US Deputy Secretary of State Vows to Do Everything to 'Deter' China From Taking Taiwan by Force

The remarks in support of Taiwan came ahead of a meeting between US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and China’s top diplomat Yang Jiechi in Rome on Monday. The US and its Western allies are not happy with China aligning itself with Russia in the Ukraine crisis and have been urging Beijing to oppose Moscow.

US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman has said that although Washington supports the ‘One-China Principle’, it would still do everything it could to "deter" China from taking Taiwan by force.

Sherman was responding to remarks by China’s Ministry of National Defence, which warned on 11 March that anyone who interferes in realising the Communist Party of China’s (CPC) long standing goal of reunification with Taiwan would suffer the “worst consequences”.

“No one and no force can stop the historical trend that China will solve the Taiwan question and realise a complete national reunification,” Chinese Ministry of National Defence spokesperson Colonel Tan Kefei said.

The Chinese official, for his part, made the remarks to counter Australian Defence Minister Peter Dutton, who said in a recent interview that Canberra wasn’t ruling out arming Taiwan in the event of "an aggression" by Beijing.

Sherman reckoned during an interview with Fox News on Sunday that Beijing has some “tough decisions” to make in coming days, when asked whether she thought that Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine had strengthened or adversely affected its ties with Beijing.

“China has – the People’s Republic of China has often said that sovereignty is key, territorial integrity is key, that countries should decide their own political future. We agree with those principles. We hope that China does as well,” the US official claimed.

Sherman then speculated that Beijing has been “uncomfortable” with Russia’s actions in Ukraine. Further, she cited the Western countries’ response to Moscow’s operation, arguing that the “international order” that both the countries subscribed to no longer exists for Russia.

The US diplomat also said that Beijing’s rhetoric on Taiwan was being influenced by the West's response to the crisis in Ukraine.

“In fact, I think they made that statement.. because they’ve seen what’s happened and they’re trying to go on the offence knowing that they ought to be on the defence,” stated Sherman.

On 8 March, Chinese President Xi Jinping addressed a virtual summit with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron and German chancellor Olaf Scholz.

President Xi not only called for respecting the “territorial integrity” of all the sides but also said that “legitimate security concerns” of all the countries must be taken into account as far as the security crisis in Ukraine is concerned.

Beijing has also been critical of the eastward expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), which Foreign Minister Wang Yi has described as a “product of the Cold War”.

The “enlargement” of NATO beyond its present frontiers was also condemned by Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin in the joint statement released by the two leaders after their meeting held on the sidelines of the Beijing Winter Olympics last month.

Putin announced a special military operation aimed at demilitarisation and “de-nazification” of Ukraine on 24 February, two days after Moscow recognised the independent status of primarily Russian-speaking Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, both of them at war with Kiev authorities since 2014.

On Sunday, the Russian forces expanded their operation in the western part of Ukraine, taking out nearly 180 foreign mercenaries in a high-precision strike on two training facilities.

The Russian Defence Ministry has said that the foreign fighters were being trained by Ukrainian forces at the two centres, which lie close to the border with Poland.

Moscow says that Russian forces will immediately halt the military operations on four conditions: first, if Ukrainian forces stop fighting back; second, if Kiev enshrines a neutral status in its constitution; third, if Crimea is acknowledged as Russian territory; and fourth, if the two Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk are recognised as independent states.

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