiguity helps to keep “enough doubts” that the US would immediately defend Taiwan if the island embrace any “reckless policy”, such as a unilateral declaration of China’s independence, explained Rudd.
The other dimension of the US stance involves challenging Beijing’s assumption that Washington will not react if the continent takes any military action against Taiwan, Rudd added.
“That is the strategic ambiguity so far. I don’t see it as a change.”