All at (sixes and) sevens and eights: Taiwan policy

Jan 18, 2025
Young Chinese man looks at Taiwan strait from Mainland China with binoculars at Hulishan fort, Xiamen, China. Contributor: Germán Vogel / Alamy Stock Photo Image ID: 2A9TX78

The fate of the world may well rest on Taiwan but our policy is at sixes and sevens, or rather, according to recent statements in the Australian press, at sevens and eights.

Rowan Callick, a highly regarded commentator on Chinese affairs has an opinion piece published in The Australian on 2 January 2025 that lists eight “common misunderstandings” about Taiwan. It is titled, “Taiwan’s fate can’t rest on the ignorance of well-meaning friends”. China guru Geremie Barme has helpfully republished it in China Heritage.

Callick’s Eight Misunderstandings can be summarised:

  1. There is little evidence that Taiwan has belonged to China since ancient times.
  2. The Australian government does not accept that Taiwan is part of the People’s Republic of China.
  3. Taiwan lacks sovereignty.
  4. The formal name “Republic of China (ROC) does not imply that Taiwan maintains a link with China
  5. Taiwanese people are inextricably part of the PRC
  6. Australia should follow the PRC’s one-China principle.
  7. The UN General Assembly resolution 2758 (1971) disbars Taiwan from any role in the UN.
  8. Australian companies may risk business relations with the PRC if they trade with or invest in Taiwan.

None of these are true, Callick says.

Ambassador for the People’s Republic of China, Xiao Qian, responded to Callick in an article in the Australian Financial Review also published on this website. It is titled “Seven truths on why Taiwan will always be China’s”.

I summarise these Seven Truths:

  1. There is evidence that Taiwan has been an inalienable part of China since ancient times, including the indigenous people of the island, although full political reunification has not been achieved.
  2. The international community recognises Taiwan as an inalienable part of China, as evidenced by the Cairo Declaration (1943) and the Potsdam Proclamation (1945), which stipulated that Japan return all territories taken from China, including Taiwan.
  3. UN resolution 2758 (1971) stated that the PRC government was the sole legal government representing the whole of China and affirmed that there was only one seat for China.
  4. Although the Taiwan question arose from China’s Civil War, discussions about reunification had been peaceful, with productive dialogue until 2016.
  5. Resolving this question is an internal matter for China and the Chinese people.
  6. There is popular support for reunification in mainland China and in Taiwan.
  7. The One China Principle is foundational in Australia-China relations. The 1972 Joint Communique stated that Canberra recognised the government of the People’s Republic of China as the sole legal government of China and acknowledged the position of the Chinese government that Taiwan was a province of the People’s Republic of China.

These Seven Misunderstandings and Eight Truths follow a predictable pattern of numbered statements on mainland-Taiwan relations. Ye Jianying, Chairman of China’s National People’s Congress, set out Nine Points in 1961. In 1995 President Jiang Zemin made it Eight, Hu Jintao reduced it to Four in 2005 and then revised that to Six in 2009. On the Taiwan side, in 2006 President Chen Shui-bian had Four Key Aims: sovereignty, democracy, peace and parity, which were also adopted later by Tsai Ying-wen; and in 2007 Ma Ying-jeou proposed Three Noes: no unification, no independence and no use of force.

The new Seven and Eight seem impossible to reconcile. Misunderstanding and lack of dialogue can quickly lead to war and war over Taiwan is likely to escalate into global, possibly nuclear conflict. It is therefore critical to assess these arguments and decide what our Taiwan policy should be.

Kerry Brown, Director of the Lau Institute at Kings College London provides some sage advice in his new book The Taiwan Story: How a Small Island will Dictate the Global Future. He has the good sense not to engage in numbered lists that mask the complexity of his argument for maintaining strategic ambiguity in order to preserve the stalemate in mainland-Taiwan relations that has prevailed for 76 years.

Brown outlines Taiwan’s longstanding connections with mainland China and its complex relations with the Dutch and other Europeans, Japan and other countries and cultures. He notes that the Qing Dynasty conquered Taiwan in 1683 more by accident than design. In recent decades the country has become markedly multicultural and relations with the US have developed rapidly. He sets out how public opinion has changed over the decades to the present stage when the majority of residents say they are Taiwanese not Chinese and do not want unification.

China’s thinking regarding Taiwan has also evolved. While unification is a key element of patriotic propaganda, as the country has grown richer and more powerful, leaders are less inclined to wait for resolution. Brown does not see any room for compromise, but notes that neither side are likely to force matters to come to a head. He is much more concerned that a US president might decide to teach China a lesson by recognising Taiwan sovereignty.

It seems that strategic ambiguity is our only hope, and further, that the key to the future of Taiwan and world peace is in Washington not Beijing or Taipei.

Which brings me to the title of this piece, “All at Sixes and Sevens”. The origin of this strange expression has been much debated. It goes back centuries. Shakespeare put it in the mouth of the Duke of York in Richard the Second, when he spoke of the chaotic political situation, “But time will not permit; all is uneven. And every thing is left at six and seven.” As for me, I can’t help thinking of the Rolling Stones “Tumbling Dice”:

Always in a hurry, I never stop to worry.
Don’t see the time flashing by.
Honey, got no money,

I’m all sixes and sevens and nines.

Say now, baby, I’m the rank outsider.

You can be my partner in crime.

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