President Joe Biden said on Thursday that the United States would defend Taiwan if China ever attacked the democratically governed island. The White House quickly walked back his remark as analysts tried to discern whether Mr. Biden might have been signalling a change in Washington’s long-held policy of “strategic ambiguity” over the role the U.S. would play in the event of a military conflict between China and Taiwan.
“Yes, we have a commitment,” the president declared after being asked during a CNN Town Hall in Baltimore, Maryland whether the U.S. would defend Taiwan in the face of an attack by China.
“China, Russia and the rest of the world know we have the most powerful military in the history of the world,” Mr. Biden said. “Don’t worry about whether they [China] are going to be more powerful. What you do have to worry about is whether or not they’re going to engage in activities that will put them in a position where they may make a serious mistake.”
The chances of such a mistake have been rising. This month alone, China sent a record 149 military aircraft into Taiwan’s air defense zone.
Chinese President Xi Jinping said anyone advocating for Taiwan’s independence would be “condemned to history,” while reiterating calls for peaceful unification of Taiwan with China this year — the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Chinese Communist Party.
Beijing has never ruled out the use of military force to unify China with Taiwan, which has been governed independently since Chinese nationalists fled to the island after their loss to the Communists in the 1949 Chinese civil war.
The White House quickly sought to clarify Biden’s remarks, insisting that there had been no change in official U.S. policy on Taiwan.
The Taiwan Relations Act, ratified by the U.S. Congress in 1979, states: “The United States will make available to Taiwan such defense articles and defense services in such quantity as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability.”
Over the summer, the Biden administration approved an arms sale package worth $750 million to Taiwan, continuing a four-decade tradition of both Democratic and Republican administrations. The Taiwan Relations Act does not directly state the U.S. is obligated to “defend” Taiwan if China ever attacks, however.
