Is the US dialling down its support for Taiwan? | Inside Story

Added: 2026-05-15

[00:00:00]Donald Trump calls his visit to China incredible and Xiinping says it was a landmark meeting. But the Chinese president's comments about Taiwan are raising concerns. Could a dispute over the territory lead to conflict between Beijing and Washington? This is Inside Story.

[00:00:31]Hello and welcome to the program. I'm Mouhammed Jhum. A year ago, US China relations reached one of their lowest points when Donald Trump announced his liberation day tariffs. The US president made some concessions when he met Xiinping a few months later. And the White House yielded more ground in the run-up to Trump's visit to Beijing. It suspended a 14 billion arm sale to Taiwan, which China claims as its sovereign territory. But that did not stop President Xi from calling Taiwan the single most important issue in relations with the US. So could differences over Taiwan put Washington and Beijing at odds as signaled by the Chinese leader? Will the US dial down its support for Taiwan? We'll raise these questions with our guest shortly.

[00:01:13]But first, this report by Imagin Kimber.

[00:01:16]>> Taiwan is the most important issue in US China relations. That's according to President Xi Jinping during the first state visit by a US president to Beijing in nearly a decade. The Chinese president made the comments during a two-hour meeting with Donald Trump.

[00:01:31]Taiwan is a self-governing nation, but it was occupied by China. Beijing says it must rejoin the mainland, and it doesn't rule out using force to make that happen. Besides talk of Taiwan, she emphasized the need for unity between Beijing and Washington.

[00:01:49]We both agree that the China US relationship is currently the most important bilateral relationship in the world today. Cooperation benefits both sides. While confrontation harms both, we should be partners not rivals.

[00:02:04]>> While US President Trump had nothing but praise for Shei, >> this has been an incredible visit. I think a lot of a lot of good has come of it. We've made some fantastic trade deals, great for both countries. Uh, he's a man I respect greatly.

[00:02:23]>> Apple CEO Tim Cook, Nvidia CEO Jensen Hang, and Elon Musk all joined Trump on the trip.

[00:02:29]>> It was marvelous. Thank you so much.

[00:02:31]It's so great to be back in China.

[00:02:33]>> On his way back to the US, President Trump said policy on Taiwan had not changed. Although he said he may or may not approve weapons for Taipei and he's made no commitment.

[00:02:45]>> And on Taiwan doesn't want to see a movement for independence. He says, "Look, you know, we've had it for thousands of years."

[00:02:54]>> The US has long said it will support Taiwan with weapons and ensure it can maintain self-defense.

[00:03:01]The US has looked to China for support in ending the war with Iran. China purchases up to 90% of Iran's oil, giving it significant influence. Some in Taiwan face uncertainty.

[00:03:15]>> People across the Taiwan Strait need peace. This requires the leader wisdom.

[00:03:19]As for America, it's not going to benefit us all if it keeps on telling people what to do. On one hand, it pressures us to buy weapons. And on the other, it plays a two-prong strategy with China.

[00:03:30]>> More meetings between the two leaders are reportedly planned. Xihinping says he wants to break the cycle of competition between great powers and replace it with unity. Whether that can be done and what it would mean for the rest of the world has the potential to shift the global balance of power beyond their borders. Imagining Kimber Al Jazer for Inside Story.

[00:03:55]>> All right, to dissect all this further, let's bring in our guests from Washington DC, Ali Wine. He's senior research and advocacy adviser for US China relations at the International Crisis Group. In Chiang Sha, China, Victor Gao, he's the vice president of the Center for China and Globalization.

[00:04:10]And in Taipei, Wenti Song, a non-resident fellow with the Atlantic Council's global China hub. A warm welcome to you all. Thanks for joining us today on Inside Story. Wenti, let me start with you today. As we heard in that report, at the start of this summit, Chinese President Xiinping made it clear that Taiwan is the most important issue in US China relations.

[00:04:30]After the summit, while on his way back to the US, President Trump said that the policy on Taiwan has not changed. But he also said he may or may not approve weapons for Taipei and that he's made no commitment. What do the words spoken and the language used by Trump and Xi signal to Taiwanese leadership at this stage?

[00:04:49]That's a lot to unpack right there. Uh I think of course what we expect kind of retreat to came out of uh President Xi from China. um a lot of continuity in substance some variation in style but basically the same message uh we're hearing from she is that Taiwan remains the reddest of all red line for China and that um for them Taiwan is basically the identity defining issue if you will for US China relations that from Chinese perspective US gets Taiwan right they are going to be friends and if alternately US gets Taiwan wrong then China may see itself sliding into adversarial territory with the US before you knew it. So that we are not too surprised about it. I think on the US reaction to it uh there seem to be I mean I guess Trump President Trump will be Trump he's going to be presenting the same kind of unpredictability we expect from him for years and uh he's no different this time around. So I think in terms of broader contours there's no real reason why US want to really change its position on Taiwan at this juncture because if you go if you think about Trump Trump is a businessman by nature and businessmen try to sell things high at a high price point and that means they would do it when US feels is in a good bargaining position visa v China but the reality is that US been finding itself once again getting stuck in a middle eastern quagmire of Iran over straight hormoons and other issues and so it's not quite in the best position to sell high if you will even if they want to sell high which is already a huge assumption so I think at this moment Taiwan is watching all this carefully of course but they are doing it with a degree of composure and indeed Taiwan's many affairs officials statement yesterday is any guide then so far from Taiwan's perspective they don't see any major surprises coming out of the meetings so far >> Victor Xiinping warned Donald Trump that missteps on Taiwan an could push their two countries into conflict. From your vantage point, how significant was that sort of laying down of the law in shaping the tone of the rest of the summit?

[00:07:02]>> Well, whenever we talk about the Taiwan issue, we should keep the Taiwan issue in historical perspective. First of all, Japan occupied it from 18 95 to uh 1945 and the carro declaration and the post proclamation dictated that Japan had to res surrender Taiwan back to China and under its unconditional surrender term, Japan did surrender Taiwan to China in 1945. So this has been carved in stone.

[00:07:34]No one should uh disagree with this.

[00:07:36]Secondly, there was a civil war in China uh which resulted in the founding of the people's republic of China in 1945. The fleeing from mainland China to Taiwan by the nationalist government, the KMT as we used to call it, the generalisimo chai-shek, which was to a very large extent an anti-Japanese aggression hero in China. So this is also a fact. Ever since 1949, Taiwan and China uh existed in kind of separation from each other. The nationalist government want to retake uh mainland China. China claimed to uh use force to reclaim Taiwan. So the two sides waited until the early 1980s to decide well you know such blatant threat to each other may not be the right thing. They started the process of rapong and over the decades rapong became more and more intensified to such an extent at any given moment there will be about 2 million people from Taiwan living working traveling studying marrying in mainland China and there have been half a million what we call mill bribes married into Taiwanese families. the two sides got closer and closer together. If there were no foreign intervention, if there was no kind of incentive given to the so-called separatists in Taiwan, the two sides may have already joined hands together. Now, you talked about the United States. Allow me to mention one thing. The United States recognized the Republic of China all the way till Dr. Harry Kissinger made that famous secret visit to China in 1971. Then President Nixon made the first state visit ever by a sitting US president to China. And then it took Ford and then up to uh President um um the next president to really uh establish diplomatic relations between China and mainland uh China and the United States. Now China raised the three preconditions before normalization could be achieved between China and the United States. One, to withdraw all the US troops from Taiwan. Very important.

[00:09:52]Secondly, to cancel US recognition of the Republic of China in Taiwan. Third, which was almost a mission impossible, to terminate the US Taiwan defense treaty. Now the United States were forced to satisfy each and all of these three preconditions before China and the United States normalized the diplomatic relations in 1979.

[00:10:18]So this is all the very important historical background. If anyone in Taiwan they are a separate independent country separate from China, they are indulging in fantasy. they will never be allowed to become an independent and sovereign country. And even if you assume the United States give the maximum support, Taiwan will still remain part of China. When President uh Trump says there will be no change in US policy regarding Taiwan, I'm so happy to say that.

[00:10:48]>> I'm sorry to interrupt. I need I need to get a question over to Ali. Let me let me get back to you about the point you're making in just a minute. But Alli, let me ask you from your perspective. Did did the US expect China to be so overt in these statements when it comes to Taiwan?

[00:11:05]>> I think so. China has telegraphed I mean even before the meeting between President Trump and President Xi. If you look at the conversation that had taken place prior uh between the secretary of state Marco Rubio and his counterpart Wangi uh the Wongi had conveyed in in similarly historic language that the brightest of red lines for China is uh would be Taiwanese independence. I think I would make a distinction in terms of what transpired at the summit. I would make a distinction between official sort of declaratory US policy and sort of informal you know policy. I think that the United States had telegraphed in advance of this meeting that there wouldn't be any change in official policy and indeed there hasn't been any official change in or change in in official US cross street policy. Um I think that if I were President Xi, you know, my strategy visa v President Trump would be to capitalize on President Trump's seeming disinterest in Taiwan security. President Trump views Taiwan or at least has viewed Taiwan mainly today through the lens of its chipmaking capacity. President Trump has said that Taiwan doesn't spend enough on defense.

[00:12:06]It has stolen America's semiconductor industry. Uh he has deputized his commerce secretary to try and onshore 40% of Taiwan's semiconductor production capacity to the United States by the end of Trump's second terms. So I think the presidency will try to capitalize on President Trump's seeming disinterest in Taiwan security. And I think that he will also try to to encourage President Trump to normalize to regularize actions that the president himself has already taken. To give a couple of examples, President Trump has said breaking with decades of US president, he has said that now he he and President Xi will negotiate future US arm sales to Taiwan. I think the president will encourage him to continue that. President Trump at a sensitive juncture in the US China relationship last year prevented a stopover across the United States by the Taiwanese President William Lie. I think the president she will encourage him to continue with that president. So even if the United States I think if I were in Taiwan, my concern would be less about changes in declaratory official US policy and more about informal accumulated steps that President Trump might take that privilege I think Beijing sensitivities over Taipe's concerns.

[00:13:12]>> Winty, I saw you're reacting to some of what Ally was saying there. So I'm going to give you a chance to jump in.

[00:13:19]>> Oh yeah, for sure. I mean um this meeting I think many expected beforehand to be primarily a business meeting where two side cut deal a little more than a geopolitical uh watershed moment where major huge changes watershed changes to declaratory policy will be made. So I think on that I definitely find a lot to agree with Alli just now and definitely that's one potential concern for many here which is the stuff that happened under the table like it doesn't need to be uh overt shift to official US policy and when it comes to how US position it is relationship with Taiwan or how it sees Taiwan's future but rather it can be something more subtle eg maybe some downgrade in diplomatic signaling for example in terms of US support for Taiwan maybe slowing down or delays of US arm sales to Taiwan as well as perhaps some shift or downgrading protocol in ter kind of um official or semiofficial or de facto official uh relationship between exchanges between US and Taiwan. I think these are matters that Taiwan are trying to monitor uh a lot and of course many in Taiwan find solace in the fact that um US state secretary Marco Rubio has a long-standing trajectory as a uh a rec track record rather as a friend of Taiwan who happened to be right now playing a huge position in the administration when it comes to foreign security policy including Taiwan.

[00:14:40]However, uh the concern is that Marubio may not be the only person who has President Trump's years. And if you judge him by the composition of President Trump delegation this time around with a huge number of business tycoons, uh you mass for example and many others that seem to be taking up the disproportionate amount of the air time and maybe ear with President Trump. So that's something that Taiwan is still trying to work out how to get into the go to the ears rather of President Trump and to make sure that Taiwan remains uh visible and remains on the forefront of um Washington's thinking about position in the Indo Pacific.

[00:15:20]>> Uh Ally, let me ask you a little bit about the optics uh that emerged from this uh visit from Trump to uh to China.

[00:15:30]the fact that she, you know, offered up such tough talk in front of Trump and that Trump didn't express displeasure.

[00:15:39]What does that say to you about the nature of the USChinese relationship right now? I mean, Trump is not known as someone who typically holds his tongue when he's confronted by behavior that he might usually consider to be an affront.

[00:15:53]Right.

[00:15:56]I Exactly. I think that your question gets to, at least to my way of thinking, one of the most important takeaways from the summit, maybe even the most important takeaway from the summit, which is President Trump now is dealing with a far more capable and confident China than the one that he saw when he made his first official state visit to China a little over or close to a decade ago, excuse me, in November of 2017. In November of 2017, I think that many observers would call China a rapidly resurgent emerging power, but few observers, if any, would classify China as being a near peer to the United States. The Chinese delegation in November 2017 expended a lot of diplomatic capital trying to persuade President Trump that President Xi was his geopolitical equal. What is striking this time around is that the Chinese delegation didn't have to make any such case because it was the president himself who acknowledged China's newfound centrality within the international system. Uh he he invoked this construct the G2. The G2 is essentially this idea that the United States and China as the world's two most powerful countries that they should even if informally but that they should regularly and intentionally coordinate to uphold international order. Uh the G2 is a construct that President Trump's predecessors had all swatted down because they didn't want to convey the impression that China was a near peer.

[00:17:12]So I think that if you're President Xi um the most significant win, albeit an intangible one, the most significant win for President Xi is that for the first time it is an American commander-in-chief of his own valition unprompted who has acknowledged that China has arrived as a near peer and thereby according recognition that it is long desired. Victor, what do you think will be the most important outcome of this state visit? What what would China be taking away as a a win or a success from this visit?

[00:17:45]>> Well, out of 10, I will give uh 9.99 uh to the success of this victory of the presidential state visit to China. Why?

[00:17:56]Several things. First of all, you may recall President Biden never paid a state visit to China during his four years of presidency. And this broke the tradition between China and the United States because ever since President Reagan, each of the sitting presidents of the United States will make a state visit to China. So Biden broke off that tradition and record. Now, President Trump through uh this state visit reconnected China and the United States through very important state visits. And the fact that he invited Chinese President Xiinping to visit the United States later this year shows the continuity of the very top level connections with each other. Now, so long as China and the United States can talk, especially at the very top level, the world should feel better and more at ease. Secondly, the President Trump did demonstrate his eagerness to be the chief salesperson of the United States to China. He wants to pedal as many products to China as possible. He brought about 17 major tycoons. Combined value of their stocks probably would account for more than 50% of the total market capitalization in the United States. So you are talking about very sizable very significant companies and I understand many of them are still uh staying in China uh engaged in uh company to company uh discussions with the Chinese counterparts. They want to invest more in China. They want to buy more from China. They want to sell more to China. This speaks loudly to the complete failure of the um disconnect between China and the United States. The uh de-risking strategy for example, all these things failed miserably. So I think uh the state visit by President Trump really ushered into China US relations a new era. Victor, let me let me let me follow up with something let me just let me ask you about something you're talking about because you know Donald Trump said that he'd struck fantastic trade deals while in China uh that were great for both countries but not a lot of details have emerged yet.

[00:20:09]Are we hearing any more from Chinese officials on that?

[00:20:15]>> Well, in China I can tell you the real truth. The demand for US-made goods and commodities is huge and China can easily be the most important market for anything made and produced and manufactured in the United States. So this is the very good news. The key is how to leverage off of a huge size and market potential in China. And allow me to emphasize trade need to be uh reciprocal. You cannot just expect to sell a maximum amount to China while blocking Chinese export to the United States. That means two countries, the two countries need to respect each other and engage with each other for the common good rather than maximizing pressure on China, blocking Chinese export on the one hand and expecting that they can sell massively into the Chinese market. I truly believe President Trump learned the lesson and he does not want to put maximum pressure on China because China will retaliate for quite a few months. China refused to buy any Boeing plane. China refused to take delivery of any soybean products and China refused to take up any of the LG products from the United States. Who suffered more? Both China and the United States suffered. I would say the United States suffered more than China. So rationality and sanity need to be restored for China and the United States to deal with each other as equal and respecting each other, helping each other whenever it is necessary so that the Americans can benefit from engaging with the largest market in the world.

[00:21:53]>> Alli, let me ask you about this. You heard Victor there talk about the fact that Donald Trump arrived to this summit accompanied by several CEOs. This was a highlevel business delegation that went along with Trump to China. Uh Trump's been talking about fantastic deals having been made. Do you think that this visit went the way that the US hoped it would when it came to business deals?

[00:22:17]>> Well, we'll certainly find out a lot more and as you said, I think that there are a lot of details that we we still don't know that details that I think will come to light in in the coming days and weeks. Um, but I think that I I would it it sends a significant signal about the sort of direction of travel about the Trump administration's China policy, which is is still emerging and and we still have, you know, more than two years left in the second Trump administration. So, his China policy will likely continue to evolve. I would say though that it represents, I think, a pretty sharp departure from the the orientation of China policy of both the first Trump administration and also the Biden administration. In both the first Trump administration and the Biden administration, there was an emphasis on on de-risisking. And the the argument that both the first Trump administration and the Biden administration had made made was that the US private sector for too long had undermined America's national security by privileging its bottom line over, you know, over the the national interest of the United States.

[00:23:11]I think that what the second Trump administration is doing is not only backing away from de-risisking but actually saying we want US companies these these major US technology companies to gain a greater exposure to China to gain a greater greater foothold in China. So I think that we're seeing a kind of reversal uh in in the orientation of China policy and I would just make one one point not only about President Trump's focus on the business aspects of the US China relationship but a broader point about his worldview. Uh, President Trump is is something of an iconic class in Washington when it comes to China policy. And I think that there are two views of his that make him especially uh, different, maybe even unique, singular in Washington. The first, he he seems to have a genuine affinity for President Xi. You saw the the praise that he used, the really quite ausive praise that he used to describe his Chinese counterpart when when the two leaders met in Beijing. And in that regard, he's quite iconic. The second way in which he's quite different from I would say virtually any other policy official in Washington is uh most others in Washington take a quite expansive view of strategic competition.

[00:24:12]I think that the president by contrast takes a rather narrow view. He has two long-standing grievances against China.

[00:24:18]One the size of China's trade surplus.

[00:24:20]Two China's export of fentinel precursors. But outside of those two grievances a lot of the other long-standing irritants in the US China relationship don't particularly animate him. So I would just just to summarize I would say one I think that the president is moving away from de-risisking. He wants US technology companies to expose themselves more embed themselves more in China's market and he also has I think a very iconoclastic view of China policy.

[00:24:43]Uh, Winty, I I want to ask you um if there is an anxiety or a fear in Taiwan that the US could over time soften its position on Taiwan in order to perhaps get more support from China, whether that's in relation to resolving issues with Iran or whether it's uh resolving issues when it comes to trade disputes.

[00:25:06]What is the level of concern in Taiwan when it comes to that?

[00:25:13]I think there's mixed feelings uh in Taiwan. Um there's to some extent a confidence that um relations between US and Taiw has been so long-standing that it's um that he has bipartisan support in the US especially on Capitol Hill that it's very hard to imagine any kind of a practical quote unquote abandonment of Taiwan by the US. I mean at this point it's pretty hard to imagine how that may look like in practical policy terms. So there's confidence in that. Uh there are however of course as always worries that in this US China Taiwan trilateral relationship obviously you had two huge superpowers alongside Taiwan itself. And at the meeting like this Trump C meeting recently for example this week uh there is a sense to quote one um Taiwanese official uh there is a sense that when Taiwan is not at the table there's always an inherent potential risk of Taiwan feeling like it just might be on the menu. So that fear that anxiety coexist uh just because the sheer differential in size into the more longer term though if you look forward I think Taiwan still finds that relationship between two sides between us and Taiwan at the people-to-people level at the cultural level at the shared similar liberal democratic value level these things in addition to technological and economic complimentarity of interest are what's going to sustain thing their interest and their cohesion as friends and partners for the longer host. So, not without concern, but there's confidence overall uh for the long term.

[00:26:49]>> All right. Well, we've run out of time, so we're going to have to leave the conversation there. Thanks so much to all of our guests, Ali Wine, Victor Gao, and Went Tong.

[00:26:58]And thank you too for watching. You can see the program again anytime by visiting our website.com.

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[00:27:11]Our handle is AJ inside. For now, that's it for me, Mhhammed Jam, and the whole team here. Alzer's coverage continues in a moment. Stay tuned.