China and Taiwan: Cross-Strait Relations Under Chen Shui-bian

7. Postscript

120 China and Taiwan: Cross-Strait Relations Under Chen Shui-bian© 2002 Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore This book focuses on cross-strait relations from early 2000 when Chen Shuibian won the presidential election in Taiwan up to August 2001 when the manuscript was submitted for publication. Events after that date have further proved the major arguments in the book. For instance, the 11 September 2001 terror attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon in the United States have demonstrated the prescience in my earlier analysis in the book of the eroding U.S. security surplus and its vulnerability to asymmetrical warfare by smaller powers and global terrorists. I said in the book that, nowadays, with the rapid advances in military technology, more and more medium and small countries, and even global terrorist groups have, or will have, more lethal but low-cost weapons that could threaten vital U.S. interests in the mainland in a potential asymmetrical warfare, without possessing and sending powerful naval and air fleets across the two oceans. Hence, instead of just with Canada and Mexico, the United States has suddenly “bordered” itself with many other countries in this increasingly globalized world, more and more unsure of where the threat would come from next. Its surplus security has thus been massively reduced to a lower level than even half a century ago despite having much more glaringly expensive weapons in its hands. The gap between America and other major powers is fast vanishing in terms of security surplus, if not in absolute terms of military weapons. This trend, if not reversed by a correct strategy, may eventually cost America its capability for world leadership. I also pointed out that together with the diminishing security surplus is the diminishing marginal strategic utility of America’s military strength that also contributes to the erosion of the U.S. security surplus. Therefore, to the United States, China is not the sole or even the most serious problem in the new century. The greater challenge will be a persistent, general and relative erosion of its power and security surplus, which will result from the massive and rapidly 7 Postscript Reproduced from China and Taiwan: Cross-Strait Relations Under Chen Shui-bian by Sheng Lijun (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2002). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition that copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies 121 Postscript© 2002 Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore growing cost of maintaining leadership in a world of increasing uncertainty and volatility, as demonstrated by the 11 September 2001 attacks. In this sense, the United States will not be fighting with a clear and specific state; it will have to fight an amorphous, invisible and, arguably, invincible enemy if it does not change the way it has been conducting itself so far. As I also said earlier in the book, the disparate threats that the United States faces in future will be fluid, multiple, and multidirectional. Therefore, the United States should enhance its moral ground, and seek political reconciliation with and closer co-operation from major powers, instead of resorting to unilateralism. It should also build regional and global security co-operation mechanisms, so that the cost and the danger will be reduced and shared among these mechanisms, and thus reduce the incentive and complicate the targeting for potential challengers, especially global terrorists. In these mechanisms, other major players should feel that they have more of a stake in co-operating than in obstructing. Thus, responsibility for order would devolve to other regional actors, although the United States would keep the de facto veto power. In this sense, the United States needs introspection and self-containment. Arrogance and unilateralism will inadvertently create festering resentment world-wide that may gang up and backfire. The Bush Administration’s labelling of Iran, Iraq and North Korea as the “axis of evil” and its contingency plans of early 2002 to develop and use nuclear weapons against at least seven countries (China, Russia, Iraq, North Korea, Iran, Libya and Syria) in certain battlefield situations, despite their strategic value, could be a letter on the wall: to reign by fear and unilateralism. I believe that the war on terrorism, just like other wars in history, cannot...