【Text by Observer Net Columnist Chen Feng】
The U.S. think tank RAND recently released a long report titled "Stabilizing U.S.-China Competition," proposing that the U.S. government conditionally support "gradual unification," clearly stating "rejecting support for Taiwan independence, permanent separation, or opposition to peaceful unification," discarding zero-sum thinking to avoid a full-scale military conflict between the U.S. and China.
RAND's policy report may not reflect the U.S. government's thinking, but it has always had a decisive impact. As early as 2015, in its report "U.S.-China Military Balance Card," it proposed that the U.S. military could no longer hold an advantage in the Taiwan Strait and should shift focus to the South China Sea, increasing overall military pressure on China while influencing the situation in the Taiwan Strait from the flank. In the following decade, the U.S. Navy continuously strengthened its military presence in the South China Sea under the guise of "freedom of navigation," and now the U.S. Army is heavily returning to the Philippines, which is the realization of this strategic proposal.
Will RAND's new proposal become the baseline of the U.S. policy toward Taiwan in the coming years?
RAND's specific measures are:
1. Strengthen crisis management: Rebuild high-level communication channels between the U.S. and China, establish "rules of engagement" for crises in the Taiwan Strait, covering cyber, space, and conventional military domains.
2. Demonstrate restraint: Both sides self-limit capabilities aimed at undermining each other's defense posture, with the U.S. avoiding excessive arms sales to Taiwan and China reducing missile deployments, maintaining a "existential deterrence" balance, and through third parties (United Nations or ASEAN) to monitor and verify.
3. Extend cooperation: Use the stability of the Taiwan Strait as a foundation for broader U.S.-China cooperation, thereby reducing risks and alleviating China's "survival anxiety."
4. From easy to difficult: Start with low-sensitivity issues, such as managing fishing disputes, then handle medium- to high-difficulty issues, such as patrol regulations for Kinmen and Matsu, establishing behavioral rules through agreements or informal "understandings."
It must be said that RAND's proposal is feasible, but it ignores the essence of the Taiwan Strait issue: the Taiwan Strait is a legacy of the unresolved Chinese Civil War, not an international relations issue. The reason the Taiwan Strait has become part of U.S.-China relations is because the U.S. insists on intervening in the Taiwan Strait.
Taiwan is a key outpost for the U.S. in the Western Pacific. If the U.S. controls Taiwan, it can lock down mainland China, control Japan, and block the Soviet-Russia southern route. Taiwan can serve as a strategic foothold for the U.S., or as a strategic buffer. At the end of World War II, the U.S. had the idea of controlling Taiwan through "international trusteeship," and eventually "settled for less," handing over Taiwan to the pro-American Kuomintang regime, but Okinawa remained under "international trusteeship" until 1972, when Okinawa's sovereignty was "returned" to Japan.
May 2025, the U.S. and the Philippines held joint military exercises called "Shoulder to Shoulder," with Japan participating substantially. Japanese Ministry of Defense
In the Cold War era, the U.S. sought to use China to counter the Soviet Union, and also recognized the importance of China as the world's most populous country and a nuclear power, normalizing relations with China, but did not "abandon" Taiwan, leaving behind the so-called "Taiwan Relations Act" and "Six Assurances" as a contingency, with "strategic ambiguity" becoming the tone of U.S. policy toward the Taiwan Strait.
However, "strategic ambiguity" was phased. From the normalization of U.S.-China relations to the early stage of reform and opening up, the U.S. had hopes of "peaceful evolution," and "strategic ambiguity" was only an implicit hint. After the Vietnam War, the U.S. withdrew forces from Asia-Pacific and refocused on Europe, objectively reducing pressure on China.
Entering the 21st century, "peaceful evolution" became impossible, and U.S. hostility toward China gradually increased, with Taiwan becoming a pawn to contain China's rise, and "strategic ambiguity" turned into increasingly explicit threats. The U.S. not only increased arms sales to Taiwan but also strengthened military posturing in the South China Sea.
But this is also an era of China's rise. China's military modernization made it unlikely for the U.S. to have any chance of intervening in a Taiwan Strait conflict, and the cost of U.S. intervention in the Taiwan Strait far exceeded the benefits, leading to a loss of U.S. credibility if it did not respond to the Taiwan Strait conflict. "Strategic ambiguity" evolved into "strategic embarrassment."
RAND did not mention the broader economic and political aspects. Trade wars represented by tariffs and trade restrictions, technological wars represented by advanced chip embargoes and restrictions on technological exchanges, political encirclement represented by AUKUS and QUAD, and media suppression represented by various baseless smear campaigns and distortions, the U.S. has continually unleashed previously unthinkable nuclear options in the U.S.-China confrontation, effectively initiating a "slow-motion nuclear strike," during which the U.S. has also exhausted its arsenal against China.
Unfortunately, the U.S.'s maximum pressure has not achieved its goals, and China's strength has instead grown逆势. China's trade continues to grow, and its focus on the Global South has actually opened up a blue ocean. The speed, intensity, depth, and breadth of China's technological development are unprecedented in history, and it is increasingly leading the forefront in more fields; breakthroughs in "traditional bottlenecks" like advanced chips and precision instruments are remarkable, and China's ability to make "the crown jewel" cheaply has left the U.S. and Europe trembling.
The U.S.'s political encirclement is also unraveling. Australia and India have "seen the situation," and Japan and South Korea will continue to fluctuate, but the baseline is also moving toward "seeing the situation." The Western media face the dilemma of "a collapse of perception about China," as years of baseless smear campaigns and distortions face the moment of being fact-checked, with the tone even shifting to "why can China do it, we cannot."
China has been growing against the tide of confrontation, proving the unstoppable nature of its rise to the U.S. and the world, and actually "nuclear disarmament" for the U.S. Nuclear weapons are most useful when they are on the launch pad, and this applies to "nuclear options" in politics and economics as well.
In other words, the U.S. has "no way" regarding the Taiwan Strait. RAND's proposal is to avoid the U.S.'s "strategic embarrassment," and rather than proposing support for "gradual unification," it is more like offering strategies for a "dignified withdrawal."
But this is not China's problem.
The Taiwan Strait issue is China's internal affair. There is no space for internationalization of the Taiwan Strait issue, and there is no issue of the U.S. and China establishing "rules of engagement" for the Taiwan Strait. China's position on the rules of the Taiwan Strait has always been clear: peaceful unification is the top priority, and "Taiwan independence" will be met with force.
The Taiwan Strait also has no issue of "existential deterrence" balance, let alone third-party (United Nations or ASEAN) monitoring and verification. China wants to boldly establish overwhelming superiority in the Taiwan Strait. Military unification is the backing of peaceful unification, and if the other side can be persuaded to see the reality, it is best. If the other side dares to act recklessly, the earth will shake and the mountains will tremble.
May 1982, Deng Xiaoping met with then-U.S. Vice President George H.W. Bush; three months later, the U.S. and China issued the "August 17 Communiqué."
Regarding the U.S. avoiding "excessive arms sales" to Taiwan, in the U.S.-China "August 17 Communiqué" signed on August 17, 1982, the U.S. pledged:
1. The performance and quantity of weapons sold to Taiwan would not exceed the level supplied during the initial years after the establishment of diplomatic relations between the U.S. and China;
2. The U.S. is prepared to gradually reduce its arms sales to Taiwan;
3. The issue of U.S. arms sales to Taiwan will be resolved after a period of time.
Over the past 30 years, U.S. arms sales to Taiwan have long exceeded "excess," and have become even more "excessive." China cannot continue to expect the U.S. to keep its promises. It can even be said that since the normalization of U.S.-China relations, the biggest cognitive understanding of China about the U.S. is: the U.S. needs commitments, but the U.S. commitments are not reliable.
One of the purposes of China's military modernization is to ensure that U.S. "excessive arms sales" are useless, and the September 3rd military parade fully demonstrated that China has already achieved this.
According to reports by Taiwanese media, the founder of the new U.S. defense company Anduril, Palmer Latch, recently stated that China might take action against Taiwan in 2027, and he opposed the U.S. intervening in the war, advocating that Taiwan should be turned into a "super porcupine." This idea is very cruel.
If there is no direct U.S. military intervention in Taiwan, Taiwan cannot possibly withstand the thunderous power of the PLA, which is a widely recognized fact. The U.S. realizes that it is about to "lose Taiwan," and wants to squeeze as much profit as possible from Taiwan before the last "opportunity window," which is predictable. Latch and others, driven by political reaction and greed of the arms industry, the U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Kolbe's request for the authorities in Taiwan to increase their military spending to 10% of GDP is the same intention, as the main portion of the growth will be used to purchase weapons from the U.S.
There are two issues here:
1. Taiwan cannot satisfy the U.S.'s appetite.
2. The U.S. has no useful weapons to sell to Taiwan.
In the 2026 budget, the authorities in Taiwan raised their military spending to 3.32% of GDP and promised to meet NATO standards by 2030, reaching 5%, equivalent to 42% of public expenditure, which is unsustainable in peacetime.
Increasing public expenditure to GDP ratio seems to increase military spending space. Public expenditure in Taiwan accounts for about 19% of GDP. If it is increased to 23% of GDP while keeping the military spending ratio of public expenditure unchanged, it can raise the military spending ratio of GDP to 4%; further increasing it to above 29% is required to raise military spending to 5% of GDP.
Israel and Japan have public expenditure ratios of 39-40%. Israel has been in a state of war or quasi-war for a long time, and with U.S. aid subsidies, it can endure, and it can afford it; Japan's debt-to-GDP ratio exceeds 230%, and interest expenses account for 24.5% of government spending, which is still under ultra-low interest rates. Germany reached 50%, France reached as high as 57%, and the burden of high taxes on Germany and France's economy and society is obvious to everyone, and no one wants to follow in their footsteps.
Public expenditure is similar to family expenditure. Both small and large families have fixed expenditures, which do not increase proportionally with family size; small families have a higher proportion of fixed expenditures, but large families not only have a smaller proportion of fixed expenditures, but can also reallocate and borrow funds according to changes in priority. Compared to this, public facilities operations, welfare, etc., are fixed expenditures for the government, while military spending and infrastructure, scientific research and development are active expenditures.
To expand public expenditure, Taiwan needs to greatly increase tax revenue, which would be a major shock to its political and economic ecology. Such fiscal fragility is unacceptable in the "international orphan" dilemma.
The U.S. no longer has "useful" weapons to sell to Taiwan. There was a time when the Taiwanese military was enthusiastic about obtaining M1A2T tanks, but now they have obtained them and found they are completely useless. When the M1A2T has the opportunity to come out, the war on the island has already reached close combat, and it's almost over. At that time, the M1A2T becomes the target of the PLA's attack helicopters, armed helicopters, long-range fire, flying bombs, and anti-tank missiles, and even the 96th, 99th, and 100th tanks may not get the chance to engage in direct confrontation.
The Taiwanese military once eagerly sought F-35B, believing that stealth and advanced weapon systems could rebuild air superiority, and the ability to take off from a highway runway could effectively avoid the vulnerability of fixed airport runways. However, the J-20 is absolutely superior in quantity to any number of F-35Bs that Taiwan may obtain, and in performance, it is even more superior. In the East China Sea, the F-35A of the U.S. Air Force has been observed riding the neck of the J-20. Satellites, high-altitude drones, early warning aircraft, and missiles, long-range fire, and attack helicopters ensure that any highway runway can be used at most once, never again. The sixth-generation and beyond six-generation aircraft make the F-35B meaningless.
The Taiwanese military's obsession with submarines has also become a half-cooked dish. This is considered "self-made" in Taiwan, but the combat system and weapons all come from the U.S. Submarines can hide underwater, attack to threaten mainland coastal cities, and defend to intercept landing convoys. However, the sea trial of the "Haikun" submarine not only delayed, but after three sea trials, it still hasn't reached the submergence test, and when it will be delivered remains a mystery. The construction funding for the remaining seven submarines cannot be unfrozen before the "Haikun" submarine completes testing and is put into service. But even without these issues, the PLA's AIP submarines have a greater advantage in quantity and performance than the "Haikun" class, and more advanced large, long-range unmanned submersibles have already entered service, making the "Haikun" class meaningless.
June 17, 2025, the first domestically built submarine "Haikun" of Taiwan conducted its first sea trial.
Note that the sea trial and delivery of the "Haikun" submarine are only for testing basic watertightness and navigation, and are far from combat system testing. In fact, the combat system has not yet been delivered, and currently, the system is temporarily installed using a "borrowed" system, and when the formal product combat system is delivered, it will be replaced, and whether retesting of watertightness and system integrity and connectivity will be needed is unknown. The construction funding for the remaining seven submarines cannot be unfrozen before the "Haikun" submarine completes testing and is put into service. But even without these issues, the PLA's AIP submarines have a greater advantage in quantity and performance than the "Haikun" class, and more advanced large, long-range unmanned submersibles have already entered service, making the "Haikun" class meaningless.
Taiwan also wants to build a "T Dome," thinking that the fragments of Israeli "Iron Dome" and American "Gold Dome" technology are enough to create a "Golden Bell" to resist PLA missiles.
The challenge of "Iron Dome" lies in the need for quick eyes and hands, and its advantage is that the enemy's launch positions are largely known, and the rocket's trajectory is predictable, with a slower ascent speed. The challenge of "Gold Dome" lies in the incoming missiles' speed, height, and trajectory complexity being orders of magnitude higher than Hamas rockets, and its advantage is that the enemy's launch positions are mostly far from the U.S., providing relatively ample space for detection and response.
Taiwan's problems are bigger. The mainland is too close to Taiwan, the mainland is too vast, and the PLA has too many, too diverse, and too advanced missiles, ranging from short-range to long-range. Even if the U.S. and Israel loosen their grip, "Iron Dome + Gold Dome" is just the starting point, but Taiwan won't reach the end. Taiwan lacks the technology, financial resources, and territory to develop and deploy such a "Golden Bell." The recent exposure of the "Strong Bow" anti-missile system revealed technological backwardness, showing the fragility of Taiwan's defense industry, which is fundamentally incapable of serving as the basis for "T Dome."
Israeli interception of Iranian missiles in实战 shows that even the success rate and ammunition consumption of U.S.-Israeli advanced missiles cannot meet the requirements of the Taiwan Strait campaign, and even if all of the U.S. and Israeli "Thaad," "Patriot," "David's Sling," and "Arrow" missile inventories were given to Taiwan, it would still be insufficient, not to mention whether they are effective or not.
Taiwan's "Han Guang Exercises" have long focused on "decisive battle overseas," later changed to "coastal battle," and now include "urban battle." But everyone knows that there is no "urban battle" in the Taiwan Strait war. Once it reaches this stage, the war has essentially been completed, and the possibility of a "super porcupine" does not exist.
The PLA's strength is no longer a steel spear, but a jet bulldozer. Latch and others just want to sacrifice Taiwan to bleed the mainland, creating an opportunity for the U.S. But the reality is that Taiwan is just a speed bump, a fast flat one. The PLA's strength gap with Taiwan is too large, and Taiwan will be flattened, with the mainland feeling only a slight bump on the road.
Taiwan wants to shed the heavy burden of military spending and focus on development and construction. Unification is the best opportunity. After unification, the defense of the Taiwan region will be handled by the central government. Even if it needs to contribute its share, China's military spending as a percentage of GDP is only 1.5%.
Everyone who has been to Taiwan knows that the income and living standards of ordinary Taiwanese people do not match the proclaimed per capita GDP of $33,400. Taiwan needs to catch up on livelihood and infrastructure, and therefore cannot fall into the trap of U.S. "excessive arms sales."
A public group in Taiwan holds a rally opposing the authorities' military purchases from the U.S.
RAND proposes that the stability of the Taiwan Strait serves as the basis for broader U.S.-China cooperation, which is problematic. The stability of the Taiwan Strait is not sufficient to serve as the basis for broader U.S.-China cooperation, because the Taiwan Strait is the most sensitive issue in U.S.-China relations. A war in the Taiwan Strait could lead to a U.S.-China war, but peace in the Taiwan Strait does not necessarily lead to a U.S.-China G2. The Taiwan Strait is neither the entire U.S.-China relationship nor the core issue of the U.S.-China relationship. The core issue of U.S.-China relations lies in "China's rise vs. U.S. hegemony."
The purpose of China's rise is to improve itself, improve people's livelihood, and improve its international status, not to challenge the Pax Americana. China's rise is too big and strong, becoming an elephant in a porcelain shop. Even if it doesn't want to rearrange the room, every move will cause the porcelain in the room to rattle and even fall. The U.S., as the "owner" of the porcelain shop, inevitably wants to resist such "overbearing behavior."
China's idea is that the Pacific is vast enough to accommodate both the U.S. and China, and China's goal is not to replace the U.S., but to build a community with a shared future for humanity. But the U.S.'s ideas are not something China can decide.
China has never relied on the U.S. to alleviate its "survival anxiety," always relying on its own strength. China has initially completed the rise of manufacturing and is now promoting the rise of science and technology. China's rise is essentially economic, and political influence and military strength are necessary conditions based on economic rise. Sustainable, high-quality economic development is the fundamental way to resolve the "survival anxiety" of the Chinese people, not the U.S. granting a reduction in tensions in the Taiwan Strait.
As for the fisheries administration and Kinmen-Matsu maritime patrols, these specific administrative-level management issues can be handled by local authorities, and there is no need to elevate them to the framework of U.S.-China relations.
In short, the four points of RAND's measures are only superficially feasible, but do not touch the root. However, if it objectively leads to the U.S. reducing its actions in the Taiwan Strait and promoting the gradual unification of Taiwan, China has no reason to refuse.
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