SPEAKER OF HOUSE, NANCY PELOSI CORRECT IN GOING TO TAIWAN

            By Hugh Murray

   I was surprised to find different reactions to the trip by Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Taiwan this August 2022.  She had earlier announced that she would go, the government of the People's Republic of China objected.  There was debate in the US.  Pres. Biden asserted that the American military discouraged her trip.  Pelosi planned to stop in Singapore, the Philippines, Japan, and South Korea, as well as Taiwan.  Some hawks in China threatened to prevent her from landing or even shoot her plane down.  On the other side, some conservative Republicans thought her trip a good idea, and hoped she would ask them to accompany her.  She did not announce her specific plans, but on Tuesday 2 August she arrived in Taipei, was presented an award by the leader of the island, and soon thereafter, continued to her next destination.

    I was shocked by Pat Buchanan's reaction, contending that she was risking war with China with no specific purpose.  Even more surprising, the reaction of Fox News star Tucker Carlson, who deemed her Taiwan venture, irresponsible, dangerous, a provocation to a war with China.

    I am usually an opponent of every political act my Speaker for the past few years: her impeachment of Pres. Trump; her 2nd impeachment of Trump, the January 6 one-sided inquiry into the fracas on the Capitol, her support for the Democratic Party pandemic policies, and her left-wing agenda.  Why then do I support her reviled trip to Taiwan.

    When House Speaker Newt Gingrich visited Taiwan in the 1990s, the PRC may have objected, but so what?  The American military and naval forces were far superior to those of the People's Liberation Army.  True, on the Asian mainland, the PLA's "volunteer" forces stole an American military in North Korea, and restored the border to where it had been when Kim Il Sung invaded the South in 1950.  But the US had no desire to invade the mainland now.  The American navy, which had defeated that of Imperial Japan in the 1940s, was far superior to that of the PLA-N in the 1990's.

      The question of who would win a war for Taiwan today is not so clear.  In war games, China often wins.  But games are not reality.  Still, it would be a closer call.  On Wednesday morning, I was pleasantly relieved when I turned on my tv, and it worked.  A first strike attack today will not be like one on Pearl Harbor in 1941.  We will not find out by listening to our radios or tvs.  The first thing to go in the star war age will be our electric grid and satellites.  We may not have electricity, a phone, or water.  Welcome to America 1820.  Or China may suffer that black-out.  Nukes may not be necessary to win a modern war.

    So why risk war with China for a non-essential visit by Nancy Pelosi?  The main reason, as close as the 2 contenders are today, the US and the PRC, under Pres. Biden - the worst President in America history, our military will only get worse.  Better a confrontation today than a year from now.  The sooner a Republican is in the White House, America and begin to rebuild and repair the broken machine where a major ship is destroyed by a minor fire in the docks, and others cannot be properly steered so as to avoid collisions, and leaders are chosen by racial or sexual quotas, not on abilities.  Better the fright today so that perhaps some can begin to repair the Democratic Party caused damaged.  This is why, for once, I cheer Nancy Pelosi, whose visit may make a wake-up call to all America about the real danger we face.

    Now the dull stuff:  About 94% of our chips are made in Taiwan.  These are used in many American industries, and without them, we cannot finish auto production, or make washing machines or most other machines.  If China were to impose a blockade around Taiwan, that too might mean war.  Unlike Ukraine, we are dependent upon Taiwan, we need it to remain an industrial power.

     China lost Taiwan to Japan in war in the 1890s, and it remained Japanese until the Imperial defeat in 1945, when it was restored to the official govt. of China, the Nationalist govt.  In China's civil war Pres. Truman sent Gen. Marshall to handle things and he demanded that Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-Shek form a coalition government with Communist leader Mao.  Chiang refused Marshall's demand, so Marshall refused to allow any arms to be supplied to the Nationalists, while Stalin was supplying Mao with captured Japanese arms from Manchukuo and Soviet sources.  Communists in the US Treasury Dept. and other departments sabotaged any later efforts to supply Chiang with aid.  Mao won the civil war on the mainland and proclaimed the PRC in 1949.  Chiang and his remnant fled to Taiwan and continued as the Republic of China.  In the effort to split the USSR from China, Kissinger and Nixon made deals with Mao.  Under Pres. Carter, we ditched The RoC, and recognized the one-China policy.

      Legally, that one-China policy gives Beijing a strong claim to Taiwan (it is harder to imagine Taiwan now conquering the mainland, which would also be a one-China policy).  But the PRC ignores the law, especially when the international court ruled against its fantasy claims to the South China Sea.  In the 1400s the Chinese probably had the largest fleet in the world and might have claimed that sea, but a new emperor around 1450 destroyed the fleet and all plans for such ocean-going vessels and established a new stay-at-home policy, which was not reversed until centuries later.  But China ignred the law and used forced to build and fortify islets in the South China Sea and threaten its neighbors and all sea-going vessels in the area with its lawless actions.